Wed June 15: Sackets Harbor to Clayton NY

The day dawned bright and lovely - and EARLY, as we planned to get to Cape Vincent in order to have lunch with Egret, before moving on to Clayton.

Part way into the journey the coast guard began to broadcast a dire marine warning that said, and I may be paraphrasing, 'wind and hail coming, get off Lake Ontario by 2pm or die'. Egret headed for Cape Vincent to tie up and hunker down, and we sped up in order to get to Clayton ahead of the doom.  Darn - we were really looking forward to spending time with them... Ah, the sea - she is a fickle mistress...

This is what the coast guard warning looks like visually.

In spite of the pending storm (of which there was no sign in the sky) we took a minute to appreciate this view of Oh Canada!!

We have been a bit spoiled by the Erie canal, where it was all about us pleasure craft - we were quickly reminded that the St Lawrence River/Seaway is a major shipping waterway, just pretty narrow in parts.

It makes sense to use the air to make energy here - I wish we had that for boats.  Oh wait - that's called a sail.....

Tibbetts Point Lighthouse as we round the edge of Cape Vincent.  Goodbye, Egret...

We are now into the area called The Thousand Islands (which is actually 1864 islands - but that's awkward from a marketing point of view).  I'll let Rick tell you a bit about this.  In the 1700 and 1800’s this area was primarily used as a source of natural resources - that is lumber, animal furs, etc.  It didn’t become a popular summer vacation area until the railroads came in the 1860’s but after that the area exploded as yet another place that rich New Yorkers came to build their summer mansions.  

The region is spread out between the US and Canada. Canada has more islands but the US islands are bigger so total land area is about the same.  In order for a piece of land to be considered and “island” it has to meet 3 criteria.  It has to be above the water year around and at least 1 sq ft in size and it has to have at least one tree growing on it.  In fact these islands are the tops of ancient mountains that were pressed down by ice during the last ice age and ground down by that same ice.  They are mostly granite and further south they join the Adirondack mountains along the west side of Lake Champlain.  Most of the islands are privately owned and there are many large and beautiful homes (more on that in our next posts). 

In the afternoon (since it NEVER GOT STORMY) I got a very unexpected urge to wash things.  I started on these white fenders.  It was very satisfying, as you can see from the Before/After pix.

Then Rick jumped in and we washed and waxed one small piece of the boat.  We agree that this project will be like painting the Golden Gate Bridge...as soon as we finish we’ll have to start all over again.

See how water spotted - no reflection.

Washed and waxed - you can see me!!

Fortunately the urge to wash quickly faded, so we could relax and enjoy the sunset. 

All of us (2 boats that we met in Oswego are also here) sit in a line, on the back of our respective boats, watching the sunset.  It's very peaceful, except for the guy next to us, from TN, who is talking about how he had to send his gun home because the rules about bringing guns into Canada are so strict.... So many thoughts about that - but I bit my tongue.

Goodnight sun.

 

 

Rick tucks the engine into bed.  Awwwwww....