Final Transit

September 2006, from the [tag]Gavdevi[/tag] Temple at Bhopar Village on the outskirts of my hometown, [tag]Dombivli[/tag]

Dombivli or [tag]Dombivali[/tag] is a suburb of Mumbai on the Central line. It has a population of about 1,193,000 (2001 census, provisional results). It is the first fully literate town in Maharashtra and the second in India. Dombivli is a predominantly Marathi speaking middle class city….

Sunset behind the Parsik hill where the [tag]Mumbra[/tag] devi temple is located. In a few minutes the path to the temple should be illuminated, and it looks like a bright serpant on the hill.

The blue-white [tag]Diva - Vasai[/tag] shuttle:

Finally, a goods train chugging silently:

The main [tag]Mumbai[/tag] suburban rail tracks are not visible in these pictures.

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On the way to Niagara Falls from Toronto is the [tag]Welland Canal[/tag]. It is a man made construction that connects [tag]Lake Ontario[/tag] and [tag]Lake Erie[/tag]. Lake Erie is about 100 meters above lake Ontario and guess what this canal does…. it lifts the ships up! awesome, isn’t it? Canadian Encyclopedia describes it as follows:

The Welland Canal is a navigational canal 43.5 km long, crossing the Niagara Peninsula of southwestern Ontario from Port Weller on Lake Ontario to Port Colborne on Lake Erie. It overcomes a height difference of 99.4 m between the 2 lakes and bypasses the turbulent Niagara River and [tag]Niagara Falls[/tag].

The [tag]ships[/tag] pass thru a series of ‘locks’ or gates that slowly raise their height. I was at lock 3, which has the St. Catharines Museum and plenty of space to watch the action:


View of QEW from Lock 3:


Queen Elizabeth Way. (Freeway that connect Buffalo, New York, USA and the Niagara Peninsula with Toronto and its western suburbs):


As the ship approaches, a bridge over a local road opens:


Gates open to let the ship enter:


Ship enters the lock:


Water is pumped into the lock to “lift” the ship up:


CSL Assiniboine. Its a beautiful ship. (notice the level):


Finally, the ship is elevated:

Children were screaming and cheering the rising ship while the crew members happily waved back at them. I have heard that sometimes crew members from foreign ships toss a few foreign currency coins at children, its worth the fun.
This large ship was going upstream, but we also saw two small sailboats going downstream.
Finally, if you are still clueless about how the whole thing works, see the little animation (source)

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Pictures from my little trip to [tag]Waterloo[/tag]. This place is right outside the University of Waterloo.

Temperatures here have been hovering around 25-30 degree C for past few days. It’s quite hot and sticky. Plus the UV index here is higher than that in Mumbai. So I get a sunburn instantly. The cold winter was brutal, nevertheless, I miss [tag]snow[/tag]…

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Picture from my weekend visit to [tag]Niagara Falls[/tag].



It was taken at 20:10, sometime after sunset.

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Artwork in Accolade East building which houses the faculty of Fine Arts, [tag]York University[/tag], Toronto.



Another picture here

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