Author: BobS

Left noonish to stage ourselves 10 miles down river thus saving 2 hours in the morning. Means leaving at 5:30 rather than 3:30. This part of the river is all about leaving at the right time to catch the most favourable current. Wind up around 15 gusting to 22. Ramble On put a jib up but we opted for enjoying lunch. We arrived at our marina on the south side of Île d’Orleans about 2pm. Winds strong abeam down the fairway but on the nose nto th slip — all good. Nice old village spread out along the river.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Relaxing days …. got some boat work done and wandered around the market and then the old town. Much fun time spent on figuring out where dinner will be! The next morning spent wandering the old town to find a bank …. there are none only ATMs. It’s not that I’m old fashioned but I needed coinage for the laundry machines.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day 9 Quebec City. Off the dock about 6:30 this morning with good sunlight and calm waters but around 0C although it didn’t feel as cool as yesterday in the rain. Left early to catch the ebb current. Finally a pretty part of the river with steep sides, lots of trees and some beautiful homes and, of course, many church spires. After the Pont du Quebec we saw the citadel and the Plains of Abraham. Shortly after that we could see the Chateau Frontenac looming above us. Many, many ships as this is an active working harbour. We turned into the narrow entrance to the outer harbour with (thankfully) little current catching us. The lock master saw us coming and started opening the gate —- there is a lock to raise/lower boats for the level of the inner harbour, Louise Bassin. Locking through very civil: one ties up to a dock inside the lock and it floats you to the new level. The marina is lovely and spacious with good services and very helpful staff. We have a view of the old town from our dock. We will be here for 3 nights when John’s wife Nanci joins us and we depart for the Saguenay.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day 8 Portneuf QC. Decided to reduce the number of days to Québec City. We chose Portneuf 70 nm away which necessitated a 7am departure. Lots of current up to 3 knots in our favour and we arrived about 3:30pm. Although sunny when we left it quickly clouded over (as per the forecast) and then rained for a while(not in the forecast!) and it was chilly to say the least. By spelling each other off each hour we were able to keep warm and catch up on our reading ?The sun coming out in the afternoon made the voyage quite pleasant. Lots of ship traffic both ways kept it interesting. The (unforecasted) higher winds made docking a bit of a chore but each boat helped the other so all went well. Tomorrow Québec City.

This morning we enjoyed riding the current out of Montreal at 12.3 knots. Gradually the current decreased to 1.5 to 2 and with the winds picking up we were able to join wind power, engine and current to stay in the high 8s to low 9s most of the day. After 40 nm we were off our destination on the south bank in Sorel about 2pm.

Unfortunately, the marina wasn’t open. A woman from the CNBI club overheard our intra-boat conversation and suggested we backtrack 4 nm and stay there. Although they usually launch late April due to the high waters (currently 9’) they only launched the docks yesterday and their boats today. Even some entrance marks weren’t out yet so we had to navigate in via the marks on our chart plotters. The charts show thin water but with an extra 9’ we never saw less than 14’. A very welcoming club and we were treated well. Kudos to this club!!

 

Set off on a pretty sunlit day down what is now more tree-lined canal than river. The 1st bridge was only 2.5nm away and given no info we set off only to find that the bridge operator wouldn’t respond. However through the magic of AIS we knew a ship was coming in 30 mins. When the ship was in sight the bridge opened and we went through.

It was just under 5 nm to the next lock and the ship did not overtake us although at the lock we had to give way to the ship and wait for it to be locked through. Delayed us about 1.5 hrs. By the time we did get access to the lock a CDN Coast Guard cutter joined us and kept the order to the next lock. We behaved ourselves!! The next lock, Lambert, was our last lock on the St Lawrence.

 

 

Clearing it we had to sail under the old and new Champlain bridges.

We then turned west at the end of le Sainte Helene (remember Expo 7?). Although it was only 1.3 nm to the Montreal Yacht Club it took us about an hour as we were headed into a 5.6 knot current. A long painful segment just creeping along.

 

The yacht club was very nice with good facilities plus all motor boats cause who would have a sailboat there with that current?? A wonderful dinner at the Õréa restaurant in old Montréal just a short walk from the yacht club. All-in-all a tiring day even though we didn’t do much more than 20 nm. But when it ends in a good port and good dinner it becomes all good.

According to the Seaway site bridges at this time of year bridges are on demand for openings for pleasure craft. Just before leaving Chris called the bridge and was told there’s a schedule and the next opening is 11am. So rather than have breakfast on the move we had breakfast before leaving. But guess we gunned it too much as we had about a 20 minute wait once we got there. When the bridge didn’t open at 11 I called on the radio at 11:05. I did not get a radio response but the gates to stop the cars immediately came down. Maybe he was napping. It was a very cool and drizzly day and John’s hot soup was most welcome. At the first lock the light was red so we proceeded to the pleasure boat dock to wait instructions which we received about 45 minutes later. Cruising requires patience ?Both of these locks (Beauharnois 1 & 2) had us with only one boat against the wall with the other boat rafted to that boat. Ramble On was against the wall leaving us little effort in locking through.

We arrived at Kahnawake Marina about 4pm. Originally we were told that the marina wasn’t open enough to accommodate us so we decided we would  anchor in the bay close by. While we were scouting the anchorage we heard a whistle and a man beckoned us in to perch on the end dock. Which means we can plug in the electric heater! Plus it’s a very pretty setting. The sun is out so it’ll be dinner outside.

Warm enough to enjoy Linda’s French toast in the cockpit of Ramble On. No locks today and pretty much a straight shot to Valleyfield. We hugged the north side of the channel as a freighter passed us. We fuelled up at the Valleyfield Marina before getting to our dock. Interestingly, all of the fuel/dock hands were young women. Vry used to seeing several hands as women but think this is the first time it’s all women. Progress? I think so. They were very good.

Chris and I had a saunter around town and picked up some groceries. Very mixed architecture with one church that seemed to be its own style. returned through a lovely waterfront park that contained some of the original canal—very pretty. While it was warm when we arrived it became quite cool later and the rain arrived. Rather like spending a rainy day at the cottage staying inside the boat to read and do small tasks.

 

 

 

Through the 2 US locks today. Almost no wind today plus nice and sunny. Late start as we waited for George Jackson of North Sails to deliver a spin bag for Ramble On and Tarja to kindly drive my laptop battery that Canada Post said they’d deliver 2 weeks from now at the post office. Instead it arrived through our letter box! Off the dock just after 10:30 and headed for the

US locks: Eisenhower and Snell. Had to hold on the pleasure boat dock rafted to each other waiting for the freighter Algoma to lock through. Both locks are a 41’ drop but have a bollard one ties bow and stern lines to and it floats down as the lock empties. Rather civilized. Arrived at our anchorage just east of Cornwall about 3:30. Finnish Line 2.0 is anchored and Ramble On is rafted on. We broke out the bottle of Prosecco that Rosemary and Jim so kindly gave us on our departure to celebrate that one year ago today I arrived back on Finnish Line 2.0 from the Bahamas at KYC.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day 2 and another windy, gusty day that was very cold with the north wind. Sailed the bulk of today up to the lock at Iroquois under just jib and stayed mostly in the 7s but hit 9.2 a few times SOG (speed over ground). Probably a knot and a half of current. John and I spelled each other off so one of us could be below warming up. The Iroquois dock had no visitors’ dock because if the high water but we had prepaid via the app Secunik (probably the worst app I’ve ever used) so we didn’t need to go ashore. Normally this lock would only drop ships/boats by a foot but with the high water it was a 3’ drop … still no biggie. The bigger 40’+ locks are coming but we will always go down which is much easier than going up.

This part of the St Lawrence wasn’t very pretty and had some ugly industrial plants.