Day 92 - Sat 27 Jun 2015
Docked - Gananoque, ON

[photo: Diane hoisting the quarantine flag as we cross into Canadian waters]

The day dawned bright and mostly sunny with very comfortable temperatures for me, but I still put the heat on a little for Diane. The hot coffee did taste good, though. There were, once again, close to a thousand little bugs littering the entire boat, so out came the hose to clean them all off and to fill the water tank.

The wakes that kept the boat rocking (not terribly, but noticeably) most of the day until sunset diminished to nothing after dark. By 0600, however, dozens of bass boats went zipping out to the river from marinas closer to the mainland and didn't even think about what their wakes were doing to those of us here. Boaters like to complain about FL as one of the rudest places, but we have seen lots of rudeness in every place we have boated so far.

We cast off before 0730 and had another breath-taking ride. This time, it was even better because we were winding through and very near many of the Thousand Islands, staying well clear of the charted rocks and watching both the water and depth sounder for anything to cause alarm. Unlike many places along our journey so far, hitting bottom here means hitting rock and certain damage.

It was a thrill to cross the line into Canadian waters and Diane attached our yellow quarantine flag at the bow. After a total of about 1.5 hours, we had wended our way through dozens of gorgeous islands dotted with homes and docks, and arrived at the municipal marina at Gananoque, Ontario. We went straight to the customs check-in dock, tied up, and I went ashore with the ship's papers to the pay phone to make the toll-free call.

It took about 15 minutes in total, and all was in order except our stores of alcohol were deemed too much to 'let slide.' The limits are ridiculously small, and prices are ridiculously high here compared to most US locations (not NY, which is also high). There is much talk about bringing and declaring alcohol amongst those crossing the border, especially us Loopers who elect to traverse Canadian waters. In our case, rather than pay outrageous Canadian prices, we elected to bring a fair amount from the US, and we elected to be honest about our declaration, which we are certain not all do.

We were told the outcome can vary greatly with the person at the other end of the phone and despite our female agent being very nice and apologetic about it, she levied a duty/tax fee of $330 US on us. I estimate that the cost of the US alcohol plus the duty/tax was about a wash for us buying it here in Canada. I also believe there was a very good chance we could have lied and avoided all or most of the tax, but our conscience is clear and there is no risk of confiscation or stiff fines by getting caught.

After clearing in, we moved to our slip for the next 2 days, removed the Q-flag, and then hosted the Canadian courtesy flag from our RADAR mast. Clyde the cat has now been in 3 separate countries. Following the usual post-arrival log entries and chores, we got changed and walked around the town to get our bearings. Overall, first impressions are very good with very friendly locals.

Several people wanted to be sure we were aware of the Rib Fest and Craft Fair in town this weekend. It boasts a lot of tents with crafts and food, but only one small one with beer where instead of kegs of fresh beer, volunteers from the local Lion's Club open bottles for the patrons one at a time. When I inquired (without trying to sound like an American who thinks we do everything better), the man said he had been served beer out of kegs in the USA and thought it was great, but licensing laws in Ontario don't permit it. Anyway, the ribs and chicken combo platter we shared was quite good, and plenty filling.

There is music tonight, but it sounds like it will be a bit late for our cruising-style waking hours. After walking for quite a bit, we used the "buy one, get one" ticket from the fest at the local Thousand Islands Playhouse to purchase tickets for tomorrow's matinee performance of The Pirates of Penzance. We are looking forward to it, except for the longish walk in the rain forecast of most of tonight and tomorrow. Back at Diva Di, I calculated we walked over 4 miles.

I believe I have learned from an experience in Clayton yesterday and now here at the Playhouse that I need to stop being so considerate when in line for service. I typically do not crowd the person in front of me, and I would often stand a good 5-6 feet behind the counter if the clerk was on the phone just to give them some space. Well, in both instances, someone else walked right up in front of me to crowd the desk clerk and asked for service. In the first case it happened so fast that I was stunned and lost my turn. Today, I quickly stepped up and made sure the clerk knew to serve us next. I can't say it is rudeness on the others' part; it just may be cultural conditioning that if I am not up there in the clerk's face, I obviously must not want service.

The day grew quite overcast by noon and cooled down a bit. The locals are saying how summer is slow to get here, and that the river (St. Lawrence) water is only 65, but at least that is warm enough for swimming. Even I have only one thing to say to that - Brrrrr! Chatting with other boaters on the dock later, everyone was saying this is one of the cooler and wetter starts to summer they have seen.

I really hope that is not the trend for the rest of our trip or it will truly be the land of the Cold, Wet, Fog and Tides, as my new cruising buddy, Robert, likes to say. He might chuckle to know I have created a personal acronym, CWFT, pronouncing it 'cowfoot,' to describe the conditions. So far, we have had no fog or tides, but those are surely coming later.

Speaking of expensive things here in Canada, the pump-out fee (to empty your waste tank) is $20! As much as they wish to protect their pristine waters, you would think they would encourage, rather than discourage, pumping out responsibly. We are glad to have a 42 gal tank that means we can often go over 3 weeks between pump-outs.

We plan to get to Kingston on Mon and stay 2 nights. That will put us just one day behind the tentative schedule we had set to keep the pace comfortable and make it through to MA by early Oct.