Miscellaneous Pictures

Sign for the turn to the Erie Canal












Most of the locks on the Trent-Severn Canal are manually operated. The lockmaster has to go around and around in circles to open and close the gates. Wonder how many miles a day during the summer they travel.


The lowest gas price we saw in Canada was 97.9…..per liter. That translates to $3.72/gallon. Mostly gas was over $4/gallon. And we squawked about high gas prices in the US!















Trish staring at the big lock doors as they close us in, with big, deep reverberating clangs.

















“Johnny Cash” at the Wanted Man concert, a tribute to Johnny Cash. As Ned said, “he was better than Johnny Cash was, even when he had a good day.” Wow.















The Peterborough Lift Lock. Each of those trays you see are full of water. When one is at water level, the other is at the top of the lock. The boats drive in, water is let in to make the tray heavier, it comes down and the boats drive out.


This is the view from Koko in the tray of water as we rode up the lift lock.











The other unique lock we went through was the Big Chute Marine Railway. It was like a great big travel lift with 2 slings in it. After you drove your boat into the sling, the railway came up out of the water and started up and over the hill. It was cantilevered so that the boats in the sling were always perpendicular to the carriage, even when going down the steep slope.

Inukchuks are rock cairns built to look like a man that simply show that someone has gone here before or passed this way. It is a distinctive landmark to native Inuit travelers on their journeys in the Canadian Artic environment. This is a hostile and an unforgiving environment and any sign of someone else being there is comforting.
We saw many of them along the water and it inspired Paul to dinghy ashore and build his own.




This is Devil’s Door Rapids on the Bad River. They are only about 1 foot tall, not very imposing at all. Lots of people with dinghies ride right up over them to get to the great fishing and exploring waters beyond. We decided to try it in Daisy. It turned out to be the site of our first (and only, so far) capsizing. Our little ole 3.3 Mercury engine just couldn’t get us up and over and we got turned sideways and over we went. Fortunately, I had put Ned’s camera in a plastic bag and the bag held! Whew! Stan did lose his good fishing pole, but we were able to retrieve my Croc and his tackle box, both of which floated. The current was enough to speed us down river and it wasn’t until we came to a big boulder about 4 feet under water that we were able to stand up. It took about 20 minutes to get Daisy turned back over and pumped out and then both of us back into Daisy. What an adventure. Thank goodness the water wasn’t freezing, just chilly.


There were a lot of seaplanes in Canada. This one at Killarney was kept on a pad above the river and he just rolled down the ramp into the water and away he went.

The main reason for stopping at Killarney is the “fish bus”. This converted school bus sells fried fish and chips from the window and does a gazillion dollars of business in the short 3-4 month season. People come from far and wide to partake. And Killarney is off the beaten path—you’ve gotta want to get there, it doesn’t just happen by chance.

The Benjamin Islands are made up of granite, yet lots of tall trees grow on them. When we were there we saw quite a few had been blown over in a swath by high winds. When we saw how amazingly thin the dirt cover was, and thus how the roots only went down less than 2 feet, we were incredulous that there were so many big trees. This is a picture of one of the recently toppled pine trees. Note how shallow the dirt layer is, even though the roots are wide spread.

Paul, Ned and Stan with our anchorage at the South Benjamin Islands in the background. The Benjamins are uninhabited islands.





















Spiders on the boat were common in Canada. I don’t know if it’s just the season or if it’s a Canada thing, but they were all over. Even the marinas in Canada sell spider spray, the problem is so pervasive. This was taken on a misty morn so the web is easily visible.





Mackinac Island prohibits any vehicles other than ambulances and police cars, so getting around is done by bicycle or horse carts and carriages. The horses are all draft horses—Belgians, Percherons, etc. This picture is of horses that had just backed into the driveway for a restaurant so the supplies could be delivered. Notice how they are leaning away from the load to keep it from going on down the hill. It was most interesting to see the driver make the horses go backward and to maneuver the cart around the corner into the driveway.


While on Mackinac Island we toured the old restored military fort on the hill above town. We were looking at the glass panes in this window to see if we could tell which were original and which were replaced. Then we noticed the reflections. The blurry ones of the fence were original glass, the clear, straight line reflection was new glass.










I had told Stan several times during our trip that I sure missed our kitty cats, which are in Minnesota being cared for by our son and his wife, Justin and Angie. Lo and behold, on my birthday at the end of August Stan got me but a new cat. It’s a yellow stripe cat, so he’s a male. He’s a great boat cat. Here he’s stretching out after a nap. His name is Kittipelli.