After two nights at Button Bay waiting for word about the Champlain Canal and when all the locks would be open, we departed on Sunday, September 11, 2011 heading south after learning that lock C-12 at Whitehall (the northern most lock at the south end of Lake Champlain) had opened for transit. Locks C-4 through C-1 (at the south end of the canal) remain closed. As the Notice To Mariners (NOTAMS) states it:

Mariners are advised that the Champlain Canal from Lock C-1 (Waterford) to Lock C-4 (Schagticoke/Hempstreet Park) remains closed due to high water levels until further notice.

The forecast included winds from the south gusting to 20 mph and with our full exposure to southerly winds in Button Bay, we wanted to find a place to anchor further south that would provide some protection. We identified a potential anchorage at Five Mile Point, but couldn’t find any information about that location; nonetheless, we decided to give it a try after concluding that there weren’t any other possible anchorages that provided protection from southerly winds. We left Button Bay at 1030, and at 1340 the anchor was down in about 9 feet of water just north of Five Mile Point on the west (New York) side of Lake Champlain. The wind subsided, never reaching 20 mph, and we spent a quiet night there.

This morning we departed Five Mile Point at 0735 in order to get the 30 miles to the start of the Champlain Canal around noon. Since the canal has some low bridges, we lowered the mast while underway and it now sits in a “crutch” on the back deck; with the mast down our “air draft” is a little less than 15 1/2 feet, so we will be able to clear all of the fixed bridges on the Champlain Canal. By 1200 we had exited lock C-12 at Whitehall and were in the Champlain Canal heading south. We stopped for the day at 1515 on the south west side of lock C-9, a nice, quiet spot in a park-like setting. We are the only boat on the long wall.

Weather tomorrow is forecast to be windy with the temperature in the high 70s. We have to do a little engine work to trouble-shoot an overheating issue that came up today, and then we’ll move a little further south to lock C-7 and Fort Edward. A friend from Fort Edward, Fred Wehner (who has been helping a lot of boaters get through this area with all the flooding), drove up to see us tonight and to report that there should be plenty of room for us at the Fort Edward Yacht Basin.

Cruising to date: 477H50M – 2973.2 SM

Judy arrived from Kansas after a long, frustrating day flying from Wichita to Boston via Dallas, only to find that Colgan Air (a contract airline for USAir and Continental) “couldn’t find a crew” to fly from Boston Logan to Plattsburg on the evening of September 5th. Due to Colgan’s poor reputation for flights in and out of Plattsburgh (we learned too late) she didn’t want to take a chance that the first flight the next morning would have a crew and certainly didn’t want to spend the night in the airport (after being told that USAir would not put her up in a hotel for the night). She rented a car from Hertz for a one-way dropoff in Plattsburgh and drove about 240 miles through the beautiful mountains of New Hampshire and Vermont heading northwest in rain and fog most of the way, took the ferry across Lake Champlain at Gordon Landing, and arrived (in rain) at the Plattsburgh Boat Basin about 0100 on the 6th! It was a terrible experience for her and a lesson for both of us: don’t ever trust Colgan Air!

Since we had a rental car for the remainder of the day on Wednesday we did some major reprovisioning at Hannaford’s (a great supermarket chain, BTW) and got Sanderling ready to depart the marina the next day.

We departed the Plattsburgh Boat Basin on Wednesday, September 7th and after pumping out the holding tanks arrived at Shelburne Shipyard about 1425 that same day. We had arranged with the shipyard to install a new shaft saver when we were at the yard several weeks earlier, and at 0745 on Thursday (September 8th) morning John came aboard with a new shaft saver and had it installed in short order. We then topped off the water tanks, took on 100 gallons of fuel, and departed at 1105 heading south on the lake.

We stopped for the day a few hours later at Mile Bay where we wanted to visit the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum (http://www.lcmm.org/). We took a mooring belonging to the Basin Harbor Club (a resort fronting on the next small bay to the south) http://www.basinharbor.com/. After getting the boat secured, we lowered the dinghy and tied to the small dock where the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum has some of its boats, walked up the hill to the museum to ask how to get to the Basin Harbor Club’s dock master’s office, then walked a mile or so to the office, paid our $20.00 for the night’s use of the mooring, and went back to Sanderling for the rest of the day.

On Friday, September 9th, we went ashore again, this time to visit the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum. What a great place to learn about the history of Lake Champlain, the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. The exhibits start with the history of the area with a major emphasis on the contact of cultures in 1609 and Samuel de Champlain “The Father of New France,” a French navigator, cartographer, draughtsman, soldier, explorer, geographer, ethnologist, diplomat, and chronicler. He founded New France and Quebec City on July 3, 1608. There is an exhibit of the 1902 ice yacht Storm King and a collection of dugout and bark canoes, kayaks, rowing skiffs and other small watercraft; the story of the Revolutionary War in the Champlain Valley; an exhibit featuring steamboats, lighthouses, early powerboats, engines and outboard motors; a nautical archeology center where work is underway to preserve artifacts and the 300 shipwrecks in Lake Champlain; a blacksmith shop; an active youth boatbuilding and outdoor education program; and an exhibit of photographs taken by local amateur and professional photographers. One of the things we learned that impressed both of us is that Benedict Arnold wasn’t just a traitor; he played a major role fighting for the revolutionaries in the war on Lake Champlain. After touring the LCMM we had a late lunch at the Red Mill Restaurant (part of the Basin Harbor Club) and then headed back to Sanderling.

(Pictures to follow)

We departed Mile Bay and the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum at 1505, September 9th. The NOAA weather forecast from Burlington, Vermont, predicted winds from the west gusting to 25 mph early the next morning and Mile Bay and our mooring were fully exposed to wind from any direction except the south and east. A very congenial fellow at the 1776 gunboat replica of Philadelphia II suggested several bays on the western shore of the lake, but when we checked them they were either too small and deep, or provided little protection. We ended up in the bay we had originally identified as a good spot, Button Bay, just south of Mile Bay on the eastern shore and fully protected from any northerly winds. As it turned out, the 25 mph gusts did not materialize (consistent with non-NOAA forecasts).

The lower locks and the northern-most lock of the Champlain Canal remain closed today due to high water (the lake level is still three feet above “normal”), so we’re going to stay here in Button Bay for at least another day. No rain is forecast until next week, so perhaps the lake level will lower a bit and the canal can reopen to traffic. We’d like to get heading south, but for the time being we are unable to leave Lake Champlain. Not a bad place to be, but it’s starting to get chilly up here in the north.

Wind is blowing 15-20 from the south today, almost as much as when we were anchored at Nichols Point last week. The marina, despite the breakwater which extends to the southern side, and Sanderling are rockin’ and rollin’ almost as much as our anchorage when we had 25-30 mph winds! At least I can get off the boat by walking along the docks that are rolling and pitching – sea legs are definitely required.

I’ve just uploaded to our Picasa web site a few photos I took of a catamaran that was damaged when tropical storm Irene passed over Vermont a few days ago. Our blog dated August 29th has some information about how we spent TS Irene at anchor. The photos were taken August 31st the day after we arrived at the marina.

Here’s the link to the photos of the catamaran: http://tinyurl.com/3kb6lmx
The photos are the last 8 photos on the page (other photos are a mix from our current cruise).

The catamaran is a 42 foot Venezia with a beam of around 24 feet. She was on a mooring at the Plattsburgh Boat Basin when Irene blew through. People I talked with who witnessed the event said that a total of four boats (all sail) broke their mooring pendants and were blown onto the breakwater which protects the marina and the mooring field. Unfortunately, the breakwater does not provide wind protection from the north, and that is where the strongest winds came from during Irene’s passing. I understand that the owner’s pendant broke during the height of the storm, as occurred with two of the other boats that went adrift; on the 4th boat, the marina’s pendant parted. A fifth boat pulled it’s mooring (1500+ pound blocks of concrete) through the mooring field (carefully avoiding other moored boats) before the owner, who was aboard, cut the line and motored into a slip on the south side of the marina. A crew of marina personnel (there was a hurricane party taking place during the storm) went out in a small boat during the storm, pulled the floundering boats from the breakwater and got them into the marina.

The cat is still sitting where she was placed when removed from the water, and I haven’t noticed any activity regarding removal of equipment or repairs.

The water level on Lake Champlain at Plattsburg has risen about 1.5 feet since Irene; all of that extra water is creating havoc throughout the region. There was little damage to boats in the marina itself, and minimal damage to the marina. Marina employees have been working the past couple of days to lengthen the chains holding each dock section in place; many sections were listing as a result of chain that was too short to permit the dock to float level at the surface with the increased water height.

Judy is currently in Kansas for her mother’s 90th birthday and I’m here in Plattsburgh taking care of the cats and Sanderling. We’ll start heading south after Judy returns early next week; hopefully the Champlain Canal will be open to the Hudson River by then.

 When we departed Plattsburgh we went into a very well protected anchorage in Hibbard Bay (north side of The Gut) on Saturday about noon and worked to get the anchor set well in all the weeds. After two attempts and waiting several hours for it to work its way into the mud below the weeds, we felt it was well set. The 50 MPH gusts we experienced during Irene’s passing proved us correct.

Here’s a photo of the sunset on Saturday night before Irene’s arrival:

By midnight last night the barometer had started to climb (reached a low of 28.9 inches from the high at 0700 yesterday morning of 29.5) and the base-line winds were dropping to about 20 (from a high of 27/28 during the peak). These figures are all based on our own barometers and wind gauge, so may not coincide with NOAA figures.

This is how the handheld GPS looked after Tropical Storm Irene had passed. Notice how the “blob” creates an arc. This was scribed as the wind shifted from the NE to the N and finally to the NW as TS Irene passed by to the east of us. The arc is created almost exactly 150 feet from the location of the anchor!

This morning the sky is clear and the sun is shining. Three of the four other boats in the bay have already left; only a single small sailboat remains.

We’ll stay here for the remainder of the day and tonight, then tomorrow (August 30th) we’ll move to a marina at Plattsburgh where we have a reservation for a week while Judy flies to Kansas for her mother’s 90th birthday.

On Tuesday the 30th we weighed anchor and moved to the Plattsburgh Boat Basin where Sanderling, the cats, and Bob will stay for a week. Here’s a photo of the anchor chain and weeds/grass as we raised anchor preparing to depart. It’s not an easy task getting rid of all the vegetation which gets wrapped around and interwoven in the chain.

Next post: a 42 foot catamaran is damaged in the storm and is removed to dry land for repairs.

We returned to the USA on Saturday, August 20th and anchored that night. On Sunday we cruised to Shelburne’s Shipyard on the Vermont side of the lake just south of Burlington. This morning the yard fixed the problem that had been causing the noise under the hull; turned out to be a Spurs line cutter part that had come loose and fallen off. Had to remove the remaining parts of the Spurs and won’t be able to replace them until we have the boat hauled again next spring. Also discovered another problem and Shelburne’s is ordering the necessary part and will replace it before we leave the lake in a couple of weeks. In the process they realigned the engine and shaft.

All is going well. Tonight we’re anchored in a small bay (along with a dozen other boats – mostly sail) in a small bay south of Shelburne Shipyard.

On Tuesday, August 23rd, we cruised a short distance north to Burlington to the temporary dock at the Boathouse Marina, went ashore for a short time to buy a few groceries and had lunch at the restaurant at the marina. We then departed and headed north past Plattsburgh to anchor in a small bay at Nichols Point on the Vermont side of the lake. We were planning on cruising southeast to Plattsburgh on Wednesday, the 24th where we had hoped to meet some relatives for a couple of days of cruising, but high winds on the lake (gusting to 30 MPH) forced us to turn around after about 30 minutes and return to the anchorage. The forecast for Thursday isn’t any better; in fact, it may be worse with winds forecast to be gusting to 35 MPH. So our plans are on hold right now while we’re sitting at anchor in this small bay along with 6-7 other boats, most of which came in this morning after we had already been out and turned around. 

By Thursday night the winds are forecast to die down, so hopefully we will be able to meet up in Plattsburgh on Friday morning and still have a day of cruising this beautiful area.

Here are a few pictures from our time in the anchorage, showing:

This is the track laid down by our handheld GPS during the high winds from the south while we were in the anchorage. North is up. The lower “blob” shows how we moved back and forth, side to side, in the wind with 100 feet of scope out; when the winds were forecast to increase, we added an additional 50 feet of chain and our position moved 50 feet to the north, shown by the upper “blob.” This photo was taken on the morning of the 25th of August.

Compare these tracks to the tracks on the same GPS when we were treated to tropical storm Irene’s winds (in the next blog post).

This beautiful double rainbow showed up evening of the 25th. It stretched from this location in the water, to directly alongside Sanderling on the other end of the rainbow. (We didn’t even find a golden anchor.)

A short time later, we had this beautiful sunset, sailboat and all:

On the 26th we crossed the lake to Plattsburgh where we met Caroline and Melissa at the town dock, after getting the holding tanks pumped out at the Plattsburgh Boat Basin. We crossed the lake, heading by the anchorage where we’d just spent the past several days, thru “The Gut” and then the draw bridge on the eastern side of The Gut, to St. Albans Bay where we spent the rest of the afternoon and evening talking and catching up on our families. Judy and I spent some time going over the charts looking for “hurricane holes” where we could wait out whatever Hurricane Irene was going to throw at us.

On the 27th, with Irene looming large on the horizon for the Lake Champlain valley and amid warnings from NOAA to prepare for near hurricane force winds, we motored back to Plattsburgh and said goodbye to Caroline and Melissa (they were driving to Chicago), and headed out to find a place that we felt would be safe from Irene’s wrath.

We chose to motor back to The Gut and stay in a small area, Hibbard Bay, on its north side during Irene’s passing. Turns out it was a good decision.

See our next post for more details on dealing with Irene.

After departing Montreal at 0955 on August 12, 2011, we headed downstream on the St. Lawrence River and anchored for the night off the main river channel at Contrecoeur – a nice, protected spot. About midway to Contrecoeur our Canadian SD data card for our Garmin chartplotter stopped loading the Canadian charts, so we relied on our navigation laptop and paper charts to guide us around the buoys and into the channel where we were anchoring. Nothing brought the Garmin Canadian charts back to life; something similar had happened several times in the past, but we were always able to get the charts to display after restarting the chartplotter. Fortunately, once we get down the Richelieu Canal north of Lake Champlain the pre-loaded charts will kick in again and we won’t have to rely on the SD card charts.

We departed the anchorage on August 13th and a couple of hours later were tied to a temporary dock at Marina de Sorel in Sorel-Tracey, near where the Richelieu Canal meets the St. Lawrence River. As we approached Sorel there were a number of large freighters anchored in the river, apparently waiting for pilots to come aboard to help them proceed upstream from Sorel. Since we’ve been in the marina, there have been freighters coming and going from the anchorages every day. We moved to our “permanent” transient dock about 1145 after Judy had picked up our rental car and the dock cleared of boats that were due to depart. Later in the day a beautiful 1933 power boat 65 feet in length came in and took the space in front of us; the boat was the Dolphin built here in Sorel and beautifully maintained.

We rented a car in Sorel and spent Sunday (August 14th) in Quebec City. It’s a beautiful place to visit, and we’ll definitely have to come back to spend more time and see more of the sights. Basically we took two walking tours (around the Old City and through the Citadel) and walked by ourselves just to enjoy the ambience of the old city. The old city was very crowded with tourists. Restaurants were packed in the lower city (along the river), as well as just to the west of the city wall along a row of restaurants outside of the wall. Despite a forecast including 70% chance of rain, the temperature stayed in the mid-70s and the rain didn’t materialize until our drive back to Sorel.

We decided to stay an extra day at the marina to do some laundry, turn in the rental car, buy more spider spray, and wait for sunny weather on Tuesday (August 16th) to start the trip south on the Richelieu. Spider spray? Have I mentioned that with all the docks we’ve been “moored” to this summer the boat is accumulating spiders faster than we can kill them! We’ve found that washing the boat doesn’t really remove them (perhaps they hide somewhere out of the way of the wash), but spider spray does a good job of killing them. So, we needed more spray and Judy found some at the Canadian Tire store (really more like a Home Depot than a tire store) here in Sorel when she drove to turn in the rental car this morning.

Totals for cruise: 420H20M – 2627.0SM

We departed Bellevue at 0730 in order to allow most of the day for the passage through the St. Lawrence Seaway locks. We had been told that pleasure boats may have to wait up to 3-4 hours at each lock, and there was no option but to get to Montreal at the end of the 37 mile day!

As it turned out, the passage through the first lock was delayed only by freighters passing through, one directly in front of us and others heading upstream which we passed before and after entering the first lock. The Great Lakes freighter John D. Leitch turned into the canal leading to the first lock just before us (coming down river) and had to slow considerably to permit to upbound freighters to pass in the straight stretches of the canal. After the John D. Leitch started to enter the lock, we tied up at the pleasure boat dock, bought our $25.00 pass for the first lock, and waited until the John D. Leitch cleared the lock going downstream and another freighter cleared heading upstream.

By 1420 we were at the second lock and by 1610 we had completed the day’s trip to the Port d’Escale Marina in Montreal. The last several miles were against the 6 MPH current on the St. Lawrence River after it had cascaded down the rapids we bypassed on the Seaway. Since we make only 7.3 MPH under the best of circumstances, we were making only 1.4 MPH over the ground heading to the marina. About 1/4 mile before the quay where the marina is located, we passed through the current and entered still water, then turned into the basin and into the marina. The staff spoke passable English (70% of the population in Montreal speaks French) and directed us to the dock where we would be located for the next few days; another young hand was on the dock to help us with our lines.

Now we’re sightseeing in Montreal, and a beautiful city it is. The first full day (August 9, 2011) we took the Metro to the Botanical Garden, and today we walked through the old city visiting the Archeological Museum, the Notre Dame Bassilica, and the Notre Dame chapel and a few other spots along the way. Tomorrow we’re heading back out toward the Botanical Garden to visit the Olympic Stadium (1972) and Biosphere and inclined tower. A Canadian friend and his family are arriving by boat tomorrow and we’re planning on dinner out with them tomorrow night before we depart on Friday heading to Sorell.

August 7, 2011

A quick post to bring you up to date since we departed Ottawa.

We tied to the lower wall at St A de Bellevue this morning after anchoring last night in a little bay just west of the lock. We departed Ottawa on Wednesday and after descending the eight locks into the Ottawa River anchored about 6 miles downstream at Little Duck Island. Thursday night we were in a small Marina at Montebello where we took on water for the first time in eight days (72 gallons) and did three loads of wash. On Friday we locked through Carillon Lock, the tallest lock in Canada with a 66 foot drop, then tied up for the night on their lower wall.

We will stay here for at least one night (when we look around today we’ll decide whether to stay another day). When we leave here we will enter the St. Lawrence Seaway locks after about 6 miles and then be in Montreal at a marina the same day (about 35 miles total).

All is going well. We should be in Lake Champlain in another 10-12 days.

We departed Smith Falls at 0830 on Monday, July 25, and headed to Aylings Marina and Boatyard in Merrickville, arriving there about 1335. We were met at the Aylings by Doug who helped us secure our lines to a dock, then came aboard to talk about the problem we were having with the coolant loss. After some discussion, he went to work trying to figure out where the coolant was going. He soon eliminated the exhaust system (good news because that would have meant a leaking head or exhaust gasket and $$$ to replace), and eventually came to a leaking temperature control valve on the hot water heater. Some more checking and running the engine until it was hot confirmed that it was the valve. The installation manual indicated that a relacement valve would be required, but a call to the local dealer in Ottawa revealed that the valves were no longer being produced and were not available, so the only option would be to bypass the valve. By then it was late in the afternoon and Doug said he’d take care of it first thing in the morning. We ate dinner at a restaurant in Merrickville, and the next morning Doug came aboard to change the coolant lines around, we started the engine to get it up to operating temperature (no leak), shut down and let it cool off, and confirmed that the leak had stopped.

We filled the water tanks, Bob took a shower and we were off at 1320 heading toward Ottawa. We stopped at Burritts Lock in a beautiful setting for the night. The next day, July 27th, we departed Burritts Rapids Lock and five hours later stopped for the day at Long Island Lock – another beautiful spot. On Thursday, July 28th, we were underway at 1005 and cruised through a winding and sometimes narrow Rideau River until reaching Hartwell Lock, at which time we departed the Rideau River and entered a series of canals leading to Ottawa. The Rideau River is very much like the Erie Canal when it is following rivers past small towns, cottages, marinas and homes. Once we entered the canals we were in Ottawa proper, passing the University and other buildings following the man-made canal winding its way toward the Ottawa River. We stopped at “the wall” in Ottawa, about 400 yard short of the beginning of the eight stair-step locks that would lower us another 80 feet into the Ottawa River. The next morning many of the boats that had been on the wall when we arrived departed early, and we moved to the “head of the line” next to the tour boats that use the far west end of the newly refurbished wooden docks along the wall.

We are about 200 yards from the bridge over the street at Parliament Hill, with the National Arts Center to our port side. It’s an active area, with a lot of boats tied to the wall and more boats coming and going up and down the flight of eight locks every few hours (it takes about 3 hours to pass through all the locks).

We have visited Parliament (you can take tours through the actual chambers), the Supreme Court building (tour given by a second year law student at the University), the National Art Gallery, and the Canadian Museum of Civilization, seen the sound and light show projected on the Parliament building, plus walked miles. This is a great spot to visit, with much to see and do.

We’ll depart Ottawa on the 3rd (Wednesday) heading to Montreal where we anticipate arriving on the 8th or 9th.

More later!

Totals to date: 392H50M – 2435.6SM

July 14, 2011 (Thursday)

We were underway from the park at the dam at Upper Jones Falls about 1010 and by 1110 we had explored a couple of possible anchorages in Sand Lake and had the anchor down in West Bay. At the far end in about 15 feet of water with heavy grass for great holding. We have learned that lots of grass is our friend when anchoring, even if it does mean more work the next day. Several nice bays we’ve checked for anchoring have a flat stone bottom with no grass or gravel for holding. I was told by a local boater that grass doesn’t grow in over 20 feet of water; it won’t grow in any bottom without silt/sand/gravel, either. So now we look for bays less than 15 feet deep where we can see grass reaching toward the surface! We spent a quiet day here watching loons (and hearing their calls) and fishing boats of all sorts plying the shores.

July 15, 2011 (Friday) we moved 3.5 SM to upper Davis Lock. John the lockmaster seems to be a legend on the Rideau for his friendliness and helpfulness. He will let boats stay on the blue line, with hydro (Canadian speak for electricity) at $10 per night on the upper docks. He obliged us by putting us on the blue line (normally reserved for boats that want to lock through) immediately above the lock door on the starboard side, so we had a nice view of the lock and the boats going through it. There are a number of shorter docks in the little pond behind the lock which John created with his own initiative, so the first night there were a total of 17 boats of various sizes at the lock. The Canadian couple in the beautiful 1933 wooden boat (Dave and Liz) were on one of the docks at the back side of the pond and we had a nice reunion with them over the next several days. Most of the boaters there seem to know each other, and many have cottages on the nearby lakes and come to the lock on weekends. By the time we left on Sunday at noon many boats had departed.

We anchored on Sunday night (July 17) in Stouts Bay on Newboro Lake. Again, we confirmed the advantage of anchoring in grass. When we first entered the small bay there were several other boats anchored in various places at the winward end of the lake, so we anchored in an open area between them. The bottom looked rather desolate on the depth sounder, and later in the afternoon when we watched the other boats depart we saw that their anchors came up completely free of any grass; the bottom was a granite shelf. We then decided it would be best to find some grass or at least a better holding bottom, so moved to a shallower area between an island and shore where the depth sounder seemed to show some grass. We anchored there, putting out over 100 feet of chain in 15 feet of water, and later, after two storms passed through during the late evening and about 0130 in the morning, realized that we had, in fact, anchored in a good bed of lake grass; the anchor held through the storms without a problem.

From Stouts Bay we cruised 9.0 SM to the public docks at Westport, also on Newboro Lake. All docks are part of town marina operation and the price was quite reasonable with hydro. The little town had a good grocery store, three ice cream stores, bakeries, and several restaurants. We ate ashore both nights we were
there, shopped, ate ice cream, and Bob had freshly baked cinnamon buns both mornings for breakfast! We departed Westport on Wednesday, July 20 heading for Big Rideau Lake where we hoped to get a spot at the park docks on Colonel By Island (Colonel By is the man who supervised and was instrumental in the construction of the Rideau Waterway/Canal which was completed in 1832). When we approached Colonel By Island it was apparent that the dock was full, so we explored three other anchorages only to discover that one had very poor holding, one was narrow and over 25 feet deep even close to shore, and the third had little to no swinging room with a number of electrical lines laid on the bottom reaching the various small islands. So we cruised past Colonel By Island again (nothing had changed and there was nothing available on the dock), and ended up on the southern side of the lake not too far from Portland in a very nice little Bay – Sheldons Bay. The bottom was only 10 feet in depth with plenty of grass. We laid out 75 feet and never budged, even though the wind during the next day got up to 20 mph at times. The lake had several nice homes (not cottages) overlooking the water with small boats of various kinds at the docks. It looked like a nice place to live (or at least spend the summer months).

Portland had a marina with diesel fuel, the first we have found since departing Kingston. Our next destination was Smith Falls where we hoped to get a spot in the basin between the two locks. We got to the marina shortly after it opened at 0830 and took on 102 gallons of fuel (the first fuel we’ve taken on since Oswego, New York) in our starboard tank (we’ve been using the starboard tank only since we discovered a slight leak about 2/3rds of the way up on the port tank earlier in the trip), pumped out the forward holding tank, and by 0945 on the 22nd of July we were heading to Smith Falls where we were able to get the last dock with hydro available! During the day more boats arrived looking for space, and somehow managed to fill up the park walls and still find hydro in some of the places. This is the beginning of the “Construction Holiday” when the construction trades in Quebec take two weeks off so the workers can go on vacation. Everyone seems to have a boat, and every boat takes to the waterways. Many keep their boats in Montreal, so they come through the Rideau Waterway from both directions (from the north and Ottowa, and from the south and Kingston) making a circular route that includes the St. Lawrence River. The lock walls and parks are filled, and it is going to be difficult to find a place to stay for the next couple of weeks without going into a marina. We’re a little concerned about whether we will be able to stay on the wall in Ottawa – we won’t know until we get there.

We’re staying here at least into Sunday (July 24th) and with the hot weather we’re experiencing we may stay longer in order to have air conditioning on the boat at night. Smith Falls is a great location with much to do. Yesterday we toured the Rideau Canal Museum and today we went to the Canadian Railway Museum (learned what a “dental car” was) and the Heritage House Museum. This morning Bob got a hair cut (after three months he was looking a bit shaggy) and Judy says he looks better now! The “downtown” area is less than a block away with an ice cream shop, a number of restaurants, Rexall Drug store, and even a movie theater. The basin, the area between the locks, is surrounded by a nice park with lots of boats and RVs – people swimming in the relatively warm water, and just sitting out under the trees talking or reading. We’ve had several nice discussions with a Canadian couple who come here every summer for a few days from a town near Ottawa; we’ve gotten some good advice from them about places to stop as we approach Ottawa.

Bob is getting more concerned about the loss of coolant in the engine which he’s been unable to resolve, so he’s going to talk with a boat yard in Merrickville about checking the engine to determine the source of the leak and making a repair. If that occurs, we will stay in the yard/marina for at least several days while repairs are made. We’re hoping it is something less serious than a head or exhaust gasket!

For those of you who may be interested in learning a little about the Rideau Waterway/Canal, the best source of info is at Rideau-info.com. The area certainly has an interesting history, and the whole thing started with the War of 1812!

The weather is really hot – 94 degrees each day for the past 3 days and there hasn’t been much rain for a number of weeks. Today for the first time we turned on the air conditioning late in the afternoon so we, and Julie and Khepera, could get away from the heat. The forecast is for more of the same for the next 3-4 days.

We should be in Ottawa within a week, if all goes well with the engine repairs.

Totals to date: 368H45M – 2374.5SM