June 23, 2009

We are now sitting in Confederation Basin Marina in Kingston ONT. We arrived here Sunday late and will be setting out towards the Trent Severn tomorrow. The weather has been outstanding, every day sunny into the mid eighties with low humidity. The last rain we had was Saturday with good weather forecasted through next Monday.

The Rideau Canal is very pretty in the lake regions with many secluded anchorages for the taking. We met two nice couples on a Grand Banks 42 from Maine that were doing the Rideau and we traveled together from Ottawa to Kingston. We had a very nice time.

As some of you all ready know the only liquor stores in Ontario are operated by the government. They are known as the LBCO stores. Well total panic has set in as the unionized LBCO workers are going on strike at midnight tonight. You should have seen the panic at the LBCO store this afternoon. There were lines out the door people jockeying for position at the check out and nearly empty shelves. Some people had two shopping carts full of liquor and wine. All the bars and restaurants also have to buy their liquor, beer, and wine from the LBCO

We are having a great time and so far, have pretty much had the places to ourselves. We will see as we get into July but I think the economy may have altered some peoples plans as most everywhere we here the boat traffic this year is slow. If they do not have any liquor stores it will get really slow.

We have traveled a leisurely 942 nautical miles.

June 14th Update

June 14, 2009

We are now on the mooring wall in downtown Ottawa. We had a very nice trip up the Ottawa River arriving on Friday afternoon. We locked up the 8 locks of the start of the Rideau Canal. As we were the only boat we were the afternoon entertainment for ~400 people. They line the locks and the overlooking bridge. The tourists were taking multiple pictures. This is a very beautiful place very much European in its flavor.

We meet some very nice people on their boat from the area and went to dinner last night in Ottawa’s version of Fanuel Hall. Talk about leisurely dining we did not finish dinner until after 11:00 PM. Then, of course, we had to dance for a while.

The weather has become very nice, 75 to 80 degrees and sunny. The outlook for the next three days is more of the same.

We will probably take 5-6 days to transit the Rideau before we return to Lake Ontario. We have covered 823 NM in our first month

June 11th 

The last few days have been interesting to say the least.  We left a small anchorage in a nice cove on Cedar Island New York at about 8:00 AM Saturday June 6th.  When we retrieved the anchor it had about a 12 foot sunken log caught on it.  Fortunately we had a trip line on the anchor and were able to get it off without too much excitement.

Our next adventure for the day was Iroquois Lock.  The wind is blowing 15-20 from the aft and the boat begins to pivot, I have the rope on the rear and proceed to get a nice rope burn on my wrist.  The boat never touched the lock wall however.  FYI the drop in this lock is 6 inches.

The next adventure for the day was trying to clear Canadian Customs.  Anyway this turned into a fiasco and we had to dock for the night in this little marina on the New York side of the river.  The day got much better then as we met some very nice people that had done the Ottawa River and the Rideau Canal and we had a wonderful time talking about the trip and what to see etc.  Sometimes things do work out nicely.

Sunday June 7^th we left the New York side, finally cleared Canadian Customs and went to a nice little Ontario Province run marina in Morristown, ONT.  After we cleared customs we decided to move Jejuda to a larger dock and the port engine starter solenoid decided it only wanted to perform its assigned task on an intermittent basis.  After plugging in shore power the AC battery charger decided that it did not want to perform its assigned task at all.

Monday the 8^th then became a repair day.  Luckily I had a spare solenoid so that repair was quick.  The battery charger was not repairable and they no longer make that model.  We are making do for the time being with a portable battery charger we purchased at Canadian Tire.

On Monday afternoon Judi and I went to very interesting “period” village called ‘Upper Canada”.  Set in the 1850’s it has a working sawmill, cheese factory, tinsmith, woolen mill, grain mill, bakery and much more.  We both felt it was well worth the visit.

Tuesday the 9^th started off raining with an easterly breeze of 20-25.  We were going to have to cross Lake St. Francis, another 20+ mile trip against the current and wind in a very shallow lake.  I learned my lesson on Oneida Lake and we waited till after noon to depart.  We went about ½ the way across and the rain started again so we snuck into a small marina on the north shore of the lake for the rainy evening.

Wednesday the 10^th we left early, went through two locks each a 42’ drop and took a left towards Ottawa and spent a delightful night in a small town on the western end of Montreal Island called Sainte-Anne-de–Bellevue.  We are docked on the town promenade just before the lock and there are it least 10 quaint restaurants that front the promenade and river.

We are off later this morning, after café and French pastries towards Ottawa.  The weather has improved and it should be ~75  and sunny.

Today we are in Cape Vincent, NY, Mile 1 of the US St. Lawrence Seaway. We are tied to the town dock which, as in many of the places we have visited has free dockage and, in some cases free electricity and water. This is a nice little town with the worlds smallest Aquarian with about 12 fish.

Yesterday we stayed in Sacketts Harbor, NY which is on Lake Ontario. Sacketts Harbor was a major Naval Port during the war of 1812.

We entered the Lake Ontario at Oswego, NY at 7:30 AM and had a great crossing in nice if very cold conditions. One great advantage of fresh water boating is that you can use your wash down pump and clean the boat as you go along.

We have gone through 30 locks so far on the Erie and Oswego Canals.

We had quite a day last Sunday when I decided to cross Oneida Lake with a westerly breeze of 15-20. The lake is ~20 miles across and about 30 feet deep. When we left the waves were 1-3 feet and half way across the wind built to 25-40 with one gust of 55. The waves quickly became ~10 feet 10 feet apart which were putting considerable water over the fly bridge bimini. I have a new found respect for the type of water you can experience on a lake.

One good thing though. We had the cleanest boat in New York after 3 hours in a power washer. Also nothing broke with only a couple of small leaks on the front windows.