Sunday was another morning of waking up, immediately checking the weather forecast and then deciding what to do. And it was another day of opting to travel early to avoid afternoon storms. Before leaving Whitehall, we went to see the resurrected hull of the USS Ticonderoga, an 1812 sloop in the American Navy that was salvaged from the bottom of Lake Champlain in 1958 and is now on display.
We departed Whitehall and immediately went through Lock 12, our last on the Champlain Canal, and entered Lake Champlain. Sometimes called “The Sixth Great Lake,” it is 107 miles long and 14 miles at its widest point. Named for Samuel de Champlain, who first explored here in 1609, it is renowned for its natural beauty and so far has not disappointed. The southern part of the lake is more like a river, with swampy and marshy banks, mostly wild but sprinkled with a cottage here and there. The Adirondack Mountains are on our left and the Green Mountains of Vermont are starting to appear on our right. Birds are everywhere, and we regularly spot kingfishers, cormorants, heron, gulls, terns, eagles and osprey, which love to nest in the navigation markers.
We traveled 19 miles with a moderate tailwind and following seas, to Chipman Point Marina in Orwell, our first stop in Vermont. This family-run outfit has a super laid-back vibe and we really enjoyed our stay here, despite the motion on the docks from wind, waves and wakes. There was a severe thunderstorm warning and a brief tornado watch, which ended up being nothing more than several waves of rain showers. We dared not walk into the town, three miles away, and did laundry, played games, ate dinner onboard and went to bed early. Map Link: Chipman Point, VT
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