#16 The Rideau Canal, 1000 Islands and going home August 26 - September 11, 2015

Ottowa's Rideau Canal in winter, a skaters paradise. We were tied at the last streetlight on the right this summer

After five peaceful days on the Ottawa wall, in the quiet center of downtown, we were joined by Maine friends, Ruth and Wick Johnson. Wick and Ruth were fellow travelers on our Croatian adventure and happily signed on with us for the trip through the Rideau Canal to Lake Ontario.

Nightly light show on the Parliament Building, the history of Canada in 30 minutes.

Ruth & Wick preparing to explore the town at Smith Falls

Opened in 1832, the Rideau is the oldest continuously operated canal system in North America. It was built to provide an alternative route to the St Lawrence in the event that the obstreperous Americans tried to take over Canada after the war of 1812. The canal is 123 miles long with 49 locks, and goes through 16 lakes and two rivers. It was a major engineering feat, for which the man responsible, Colonel By, got no credit during his lifetime because cost overruns caused him to be recalled to England in disgrace. Now lots of things are named after him. Over 1000 Irish and French Canadian laborers and their families died during the six years of construction, mostly from malaria and other diseases.

Fishing along the canal. You can see the falls the canal avoids in the back

Now the entire waterway is a UNESCO World Heritage site, managed by Parks Canada. Each lock is a miniature park, perfectly tended with flowers and manicured lawn. At every stop we saw people picnicking, fishing, biking or just sitting and watching the boats.

Narrow passage through Clear Lake

Lock keepers house at Old Sly's Lock

Swan from the kayak at Opinicon Lake

In between the locks we went through beautiful lakes and rivers with nary a road in sight. We found local orchards and local art galleries, cute towns and restaurants of uneven quality, including one with a waitress who may have been related to Seinfeld’s Soup Nazi.

Lock at Smiths Falls

pretty tame beaver

We got pretty good at the lock drill, except for the time I temporarily cleated the line that was around the cable used to keep boats fixed to the wall while in the lock- and then forgot about it. This is not a problem while the boat is being lifted to the point where the boat cleat is even with the top of the lock wall, the line slides up the cable as the water rises. But in some locks the water is filled to the top of the wall, which means the cleat on the boat rises above the wall, and if the line is tied down the boat starts to get pulled over. There is the potential for a hole ripped out of the boat...

Lock tender and his dog. Note cables used to keep boats next to wall in lock

Wick noticed the boat was starting to tilt, but at this point the line was too tight to uncleat and we were madly rushing about for a knife to cut the line. The ever-alert Parks Canada lock tenders acted before we did, and let some water out so we could untie the line. I was mortified. I asked the lock tender if this happened often, she smiled kindly, and nodded, “it happens”.

The marina at Westport, on the Upper Rideau Lake. Everywhere is getting quiet at the end of the season

Davis Lock, isolated at the end of a country road but a favorite of campers, bikers and boaters

While walking to an art gallery

Locks 47, 48 and 49, at Kingston Mills, the last set before Lake Ontario

Ruth is pressed into service to get Joel a bit more presentable for the City of Kingston

Approaching Kingston we just missed the bridge opening, and it would be a two hour wait for the next one. So we decided to squeeze under the other bridge, purportedly a 17 footer (no one in official capacity will tell you the clearance, for liability reasons I suppose). We could tell we weren’t going to make it on the first try by taking down the usual antennas, so we backed up and unscrewed more stuff from the top, and ever so slowly inched our way under, with maybe three inches to spare.

Our unscrewed antennas and plenty of scratches on the underside of the bridge

Kingston is a nice city, with lots of good restaurants and shops.

Some excellent eating in Kingston

Ruth and Wick took a rental car back to Ottawa and Joel and I headed east to Gananoque Ontario, “Gateway to the 1000 Islands” where we awaited our angel friends from Hallowell, Cathy Murray and Mike Waters. They are angels because they offered to drive our car, along with their own, from Hallowell to Ontario which is easily a 10 hour drive.

The Murray cottage on  Charleston Lake

Cathie's family has a cottage at Charleston Lake, which is a short drive from Gananoque and we had a chance to visit with some of the mighty Murray clan and enjoy lunch and the beautiful lake shore spot.

We left Gananoque, a very cool town, to explore some of the Admiralty Islands for the two nights we had Cathie and Mike with us. It was beautiful weather, and Labor Day weekend, so there were tons of boats out. The first night we anchored at Beau Rivarge Island, a Park Island, where camping is permitted. It was being well used.

On Beau Rivarge Island with Cathie & Mike

Exploring Beau Rivarge

 The second night we went to a larger island known as Thwartway, or Leek Island. We were able to use a park mooring- no charge since we had our annual mooring pass, and shared the harbor with just  a few other boats. Lots of swimming kayaking and exploring. There aren’t really trails the island, but the woods have a clear understory which made bushwacking pretty easy.

Thwartway Island was used as a place of psychic recovery for WWII veterans, we found remainders of the farm & buildings

Family obligations called the Murray Waters so we said farewell and set off in search of a winter boatyard for Snow Goose. We tried Alexandria Bay, NY where we went through customs using a phone booth at the town dock, but didn’t see what we needed.

On our way down river to Alex Bay

So we turned around and went back up the St Lawrence to Clayton NY and settled in at the French Creek Bay Marina. Its a bit funky, but the people seemed very knowledgeable and competent, and they have been there a long time. Mike still had our car, and he and Cathie’s brother Brendan were kind enough to drive across the bridge to the US and deliver it to us once again.

So, we spent couple of days packing, said our goodbyes to Snow Goose, and had a very beautiful drive back to Maine.

One last sunset for the season

Signing off until next spring,
Sarah & Joel