Day 30 2nd year. June 19. On to Lake Simcoe and Orillia. Miles 18.9. Total. 3153

Woke to a beautiful cloudless day.

Traveled through the last two locks and the coutryside before the lake- Lock 40 Thorah, dropping 14 feet and Lock 41 Gamebridge, dropping 12 feet-

then through a swing bridge and the breakwater into Simcoe Lake.

We lucked out as we entered the lake, it was flat calm this morning. The shore line is lined with homes, at least what shore we could see. Simcoe Lake is 20 feet long and 12 miles wide, half the size of Lake Okeechobee, but twice as deep.

Are traveling with On Business across the lake. This is their cruising grounds. Will take about 2 hours to cross.

Once across lake, we enter Atherley Narrows, the channel that connects Lake Simcoe with Lake Couchiching. The narrows are filled with marinas, five to be exact, and they come in all shapes and sizes. The current through Atherley Narrows is strong and the water is very clear. We can see the bottom at 8-10 feet.

Exiting the Narrows, we enter Lake Couchiching. Couchiching means place where forces meet and squeeze through in the Objiwa language. Will travel across the narrow width of the lake to dock in the city of Orillia’s marina, Port of Orillia.

Got settled at our dock

and walked to the small downtown located on the southeast shore of Lake Couchiching. The town offers easy reprovisioning for boaters and apparently is the place to go to indulge in all the goodies it’s three bakeries can provide. Will have to taste test for you!

Can attest to great sweet and savory tarts, butter tarts, sticky buns, fruit pies, scones, and sandwiches. Don’t know their secret for flaky crust but I wish I did. Bill and I splurged with our lunch at Mariaposa market to get a extraordinary peanut butter cookie smothered in chocolate and M&Ms. Yummy!

After lunch we wandered around town and found the old City Hall which is now an opera house with a show celebrating Gordon Lightfoot, a native of this area. Also found some more old brick buildings and enjoyed the waterfront park. Had to walk off our lunch and cookie.

At the end of the day the marina had a Canadian flag lit up.

Reflections on the Bahamas

Reflections on the Bahamas Over the past 10 weeks, we have traveled through Abaco, Eleuthera and Exuma Islands and enjoyed the hospitality of the Bahamian people. We have learned all about the islands, its unique geography - limestone, caves, blue holes and chalk cliffs; and colorful history-pirates and rum running, salt ponds and cotton plantations, boat building and wrecking/salvage. Traveling over 1300 miles through narrow cuts and wide bays to vast depths of ocean, we negotiated the islands and found safe harbors, calm coves for anchoring, bays filled with moorings and marinas large and small. This trip required us to pay close attention to the weather, the tides and currents as we traveled between and through the islands. The Bahamian people are warm and friendly, willing to give us rides, advice and directions, as well as some secret recipes!! We enjoyed hiking trails, walking the beaches, snorkeling the coral rocks and reefs, discovering ruins and ol...

June 4-5. Day 63-64. On to Cape May New Jersey. 53.4nm. Total 1534 miles.

Left Delaware City at 5:35am to be able to take advantage of the strong currents going with us while traversing Delaware River and Delaware Bay. The Delaware River goes south about 15 miles and flows into the Delaware Bay. As we travel south, New Jersey is to the east and Delaware is to our west. We are traveling just outside the shipping channel and are really moving at 10.9 knots. That is three knots faster than we normally travel, as the outgoing tides are pushing us along. Nice to have Mother Nature helps us save on fuel. The Delaware River is about 8 miles wide so there is plenty of room for the freighters and the pleasure boats. So far, we have not encountered any commercial traffic, but there is a large freighter behind us that will eventually pass us as they travel at 14 knots. The Delaware Bay proper varies from 23-29 miles wide and 26 miles long. There are five lighthouses on the Delaware marking the shipping channel. We went by Ship J...

Day 98. 2nd year. August 27. On to Manistee. Miles 25 Total miles. 3910.

We weighed anchor on a sunny 50 degree morning. So we put on our sweatshirts and drove from below as we left Frankfort. Going through Frankfort’s channel and breakwater we encountered a few intrepid fisherman and further along as we cleared the breakwater there must have been over a hundred fishing boats. Almost like playing bumper cars, but with boats. Had to negotiate a path between them as the fishing boats were all trolling fishing lines behind them. We were still seeing fishermen 4 miles south of Frankfort. These guys sure take their fishing tournaments seriously! The shoreline that we pass heading south are still sand dunes bluffs some as tall as 200 feet. As we travel, we pass the small town of Arcadia and Portage Lake, each situated on an inland lake which is connected to Lake Michigan by a dredged channel. Interesting to note that the dredged channels were originally small rivers connecting the inland lakes to Lake Michigan. As we passe...

Crustacean Travels

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