Lockport Locks & Erie Canal Cruises

The owners of Lockport Locks & Erie Canal Cruises provided some interesting information when we purchased our ticket.

DURING 2009

More than 50,000 guests representing all 500 states and 18 countries visited Lockport Locks and Erie Canal Cruises.

Lockview V, and Lockview IV completed 1,250 cruises through Locks 34 & 35. More than 3,200 other vessels cruised past our buildings.

More than 10,000 cars a day pass Market Street building.

Lockport Locks & Erie Canal Cruises appeared on The History Channel's Modern Marvels, The Discovery Channel, The Travel Channel [and] Filmed by National Geographic.

DID YOU KNOW ?

You can still travel the Erie Canal from the Niagara River to the Hudson River. It takes about 7 days.

Before the Canal was completed in 1825, travel between Albany and what is now Buffalo took 7 weeks.

The Niagara River provides the water to this Canal section....

OUR STORY

Twenty-three years ago, Mike and Sharon Murphy started Lockport Canal Tours with two pontoon boats and a dream. Today, the business, now called Lockport Locks & Erie Canal Cruises, Inc., has blossomed into Lockport's most popular tourist attraction. With the acquisition of their property located at 210 Market St., in Lockport, the company can also boast having Western New York's most unique banquet/meeting facility.

The main building, originally built in the 1840's has been renovated to resemble an 1800's Canal town. With over 100 windows overlooking the historic Erie Canal, the Canalside (open year-round) houses banquet and meeting space for over 200, a Cafe, gift shop and outdoor landscaped picnic area with 100 foot shelter to accommodate 300. The original stone walls are the remains of what was once Niagara Preserving Company, one of the first companies to effectively preserve food in metal containers. The property was also at one time Western Block Company, a business that manufactured block and tackle for pulleys used on canal boats. Many of these artifacts can still be found throughout the spacious building....

Lockport Locks & Erie Canal Cruises' historic two-hour narrated cruise (May-November) give its passengers an opportunity to "Experience Life in the Past Lane," by showing them five of the original 1800's locks, and actually locking through Locks 34 & 35, the only double set of locks on the Erie Canal. Other highlights of the trip include passage under Lockport's "Upside Down Bridge," Lockport's "Big Bridge" (the widest bridge in the U.S. at 399 feet wide), through the "rock cut" and underneath lift bridges. The historic narration by the Coast Guard Licensed Captains is also accompanied by crowd-pleasing canal music, popular during the 1800's.

Your cruise will be aboard Coast Guard inspected vessels: Lockview IV, a 55-passenger motor vessel built to resemble the African Queen, provided tours in Hilton Head and Mystic Seaport... before her service in Lockport. {Or} Lockview V, a 150-passenger double-deck motor vessel built for the Great Lakes, previously provided tours in Florida and Booth Bay Harbor, Maine.

Local history is still very alive at Lockport Locks & Erie Canal Cruises, and has been experienced by over 1/2 million people since its inception. For more information, please call toll-free at 1-800-378-0352, or visit our web site at http://www.lockportlocks.com . This is a must see attraction!