Shabbat dinner aboard s/v-Ihana

Dinner on Friday night, with Ilona, candles, wine and challah (and food).

Trent/Severn Waterway, Lock 44 – The Big Chute Marine Railway

Infriggincredible. 

The "railroad car" on the Big Chute Marine Railway

This "lock" consisted of a cross between a dry-dock, a travellift, and a railroad car.  We motored in, and then they stabilized the boat in slings (think: travellift). Then the whole rig moved forward on train tracks (think: railroad; cable-car) up (think: dry-dock) and over (54 foot water level difference) the hill and across a highway (crossing gates shut for cars and people) and down into the next pool.  Never seen anything like it.  We had the ride of our life, in our boat watching the whole thing.

Boats motor into the "dry-dock".  Lockmasters move the boat over the slings.

The whole thing moves forward and up; the slings do not get raised;
the water drains away beneath them.

Then it moves up and over the hill between the two pools.
Over a highway (crossing-gates down).

Detail showing the wheels on the tracks.

View of the marine railway from below.
The blue line is where boats tie up while waiting their turn on the train.

View of the hill. Note the two sets of tracks.
The forward set of wheels on the train car ride on one track;
the other wheels ride on the other tracks (or vice versa).
The train rig stays (approximately) level because of the difference
 in height of the two tracks. 

Slings hold the boat as the car comes up out of the water.

Another view of the two sets of tracks.
The wheels that are more downhill ride on the upper track.
The other set of wheels ride on the other track.
It works to keep things on the level; hard to explain unless you see it.

After passing through (well, up and over) the "lock", we tied up at one of the docks and spent the night. And stayed all the next day and night.  

Finally got the temporary antenna rigged up so we have some VHF while the mast is down – not too important on the canal but critical for our crossings of Lakes Simcoe and, of course, Ontario.

Made arrangements to park our boat at a marina in Orilla Ontario next week – so we can spend several days with Naomi, Clayton & Stephanie in suburban Toronto. They will pick us up on Sunday afternoon.

Only 2 locks to go until that marina – plan to do them tomorrow AM before the crowds.  This is the big 3-day holiday weekend in Canada, so – of course- everyone is here and out on the water or in the anchorages or docks.

Trent/Severn Waterway, Lock 45

We finally made it off of Georgian Bay.  This bunch of rocks has the most confusing set of navigation charts.  The Richardson's Chartbook, the Canadian Small Craft Route Charts, and our Garmin Canadian charts chip all give different information – fun choosing which to follow.  And the Coast Guard adds and removes buoys – a good idea to have them current, but it obsoletes the charts. We've been following the buoys, when we could identify them. Impossible without getting lost occasionally.  But we are now in the Waterway and off of Lake Huron.

As has been usual lately: Ilona at the bow with binoculars, paper chart, compass and walkie-talkie headset.  Bob at the helm with chartplotter, depth-gauge, throttle, wheel and the other walkie-talkie. Conversation: where-are-we and where-is-it and watch-out-for-that-boat/rock/buoy/shoal/wake/gust.

Yesterday we got to the first lock, at Port Severn. We had to wait for about an hour and a half, in a rock-infested pool with wind, current, and about a dozen boats crammed into a small space (picture the turning basin of most marinas). Everyone was trying to keep his or her boat moving very slowly (steerage speed or less) and not hit anyone else.  It was pretty frightening and a good chance to practice motoring skills.  We finally got a spot on the wall to tie up and wait our turn at the lock.  We hear this is the worst lock on the whole waterway (we suspect most of them are).

Stopped for lunch in mid-afternoon, then on to the next lock.  Much nicer here – compared to the Georgian Bay Small Craft Route, there are less rocks in the channel and well-posted buoys.

We are now a motorboat

Arrived at Midland, Ontario, yesterday afternoon.  We spent the morning anchored somewhere just off the Small Craft Route along the southeast shore of Georgian Bay, waiting for the rain and possible thunderstorms to stop so we could make the jump across the bottom of Georgian Bay.  The weather turned out much better than expected - it was "fair to Midland." [why does he keep coming up with things like this ???]

s/v Ihana, mast down and fendered

Today we had the wonderful crew at the Bay Port Yacht Center (in Midland) build a cradle to hold our mast, boom and mainsail, after they took down the mast. See picture of our boat with the mast down and cradled, and fenderboards for the canals.. We need to have the mast down for our next adventure - the Trent / Severn Waterway from Georgian Bay to Lake Ontario. This bypasses most of Lakes Huron, Erie, and the Detroit area - takes us north of Toronto for 240 miles and 44 locks!  More on this later.

Last night we took the dinghy across Midland Bay to downtown Midland, for shopping and a nice chinese dinner.  It was a 10 minute commute by boat, saving us a 20 minute walk ...

Rocky Road

Pictures from the Small Craft Route down the east shore of Georgian Bay.  Beautiful, but difficult traveling by boat.  For well over 100 miles, we saw water and rocks. Lots of rocks.  Lots of lots of rocks. Some water too, sometimes not enough.

Rocks. Shoals. Almost- or actually-submerged rocks.

Red to port, green to starboard here.
Barely passable inside the buoys, and not often very deep.
Outside the buoys, you WILL hit a rock.

See the obvious rock.  See the not-so-obvious shoal?

Well marked rock, with daymark indicating which side is safe to pass on.

Missing Lake Superior, where shallow water is 100 feet deep.

Lots of people do this

There were sometimes over 150 boats checking in to the Cruiser's Net at Little Current - boats sailing or motoring on the North Channel.  And these were just those checking in.
We have seen hundreds - maybe more! - people doing something like what we are doing.  Most are not going as far as we are planning, but a whole lot are.  We keep meeting people who have or will be traveling to Florida for the winter, some of whom do this every year.

Moral to story - we're aren't the only ones crazy enough to take a trip like this.

Punch line - There are plenty of people to provide help, information, and companionship out here.  Wow.

Thank You - continued

Again, we are indebted to many people who helped us along our way.  It's hard to mention them all, but we especially thank:

The team at Bay Port Yacht Center in Midland, Ontario - for their excellent work in unstepping our mast and building a cradle to hold it on the boat.  This saved us a lot of work and, besides, they knew what they were doing.

Jenny & Mike Sutton (of Roseville MN!) - for information (and chartbooks) on their trip to the Bahamas by sailboat for a year, what we should expect, and valuable hints and suggestions.

Happy Smith (Great Lakes Cruising Club) - for information on anchorages and routes to get us down the east shore of Georgian Bay from Britt to Midland. Also for inviting us to join 9 other sailors from the GLCC for dinner in Britt.

Mike and Diana Nelson, and David Craigie (Trailer Sailors) - for providing us with charts, chartbooks and cruising guides - and information - on the Trent / Severn Canal and the Small Craft Route on Georgian Bay.

John and Coleen Travis (Trailer Sailors) - for organizing and executing a wonderful 2 week interlude in the North Channel of Lake Huron, with about 30 boats. Our boat was the largest and - since it was trailered from Lake City, MN to our launch point in Superior, WI - technically it was a trailerable boat.

John and Irene Clement (Trailer Sailors) - for loaning us their truck in Little Current, ON, so we could drive to Espanola to refill our propane bottle.  Would you believe it is almost impossible to get propane on Manitoulin Island?

Jim Kimmet (Northern Lights Sailing Club) - again, for crewing with us all the way across the south shore of Lake Superior.

The crew of the s/v Iroquois, who clued us in that Garmin did not supply us with the best charts for Canada, and helped us know what to order. Now we are no longer anchoring 1/2 mile inland ...

Countless other boats we met along the way.

Auto, our wonderful autopilot.  On light-air days, he took over the helm so we could relax and not be enslaved to the wheel for hours and hours.  Too bad he hasn't learned to steer with strong winds and waves, but then we would have missed all the fun ...

Ilona, for being the best possible crew member and co-captain.  And for wanting to go on this adventure, maybe even more than I did.

And I'm sure there will be more people to help us along the way.