2005 CRUISE
TRIP 4 LOGS
Ottawa, Ontario to Montreal, Quebec, Canada to Brewerton, NY, USA
September 8 – 21, 2005

Houston, TX to Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, Thursday, September 8, 2005

     Angela and I flew on Continental to Newark, NJ and then to Ottawa.  Our friends Dennis and Louise met us at the airport.  We went to the boat (in Manotick) and took inventory of the food left in the refrigerator; the marina threw away all the food in the freezer.  We went to the grocery store and then met Guy and Lorraine for dinner in Manotick.  The six of us had a good meal and enjoyed each others’ company.  After dinner we moved the groceries to Guy’s car and went to the boat.  We unloaded the groceries and showed Guy and Lorraine the boat.

Manotick to Long Island Locks, Friday, September 9, 2005

     Chris Hurst wanted me to look over his invoice as a way to settle our bill, so I met him early in the day.  Two and a half hours later we were finished.  It was expensive.  By the time we had fueled up and moved down the river, we could not get through the first set of locks.  The closing time for locks on the Rideau Canal had changed to 4:30pm.  We tied up above the Long Island Locks for the night.

     We discussed having dinner with Dennis and Louise; one of the ideas was to go to the casino at Hull.  Since we had progressed so little down towards Ottawa, Dennis suggested going to the casino near us called the Rideau Carleton Raceway.  The casino had slots only but also had a buffet and a horse race track.  Harness racing was scheduled for Friday night.  We called Guy and Lorraine to invite them and found out they had already made reservations for them and for Lorraine’s parents.  The 8 of us had dinner, watched the harness racing, and donated a few quarters to the casino’s slot machines.  It was a fun evening.

Long Island Locks to Ottawa, Saturday, September, 10, 2005

     The locks still opened at 8:30am, and we went through the set of three locks beginning at that time.  It took over three hours to get back to our spot (almost the exact same spot) on the wall in downtown Ottawa.  We had lunch and walked to the fresh market.  Angela picked out the vegetables she wanted, and I brought them back to the boat.  I did a few chores, talked to a few cruisers that dropped by to chat, and took a nap.  Angela shopped and bought a few Christmas presents.



     The weather was pleasant with a high of about 75 degrees F.  The coolness of Fall was in the air, and we saw some color in the tree leaves.

     Louise and Dennis had left town, but before they left Louise told us about a street festival on Parent Street that evening.  We walked there to an Irish pub for dinner.  There was an Irish Village there, and the stage was occupied by a series of musicians and singers performing Irish tunes.  The food was fairly good, but the pub was dark and smoky – we were glad to get out of there.

Ottawa, Ontario to Montebello, Quebec, Sunday, September 11, 2005

     The lockmaster told me they would be locking up first thing, and that we could lock down at 10am or so.  We waited for the boats locking up to pass us (there was only one), and we pulled away from the wall and moved down to the top of the locks.  To my surprise, there was a blue line there, on our port side.  Had I known that, I would have tied up there instead of waiting for the upbound boats to pass us.  The lock master and staff had taken off for a break, but they regrouped and started the process of moving us down the flight of eight locks.



     Locking down took about two hours.  Angela got off the boat and took some photos and short movies of the beautiful setting for those 1832 locks.  At the bottom we were in the Ottawa River.  We went upstream and took some photos.  Then we headed downstream towards Montebello, 42 miles away.





















     Le Chateau Montebello was owned by the Fairmont Hotels.  We stayed there in 2000; it was one of the most expensive marinas we had experienced.  At that time their price was $2.50 CAN per foot; in 2005 it was $2.75 CAN per foot.  I believe they added tax after that.  That included 50 amp power and water.  We were glad to dump the sulfurous water from Hurst Marina and fill up with good water at Montebello.



     The marina was run by a very young girl, which was becoming the usual case at marinas; and she spoke very little English.  In all of Canada we saw labels and signs in both English and French, except in Quebec the English was often omitted. 

     Angela did a few chores, and I changed the oil and filter on the generator.  We walked around the beautiful old lodge, and we enjoyed the grounds and the cool breeze.  We ate dinner on board.









     It was the four-year anniversary of the Attack on America in 2001.  Louisiana was going through the initial recovery efforts after Hurricane Katrina on August 28.  Both were very sobering and challenging events in the history of our country.

     We went through 8 locks during the day and 16 for Trip 4.

Montebello to Montreal, Monday, September 12, 2005







     We left Montebello at 9:15am.  We went down the river to the Carillon Lock with its almost 60’ drop.  I called the lock on channel 68, and a lady answered.  I advised we would like to go through the lock.  She replied, “We are waiting for you, Captain.  The door is open and you have the green light.”  At that time I could see neither the door or the green light, but 10 minutes later we were inside tied up to the floating dock inside the lock. 









     A nice young man from Quebec was already in the lock.  He and his wife had arrived on a pontoon boat.  He said he had been anchored at Long Island Locks when we were there.  He said he saw us at Montebello when they passed it by.  We chatted about cruising while the lock lowered our boats tied up to the floating dock inside the lock.  The lock staff was very pleasant, although English was difficult for one or two or them.



     Below the lock we followed the channel down to Montreal.  It was a tricky channel, and a few more buoys would have been a big help.  We had charts, and I would not have wanted to make that run without them.  We called the lock at Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue on Channel 68, and they eventually responded in English.  We went into the lock and tied up to the floating dock there.  The lock master had a fancy piece of gear there to authenticate our season pass to use the Parks Canada locks.





     On the other side of the lock, which lowered us two feet, we went into Lake (Lac in French) Saint Louis, a treacherously shallow lake.  There was a short cut to the St. Lawrence Seaway, which we had used in 2000.  And there was a deeper route, but longer, that we chose because we were told the water was low.  Angela navigated and studied the chart, and I did the piloting.  Even though many of the buoys had been renumbered and some buoys were missing, we did fine for most of the route; and the water was deep (12 – 20 feet).

     At the end of our passage across the lake we had to turn right, make a short run, and then turn right again.  Each direction had buoys named with a different code, like AD 21.  However, we were close to the Seaway, and there were range markers all around us as well.  We got turned around and got into some shallow water.  We recovered and made it to the Seaway channel with going aground.

     Shortly after getting into the Seaway channel, where it was 30 feet deep, we went into a manmade canal that bypassed the Lachine Rapids.  The canal was about 20 miles long and had two locks.  High bridges had a clearance of 125 feet for the ocean-going ships that used the Seaway.  The speed limit was 6 knots in the canal.  The chart name was Canal De La Rive Sud, or South Shore Canal.  We went through the Cote-Sainte-Catherine Lock, at Mile 10 (of 20 in the canal), after a wait of about 20 minutes.  The lock dropped us 30 feet. 



     We knew the procedure at these locks as we had been through other Seaway locks.  We had to tie up at the pleasure boat dock and walk up to the phone booth, pick up the phone, and talk to the lockmaster.  They just won’t use the radio; I don’t know why.  I asked the lockmaster if they would call the next lock.  He said they do and will, but I still had to tie up at the pleasure boat dock and use the phone.

     The next lock was at Mile 3; it was called Saint Lambert.  It had a complex system of bridges on both ends.  Once the lock lowered us 16 feet, we had to wait for the trains before the bridge would go up.  In each of the locks the lock personnel collected $20 CAN from us and provided two polypropylene ropes to us for the locking.







     We came out the north end of the canal and into the St. Lawrence River.  We passed the end of Ile Ste. Helene and turned upstream toward the Port of Montreal.  After a mile or so we experienced the current from the rapids in the river.  It was impressive.  At that point we were below all the locks on the St. Lawrence Seaway; there were no more all the way out into the Atlantic Ocean.  I thought I might like to make that trip in 2006.

     We eased over to the Port of Montreal and found our marina.  We called on the phone, and the young girl directed us to an alongside berth.  Then we found out she did not have 50 amp power for us.  I showed her the email we had assuring us of a reservation with 50 amp power.  She assured us they did not have any slips available with 50 amp power.  As we walked to her office with her, we passed a trawler with an unused 50 amp power plug.  Unfortunately we could not reach it from our berth.  They had not planned well when assigning berths to boats with more power than they needed.  There was no way she could get us the power we wanted, and she would not reduce their $1.75 CAN per foot price either.

     She did give us the names and numbers of two other marinas in the area.  I called both, and the La Ronde Marina was the only one that answered.  It was after 6pm at that time.  Guy Schneider said he was on the river heading for his marina, which we had seen at the north end of Ile St. Helene; and if we left then he would meet us.  We did, and we met him just as he had predicted.  He did not use the radio, but Angela told me he was making hand signals to us to follow him into the marina.  I did, although I could not turn as fast as he could; and we went aground and hit something hard.

     I was very upset and called Guy on the telephone.  He talked us over to a T-head berth where he had 50 amp power for us.  He came up in his small boat and assured us he had no rocks in his marina, sand and grass but no rocks.  He said he would dive under the boat the next morning to see the condition of our props.

     We covered 95 miles that day and went through 4 locks.  Our lock total for Trip 4 was 20.

Lay Days in Montreal, Tuesday – Friday, September 13 – 16, 2005

     On Tuesday Guy (pronounced “Gee”) was out in his boat, with his employee Jack, sounding the area where we hit the solid object.  He found a pipe about 6 feet long, made of aluminum, that was apparently the object I hit.  He brought his dive gear and went under our boat.  He confirmed that our port prop was okay but our starboard prop needed to be removed and reconditioned.  He said he knew where it could be reconditioned quickly, and he promised to return to take off the prop.

     I walked around the area a bit.  La Ronde was the name of a large amusement park owned by Six Flags.  Our marina was located in the shadow of the park; it was necessary to drive through the amusement park in order to get to the marina.  The amusement park was closed except for weekends.  It had been built, along with other structures on the island, for the world’s fair, or EXPO ’67, in Montreal.  Everything we saw was showing signs of age; Guy said the marina silted in and the sand had to be pumped out occasionally.

     Guy was a diver, and his friend Roger was a boater.  Both had been to Florida numerous times.  I met Guy’s girlfriend, Solanges, and Roger’s wife, Nicole.  We chatted for a while about boats and cruising.  Later Roger and Nicole took us to the Port of Montreal, the same marina we had tried to use the previous day, in their boat, a 29’ 2004 Monterrey.  It was a fast and pleasant trip.  The side walls of that marina were about 50' high.





     Angela and I walked around Old Montreal.  We saw numerous pretty places and took a lot of photos.  It was a hot day, about 31 degrees C.  We ate dinner and had a carriage ride, then took a taxi back to the marina.











     On Wednesday our Montreal-area friends came by the boat just as Guy and another diver, Sylvan, were giving up on removing our prop.  They said it was on too tight.  The next options were to lift the boat at another marina with a travel-lift or have another diver come with air-powered tools and remove the prop.  Guy said he was working on both options.  We went to town with our friends, but I asked Guy to call me if he needed me to move the boat to the other marina.

     We went with our friends to lunch on the island at a restaurant named St Helene de Champlain.  It was expensive and good.  Then we drove to the Botanical Gardens in Montreal, which the ladies liked.  Later our friends took us to a grocery store where we could buy a new chip for our digital camera.  We forgot the second chip, and Angela filled up the first one with photos of flowers.  They dropped us at the marina, and we said good night.

     When we got back to the marina, no one was there, so we didn’t know whether or not the prop had been removed.  We had no phone message from Guy.

     On Thursday we realized the marina was closed; the office was closed and no one was around.  I got the idea that we could make it to New York without prop repairs.  It would not be fast, but we had a lot of locks to go through, and fast might not be possible anyway.  I was getting the feeling that no progress was being made, and Guy might not be able to get the prop repaired in a reasonable time.  So, I cranked up the boat and moved out into the St. Lawrence River to check the vibration.





     I backed the boat where Guy said he had 11 feet of depth and found three feet fouled with grass.  I went forward toward the side of the channel where he said he had 5 – 6 feet of water.  Our depth indicator said 20 feet.  We got into the Seaway without any big problems, although we plowed black mud where we were reading 20 feet of depth (?).

     On raising the RPMs we experienced the vibration, but I actually thought we could live with it on the way to New York.  I called Guy to discuss it with him.  He talked me out of going, saying the marina with the travel lift was supposed to call at one pm as well as two divers who could take off the prop.  It was 12:30pm, so I decided to wait.

     I went back into the marina, and came aground on some sand and grass.  Then the engine died.  Then we were able to move forward, but it seemed we were dragging a lot of grass or running through sand.  Then we hit something hard, and the engine died.  I think both props hit something hard.  Then we approached the T-head berth, and we hit something hard again.  I was so upset; it seemed the marina was littered with hard objects under water.

     I called Guy.  He said the travel lift was unavailable because they were taking out local boats for the winter.  He said his divers had not called yet, and he wanted me to move to another slip with more depth for the divers to work.  We moved into the slip next to the one he specified – it was not wide enough.  I called Guy and told him we had gotten moved.  He had not heard from the divers and would be back to the marina at 5pm.  I told him I could get spare props sent by plane to Montreal, and he said we had better do that.

     I worked on these logs and waited.  At 6pm we had heard nothing from Guy.  Later a diver from Montreal called; his name was Andrew.  He said he had met Guy at a yacht club and he told the diver to call me.  We made a date for 2pm the following afternoon; the props were due in at 3pm.

     On Friday I spoke to Guy on the phone.  He had gone to Quebec to get a boat and bring it back to Montreal.  I heard my props were not going to be there until 7pm, so I called Andrew and rescheduled him to 5pm .  During the day I assembled the boarding ladder and added lengths of ropes to my lines so I could move the boat away from the dock and give the diver room to work.  It started to rain.

     At 4pm a van from Vermont showed up with my props.  Andrew and his friend Simon showed up about 5:30 or so.  By 9pm the job was done,  almost all the time in the rain and cold wind.  I put the crates and the damaged props on the flybridge and tied them down with rope.





Montreal, Quebec to Morrisburg, Ontario, Saturday, September 17, 2005

     We left the marina at 9am; Guy towed us out so we wouldn’t hit anything else.  The spare props were not as efficient as the main props, but they did work.  We went up the South Shore Canal and through the two locks, St. Lambert and St. Catherine with a 20-minute wait at the first lock.  We followed a cargo ship into Lake St. Louis, and I passed him, thinking we could get to the next lock before he got there.  That was true, but the lockmaster would not let us go through while he was waiting for the ship.  So we waited two hours for him to arrive and go through the pair of locks at Beauharnois, and then we passed him again.  The weather changed to fog and rain.









     The last two locks we transited that day were also impacted by a cargo ship in front of us, and it was dark when we got out of Eisenhower Lock.  (The two American locks charged $50 US for the two locks.  We paid $20 CAN each for the Canadian locks.  In 2000 we were charged $10 CAN for each of those locks, Canadian or American.)  It was very dark with no moon, but we had radar, paper charts, a search light, and two pairs of eyes.  We did fine, and we even passed a ship going the other way in the dark.  We pulled into Crysler Park Marina at 9:30pm.

     We covered 115 statute miles and went through 6 locks on the day, making our lock total 26 for Trip 4.  We spent 12.5 hours on the water but had only 10 running hours due to the delays at the locks.

Morrisburg, Ontario, Canada to Cape Vincent, NY, USA, Sunday, September 18, 2005



     We left Morrisburg at 9:15am after paying our bill.  We pulled into Cape Vincent at 4:15pm.  Along the way we went through the Iroquois Lock, the last lock on that section of the St. Lawrence Seaway and a guard lock with very little lift (none the day we were there.  It still cost $20 CAN. )  We went through Brockville, Ontario, a very pretty town with a dangerous channel upstream and lots of islands.  It also had lots of sport divers out in the water that day.













     We passed and photographed Singer Castle on Dark Island.  Later we came to Boldt Castle on Heart Island.  We circled it and took lots of pictures.  We cleared US Customs on Heart Island; it was pretty easy to do there.  I let Angela off at a dock on the other side of the river so she could take some pictures of the boat in front of Boldt Castle.











     We cruised around the Thousand Islands near Alexandria Bay, NY and took some photos.  We had toured that area in 1997 and again in 2000.  It was a very pretty area.







     The river got wider as we moved upstream.  We passed a large ship, but there weren’t many of them.  At Cape Vincent the State of New York had a Fisheries Department dock with free docking for a few pleasure boats on a first-come basis.  We tied up there and walked around the town.  The weather had cleared, and we had a pretty day.





     We calculated our mileage at 83 miles for the day.  We added one lock for a trip total of 27.  The high temperature was 78 degrees F.

Cape Vincent to Brewerton, NY, Monday, September 19, 2005

     Leaving Cape Vincent we were shortly in Lake Ontario, which was like an ocean.  We had seas of 2 to 4 feet, and it was uncomfortable for an hour and a half.  The later part of the crossing was smoother.  We arrived at Oswego, NY about 11am.

     The Oswego Canal runs 23 miles up to the Erie Canal, and we began immediately to go through Lock 8.  We bought a 2-day lock pass for $20, the minimum we could buy.  Locks 6, 7, and 8 were transited quickly.  I found a railroad bridge with less clearance than the charts said and sheared off the anchor light.  I should have turned down the light as I did the antennas as we approached the locks.

     The Oswego Canal, and the Erie Canal, had 10 mph speed limits.  Bridge clearances were as low as 20 feet.  We went up through 7 locks on the Oswego Canal and one lock on the Erie Canal for a total of 8 locks for the day and 35 for Trip 4.

     We arrived in Brewerton about 5pm.  We stayed with our friends, George and his daughter Kim, at ESS-KAY Yards for the night.  They’re nice folks; we met them in 1997 when we first came through that area.  We ate on board, trying to empty the refrigerator before the long winter storage.

     Before we got into our slip for the night, we heard about Tropical Storm RITA, destined to be a hurricane.  It was reported to be taking aim on Houston, Texas.  In our slip we were blocked by trees, we think, and could get no news on the satellite television.

Lay Day, Brewerton, NY, Tuesday, September 20, 2005

     I had a dilemma – should I continue with my plans to go to a class reunion at Virginia Tech and give a lecture there, or change my plans and go home?  The news on the hurricane was not good, but the projected path included all of the Texas coast and a small part of the Louisiana coast.  We would not know enough to make the best decision until it was too late to go to Virginia.  As we followed the hurricane through the day we learned that many in Houston and surrounding areas were announcing school and business closings, even though my past experience was the storm usually changed directions unpredictably.  The most recent Hurricane Katrina was supposed to go north up the Florida coast; it actually hit the New Orleans, Louisiana and Mississippi coast area.

     We moved a mile or so west to Winter Harbor Marina, a nice facility with nice people where we were going to leave the boat for the winter.  Our plans were to fly out the following day, and all day we examined our options and compared notes with family and business friends.





     Ultimately we made the decision for me to continue with our plans for Virginia and Angela would go home.  She, and only she, could take care of her orchids and other plants and green house.  She had family there, and so did I.  She could get help if needed, and she could go with some family if evacuation seemed necessary.  But, we wouldn’t know for a few days where the storm would actually go ashore.  Our experience was they almost never go where they are first projected to go.

     Angela and I met Leslie at the office and Jim, the Service Manager.  We made lists of things to do, and we packed for home.

Brewerton (Syracuse), NY to Houston, TX, Wednesday, September 21, 2005

     We flew out of Syracuse at 9:15am.  In Detroit Angela planned to fly to Houston due to Hurricane Rita.  What we found out was no one could get to the airport to pick her up due to a massive traffic jam there.  We changed her plans again, and she and I flew to Roanoke, Virginia.  We carried out our plans to attend a class reunion there, and then we flew to Houston on Sunday.  We had round-trip tickets with our return to Syracuse set for May 15, 2006 .

Statistics for Year 2005 Cruise, Trips 1, 2, 3, and 4:

              Engine  Generator                 Fuel        Fuel        Run     Lay    Travel  Total   No. of
              Hours      Hours      Miles    Gallons     Costs       Days   Days   Days   Days  Locks

Trip 1       55            53          850        1437      $3253          6         1        2         9         9
Trip 2       72            48        1010        2109      $4900         12         5        2       19         9
Trip 3       40            77          335          515      $1404          9         4        2        15       45
Trip 4       41            69          455          720      $1670          7         5        2        14       35      

Total      208          247         2650       4781      $11227        34       15        8        57       98

 
Average speed was 12.7 mph 
Fuel Usage was 1.80 gallons per mile
Fuel Cost was $2.35 per gallon 
Fuel Cost per mile was $4.24
Running hours per running day was 6.1
Gallons per running hour was 23.0 
Miles per running day was 78
Generator hours per running hour was 1.19 

     Shown below are photos of M/V ILLUSIONS after being placed inside one of the two storage buildings for the winter.