Saturday, June 30 – Day 57:
We dropped our lines from the Kingston Marina, and headed up the Rideau Canal towards Ottawa, 128 miles away. The Rideau Canal was constructed in the 1820’s primarily as an alternate military route between Lake Ontario and Montreal just in case Canada’s enemy to the south ever captured the St. Lawrence River. It consists of a system of beautiful rivers and lakes connected by 49 locks. Today, the Rideau is used primarily by pleasure boaters, cottagers & tourists. All of the locks on the canal are operated by hand via various systems of gears, pulleys and ropes, mostly by young teenage & college-age students supervised by an adult at each lock. At many of the locks, local townspeople come down to the picnic tables at the sides of the lock chambers, with picnic baskets, and watch the show of the boaters trying to maneuver the boats of various sizes and lengths through the locks. Some of the locks are multi-level, (called flights), to break up the elevation difference among several chambers, so that when you leave one lock, you immediately enter the next lock. The 7 locks that we did today, even though charming and nostalgic, tested Belinda’s patience to the max because the lock chambers were extremely small with lots of turbulence and required quick securing of Rickshaw fore & aft else we might end up sideways in the lock. As you know, Belinda is very petite and has (according to her) very short arms to enable her to quickly grab the cables hanging down the chamber walls while Jim attempts to keep Rickshaw close and parallel to the lock walls. The rivers and lakes between the locks were very picturesque and, at times, appeared to be in the middle of a wilderness with only a few summer cottages peeking through the dense forest. We decided to call it a day after only 25 miles at Morton Bay, which was a very protected & scenic anchorage surrounded by steep granite walls within just a short distance to our anchoring spot. Since tomorrow is Canada’s independence day, Canada Day, there were several ski-boats, pontoon boats and wave runners in the bay, but by 5pm, all other boats except for one other cruiser had pulled up their day anchors and headed back to their summer cottages, leaving the bay almost completely deserted. It was great after so many nights in marinas and town dock walls to finally be able to sleep under the stars with the windows open, feeling the cool lake breezes blowing through the aft cabin.
We dropped our lines from the Kingston Marina, and headed up the Rideau Canal towards Ottawa, 128 miles away. The Rideau Canal was constructed in the 1820’s primarily as an alternate military route between Lake Ontario and Montreal just in case Canada’s enemy to the south ever captured the St. Lawrence River. It consists of a system of beautiful rivers and lakes connected by 49 locks. Today, the Rideau is used primarily by pleasure boaters, cottagers & tourists. All of the locks on the canal are operated by hand via various systems of gears, pulleys and ropes, mostly by young teenage & college-age students supervised by an adult at each lock. At many of the locks, local townspeople come down to the picnic tables at the sides of the lock chambers, with picnic baskets, and watch the show of the boaters trying to maneuver the boats of various sizes and lengths through the locks. Some of the locks are multi-level, (called flights), to break up the elevation difference among several chambers, so that when you leave one lock, you immediately enter the next lock. The 7 locks that we did today, even though charming and nostalgic, tested Belinda’s patience to the max because the lock chambers were extremely small with lots of turbulence and required quick securing of Rickshaw fore & aft else we might end up sideways in the lock. As you know, Belinda is very petite and has (according to her) very short arms to enable her to quickly grab the cables hanging down the chamber walls while Jim attempts to keep Rickshaw close and parallel to the lock walls. The rivers and lakes between the locks were very picturesque and, at times, appeared to be in the middle of a wilderness with only a few summer cottages peeking through the dense forest. We decided to call it a day after only 25 miles at Morton Bay, which was a very protected & scenic anchorage surrounded by steep granite walls within just a short distance to our anchoring spot. Since tomorrow is Canada’s independence day, Canada Day, there were several ski-boats, pontoon boats and wave runners in the bay, but by 5pm, all other boats except for one other cruiser had pulled up their day anchors and headed back to their summer cottages, leaving the bay almost completely deserted. It was great after so many nights in marinas and town dock walls to finally be able to sleep under the stars with the windows open, feeling the cool lake breezes blowing through the aft cabin.
Parts of the Rideau Canal are narrow and windy ......
....other parts of the Rideau Canal are large lakes dotted with picturesque islands.
Our anchorange in Morton Bay - by dark there was only one other boat in the bay. Notice our Candian courtesy flag. It is customary to fly the flag of the country you are visiting.
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