CSS Acadia at sunrise

The blog has been on a bit of a hiatus for the summer with everything else I had going on, but now that we are back into autumn and reduced travel, I can get this started again.

After heading back to the office a few days a week, I get to enjoy my morning ferry and waterfront commute again, at least for a while. With sunrise well timed for my walk past the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic this morning, I was rewarded with these views of retired survey vessel CSS Acadia on the waterfront with the rising sun behind her.

The winter cover has been reinstated, allowing the rising sun to provide a nice glow over the deck. At the same time, the smooth water allows for a nice silhouette of the ship's reflection.

The images can be found here: https://smcclearn.smugmug.com/Nautical/Ships/

Hopefully the nice weather continues well into fall, to keep my morning walk as pleasant as possible.

Lunenburg Waterfront

I had heard that a schooner was being launched this past Sunday, and figuring that they would launch on the high tide, I headed over to see if I could photograph the launch. Unfortunately, I was too late, but there were still some picturesque scenes for me to capture.

David Westergard continues to build schooners in the historic Smith & Rhuland shed on the Lunenburg waterfront.

The launching ways lead into the water from the old Smith & Rhuland shed.

A more modern version of the traditional fishing dory.

The schooner whose launch I missed on Sunday, already tied up at a nearby wharf.

Further along the waterfront, other boats prepare to take to the water. Wooden boats often need to allow their planking to swell up at the beginning of a season, and to prevent them from sinking, they often need to sit on the shore while this occurs. This may be what was happening here. 

Not all the boats in Lunenburg were sitting alongside or on the shore - the tour boat in the background was taking passengers around the harbour.

It started out overcast, but the sky cleared and provided some beautiful light on the waterfront.

Floating Boardwalk Installation

With construction of the new Queen's Marque development going full bore between the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic and the Cable Wharf, a portion of the Halifax waterfront boardwalk is no longer available for pedestrians looking to walk the waterfront and see the sights (and avoid the bottleneck that is Lower Water Street in summer). 

Waterfront Development has therefore been working on a solution to bridge the gap, and a new temporary floating boardwalk runs from the south side of Cable Wharf to the wharf where CSS Acadia is berthed. 

The new floating boardwalk stretches south from the Cable Wharf to a point just forward of CSS Acadia.

A row of steel piles provides lateral anchorage for the connected boardwalk sections, and they slide up and down these piles with the tide. Gangways at each end ramp down to the boardwalk, and provide accessible access for everyone to enjoy this new waterfront feature, regardless of the water level. I haven't tried the boardwalk during inclement weather, and I wouldn't be surprised it is closed altogether if the wind and waves don't cooperated, but I was pleasantly surprised at how stable it was.

Local contractor Waterworks used their base in Woodside as a staging area, from which the boardwalk floats were put in the water and towed to Halifax. The floats were also used to provide a free ride to the piles required to hold the whole thing in place.

A boardwalk float is towed from the staging area.

The float and "tug" seemed awful small in the middle of the harbour, especially with Maasdam as a backdrop.

Construction started at the Cable Wharf end, and continued south to the Maritime Museum. 

The pile driver sits on the shore side of the floating boardwalk, driving piles from north to south. On the left is the imaginatively named "Pontoon 1", which is the former Woodside Ferry Terminal float (minus its superstructure). Waterworks replaced this pontoon in 2014 with a new concrete version, and evidently kept the old steel one for themselves.

The boardwalk sections are held together by bolted steel connections, and the gap between each float is bridged with a hinged metal connection.

The two connectors are visible on either side of the raft.

Railing posts were installed on shore, but the in-fill between each post was added once everything was in place.

The public making use of the completed floating boardwalk.

Another view of the completed project.

Once complete, the Waterworks pile driver and barge Commdive II were towed back to Woodside.

Commdive II under tow of a small Dominion Diving tug, and Waterworks I following along behind - presumably used for steering.

The floating boardwalk will remain in place for the summer months, and will be dismantled for the winter. Presumably the steel piles will remain in place, but I'm guessing. The boardwalk is open during the day, but appears to be closing around dusk each evening, so it isn't open around the clock.

Sailing Yacht "Louise"

The sailing yacht Louise has been on the waterfront in front of the museum for the last week or so, and so here are the inevitable reflection photographs.

For those interested in the actual yacht, I will start with these:

SACKVILLE arrives on the Halifax Waterfront

HMCS SACKVILLE transited from the Dockyard to her berth on the Halifax Waterfront in front of the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic this morning. I had hoped to tag along for the ride, but couldn't make it over in time. My fallback position was to take photos from the ferry as she left the Dockyard, but the timing didn't work, so I grabbed a few photos from the pier instead.

Although the tugs left her side briefly in order to switch sides from port to starboard, this occurred when SACKVILLE was behind Cable Wharf from my location, and I didn't catch it. It is therefore nice to catch an angle such as the following images where the tugs do not appear.

In a few of the images, I managed to avoid having both the tugs and Cable Wharf show up in the background.

As SACKVILLE came alongside, I got to try for images of the crew throwing the lines ashore.

SACKVILLE won't formally open to the public for a few weeks, although she will be open by appointment until then. 

Photos this week: October 1-7

I will start with the weekend, during which I managed to pop over to Lunenburg to see the sights there. This sailboat was sitting in her cradle next to the old Smith & Rhuland shed, which appears in the background.

I also caught up with the Blue Dream Project schooner, now named Mahayana, which was launched this summer and is being completed alongside a wharf in front of the old Smith & Rhuland shed where she was built.

Mahayana alongside a Lunenburg Wharf, with the Smith & Rhuland shed in the background.

The work week started out a bit rainy, and Monday was a bit of a loss for photos, however Tuesday was sunny again and made up for it with HMCS ST. JOHN'S getting her feet wet again after a maintenance period on the Syncrolift. The speed of the process took me by surprise a bit, in that I took too long getting my camera out to capture her with the keel blocks still showing.

HMCS ST. JOHN'S being lowered back into the water.

HMCS ST. JOHN'S being lowered back into the water.

By the end of the day when I returned to Dartmouth on the ferry, ST. JOHN'S was once again alongside one of the jetties.

Speaking of frigates on the Syncrolift, I should share a view of VILLE DE QUEBEC on the lift some years ago, from a slightly different (and more impressive) viewing angle.

VILLE DE QUEBEC on the Syncrolift. I don't remember how I got close enough to get this angle.

Wednesday brought with it a terrific fog that replicated the sea smoke that one normally expects in the dead of winter with temperatures of -17 Celsius or so. I turned around just at the right time to see HMCS VILLE DE QUEBEC sneaking out of the fog bank.

HMCS VILLE DE QUEBEC.

HMCS VILLE DE QUEBEC. Look carefully for the RHIB to the left of the photo.

Silhouetted against the rising sun and casting shadows in the fog, VILLE DE QUEBEC continued up the harbour and went to anchor.

VILLE DE QUEBEC at anchor.

Around the same time that morning, I captured an image I am calling "Last of the Old Guard": ATHABASKAN and PRESERVER are the only two HMC warships remaining to have been commissioned into the RCN before 1992 (I am being careful to specify warships here, because sail training vessel HMCS ORIOLE was commissioned in the 1950s), when the namesake ships of the HALIFAX class commissioned.

Last of the Old Guard: HMC Ships ATHABASKAN and PRESERVER. Despite the fog hiding the background, the sun is cutting through and illuminating both ships - a lucky catch!

Although a jetty queen and unable to go to sea due to corrosion issues in the hull, PRESERVER is nevertheless still in commission, but is due to be paid off on October 21, 2016. She has been used for alongside refueling in recent years. ATHABASKAN is scheduled to follow her in Spring 2017, the last of the IROQUOIS class destroyers to leave service.

From Cable Wharf I managed to get this shot of the Woodside Ferry heading to Dartmouth with the sun burning its way through the fog and cloud.

Sun, ferry, & fog. The sun is reminding me of the moon in this shot for some reason.

A day or two later, the sun cooperated for me and I caught it shining through the gun shield on HMCS SACKVILLE. 

HMCS SACKVILLE.

Cruise ship traffic continued unabated this week, with a total of five visiting on Friday, of which I only managed to photograph three.

Seven Seas Mariner appearing from behind George's Island.

Serenade of the Seas, Seven Seas Mariner, and Caribbean Princess.

Serenade of the Seas and Seven Seas Mariner.

Happy Thanksgiving Weekend, everyone!