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I'm uploading this summer's photos to onedrive for posterity and thought I'd make a destination post about Singer Castle in the 1,000 islands region of the St. Lawrence River, located between Mallorytown Landing ON and Chipewa Bay, NY.

It's worth a visit. The tours are guided only, and you are not allowed to roam the grounds unless you are with one of the docents. There's a small gift shop with a couple of snacks but no food or ice.

Castle view from the dock:


It's located on the American side of the river, so Canadians will have to use the CBP Roam app to self-report to US customs, or check in physically at customs on Heart Island across from Alexandria Bay, NY. The CBP roam app is excellent, and we usually receive an email approval within 20 minutes of applying. It may help that the entire family are NEXUS members.

Rear view of the castle from the grounds:


Docking is on the south side of the island, but it's a high concrete dock which is a step up from the cockpit gunwhales. The downstream end of the dock is reserved for commercial tour boats. There are dockhands who will take your lines. The boat may take a beating from passing motorboats, though, so depending on when you go you may want to try docking on the inside of the dock: it's narrow in there, and hard to maneuver, but it should be feasible. We have always stayed on the outside, and have a nice bend in the starboard stanchion assembly because of it.

From the third or fourth floor:



The castle is full of usable secret passages. You're not supposed to explore them unless you stay the night. The price for an overnight stay for 6 people was under $1k including a meal and full access to all the grounds.

The secret passages were used by the castle staff to be able to clean and serve guests without being seen. Kinda cool.


The entrances to the passages were operated by secret methods: coat-hooks and magnets and stuff like that. One secret passage overlooks the main dining room so that the servants could see what was needed and magically bring it to the guests.

The castle more or less in its original, functional state, with the original library, suits of armor, and sewing machines all over the place.

If anyone is interested, I can post more, or do the same for Boldt castle or Alexandria Bay...just let me know.

Very neat I was unaware of the destination great pics so far! Interested in more!

Nice shots.

So, what's the story about the fella who owned it? Where did he make his money?

Very cool.

So you can just dock there.

Admission charge?

What a neat spot! Thanks for posting! I'd love to see more if it's not too much trouble.

The 1,000 Islands area is very unique and even more incredible if you have your own boat like Starscream. Singer castle was one of the "summer homes" of the ultra rich Singer family famous for creating the line of sewing machines back in the day. I haven't been there, but I've been to Boldt Castle and Heart Island. These are "summer homes" bigger than any mansion you've seen and were partially occupied by the robber barons of the time. Just the "boat house" at Boldt Castle is bigger than any house I know of and the Castle is 10x as big. Open to the public. Worth going. Even if you don't have a boat, you can take the ferry.

Present day 1,000 Islands isn't far off. Going around the area by boat I've seen some of the biggest modern mansions in my life, mostly flying Canadian flags I'd estimate I've seen some modern boathouse out there, ornately constructed, that were easily 5,000sq/ft and the mansion(s) above them vastly larger. Again, probably summer homes.

The seafloor(?) Often shoals in unusual places too so local knowledge is critical and MANY boat crash on the shoals out there from time to time. Plus there is a significant current out to sea. VERY unique area!

NiceAft wrote: ↑Wed Nov 30, 2022 3:42 pm Nice shots.

So, what's the story about the fella who owned it? Where did he make his money?

From memory, the original owners were the Bourne family, and somewhere along the line one of the Bourne's was the president of the Singer Sewing Machine company, which gave the castle its current name. I'm not sure where the original fortune was made, but that was one rich family. They occupied the castle up until the 60's, where it was sold for a ridiculously small sum. It passed through a couple of hands, but is now owned by a European person who owns multiple castle sites throughout the world, and operates them for profit. In the gift shop there were photos of some of the other propertires owned by this person, who was never named throughout the tour.

For a family of 5, admission was something like $50. Not crazy, at all. When a tour boat shows up, though, easily 200 people can show up all at once, and tour boat arrivals are pretty constant, although not nearly as crazy as they are at Boldt Castle. The staff does a pretty good job of partitioning them off and taking the groups separately through the castle. If you're lucky, you can get a private tour, but the timing has to be perfect.

The island that the castle is located on is sometimes called Jorstadt Island and sometimes it's Dark Island. The castle has been known as "The Towers", "Jorstadt Castle" "Dark Towers", and "Singer Castle" at one time or another.

Nice pics my friend. We visited the 1000 islands this past summer but stayed at the west end. We have been by Singer but it was always full so just went on past. Would like to see your pics of Boldt also.
Richard

Starscream wrote: ↑Thu Dec 01, 2022 9:57 am

NiceAft wrote: ↑Wed Nov 30, 2022 3:42 pm Nice shots.

So, what's the story about the fella who owned it? Where did he make his money?

From memory, the original owners were the Bourne family, and somewhere along the line one of the Bourne's was the president of the Singer Sewing Machine company, which gave the castle its current name. I'm not sure where the original fortune was made, but that was one rich family. They occupied the castle up until the 60's, where it was sold for a ridiculously small sum. It passed through a couple of hands, but is now owned by a European person who owns multiple castle sites throughout the world, and operates them for profit. In the gift shop there were photos of some of the other propertires owned by this person, who was never named throughout the tour.

For a family of 5, admission was something like $50. Not crazy, at all. When a tour boat shows up, though, easily 200 people can show up all at once, and tour boat arrivals are pretty constant, although not nearly as crazy as they are at Boldt Castle. The staff does a pretty good job of partitioning them off and taking the groups separately through the castle. If you're lucky, you can get a private tour, but the timing has to be perfect.

The island that the castle is located on is sometimes called Jorstadt Island and sometimes it's Dark Island. The castle has been known as "The Towers", "Jorstadt Castle" "Dark Towers", and "Singer Castle" at one time or another.

Good talk, thanks.

Boldt Castle is absolutely amazing. It's very touristed, but if you arrive early on a weekday, it really isn't so bad. At Boldt Castle, you are allowed to roam freely throughout the castle and grounds, but of course some of the furnished rooms are partitioned off so that they can be viewed, but not touched.

It's located on Heart Island, just across the commercial channel from Alexandria Bay, NY. Alex-Bay, as it's known, is worth a stop as well. It's a small town with an active tourist strip, and tons of relatively cheap, sheltered, public docking on the main pier. The A-Bay public docks have bathrooms, but no other services. There are at least two marinas located at the public docks that have pumpout, fuel, and parts.

On Heart Island, there's a fairly large dock available for private visitors. Deeper-draft vessels should stay on the outside, while smaller, easily maneuverable boats can get on the inside of the docks. The docks are on the north side of the island, not visible from the main channel. There is plenty of depth all around the island for a circumnavigation.

Here is a photo of the docks on Heart Island. Again, you can take a beating at these docks because almost everyone just blasts by at full throttle, slamming parked boats up against the dock:


There's a US customs office located on Heart Island, located a few steps to the right of the photo above. Canadians, don't forget to check in using CBP Roam or by visiting the office on the island.

When roaming the grounds, remember that there are Canada Geese all over the place, and they poo, all over the place. The photo below looks idyllic, like you'd like to lie on the grass and take the sun, but take my word for it: don't. This was taken a few years ago, when our boys were little, but you can see that at least one is looking out for bird poo.


The castle is the main attraction of course, but there are several outbuildings and beautiful grounds to explore. As someone said above, there's also a yacht-house located on Wellesley Island, accessible from the mainland by road or from the castle via pontoon-boat tour, for an extra charge. We've never visited the Yacht-House.

Here is the approach from downstream, in the main channel (boat heading west-ish). Alexandria Bay is on the mainland to the left of the photo, and you can see the yacht-house (the right-most building in the photo) located on Wellesley Island tucked in behind Heart Island.



The odd structure on the left side of Heart Island is called the playhouse, and houses a full bowling alley (under re-construction). The river-level building on the right side of Heart Island is the old Power-House. If you are approaching from this angle, head towards the yacht-house from here so that you pass the power house on your port side. Keep your distance from Heart Island as you approach the power house, as the big tourist boats dock just behind the power house. You pass through a channel that starts at the power-house, and goes between Heart Island and the little rocky island on the right of the photo. The docks are just through this channel. Public docks are just past the tourist boat docks, almost on the other side of the island from where this photo is taken.

Rick Steves has nothing on you Starscream

Just an aside, which is your preferred pronunciation, Stars Cream or Star Scream

NiceAft wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 8:18 am Rick Steves has nothing on you Starscream

Just an aside, which is your preferred pronunciation, Stars Cream or Star Scream

Was a username quickly chosen for its transformative implication, before I owned the boat.