Friday, September 14, 2012

Brockville to Quebec City


July 7.  Left Brockville with some light rain and light winds so therefore ended motoring to the first of seven locks on the St. Lawrence, the Iroquois Lock. After transiting the lock around noon the skies began to clear and the rest of the day was another sunny, hot and humid day.  Ended up stopping for the night at Chrysler Park Marina. No more free docking.

July 8. A clear day, sunny and hot again. The winds were from the NE at approx. 10kts and therefore had to motor into it.  Had a relatively short wait at the Eisenhower Lock as the lockmaster was waiting for another boat which never cam.  After the lock we continued to motor.  This time we had a current push us as well and averaged 8kts through Cornwall and 6.5 to 7.5 for the rest of the way.

An increase in wind allowed for some sailing for a few hours prior to heading to Valleyfield.


Tried to call Valleyfield Marina but got no response.  Figured that maybe no one was monitoring their radio even though it was a Sunday with many boats racing in and out of the marina. Once we arrived we noticed that there was a lot of conversation on the radio, apparently they only answered calls that were in French.  Although once moored the people in the marina were friendly.

July 9.  Again a hot and sunny day with light winds to start the day.  Motored to and passed through two bridges with little delay, had to wait a half hour for a freighter.  It was when we got to the locks that we had our longest wait. Two and a half hours as several freighters went through.

Rafting party in the locks
During that time several other boats joined us, four  powerboats and four sailboats. 
The sailboats were all travelling together.   They were from Kingston and were heading to Montreal.  After some conversation they suggested that we should try to go to the Royal Saint Laurent Y C instead of the Point Claire Y C as it had more water and could be easily accessed.  That was where they were heading.  So I went down below and called the club.  Ended up being on hold for some time because as I found out afterwards, they were talking to one of the people from the other boats that were calling in for us and added us to their group.

Once in the lock all the boats ended up rafting with each other.

Catherine's mother 'Mama" visiting
By the time we exited the lock the wind had picked up that we were able to sail close hauled with both main and genoa.  We had such good speed that we remained ahead of the group for the distance from the lock to outside the yacht club.  There we waited for the others to pass us and enter the club first as they had booked for us.

There we were met by Caroline and Mama.  Caroline picked up Oliver to go back to their house for Nicolas’ birthday celebration and Mama stayed behind for a while to enjoy a glass of wine with me.

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July 10.  Sunny and hot again.  Left later than planned as Oliver arrived late from the party, but it made no difference as we arrived at the last set of locks around noon only to find the boats that left earlier that day still waiting to go through the locks.  By this time the wind had picked up and made docking by the lock difficult. First time in a long time I had to try a couple of times to get to the last little space that was available, next to a work barge in front of all the other boats with strong winds and current.

After a two and a half hour wait we finally were let through. Again we rafted with the sailboats from the previous day.  As we left the lock one of the members of their group had engine trouble so they did not continue, all the other powerboats raced on ahead. We puttered along at our average speed and again caught up to the power boats as they were waiting to go through the last two locks.  This time the wait was only a half hour.
South Canal
Saint Lambert Lock and Bridge, Good Bye St. Lawrence Seaway

Once through the last lock and bridge we headed to Longueil Marina for the night.

Longueil Marina
 
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Good-bye Montreal
July 11. Waited for the marina to open so that we could get the deposit back for the washroom key. Another sunny and hot day with little to no wind. Fortunately the current averages 2kts, which really helped our progress.  Prior to Sorel we did get some wind from behind us allowing us to fly the spinnaker for the first time.

1966 original spinnaker
At Sorel marina we bumped the bottom a couple of times as we approached the fuel dock.  After checking in we were told that we could go to the other side of the marina for the night. As we approached the dock we ended up getting stuck in the mud just 15 feet from the dock.  After standing around and looking on, it finally occurred to one of the people on the dock that the marina staff could pull us off the sand bar with their work barge.  An hour later we were off the sand bar and moved back to the other side. 

The marina staff informed us that the water level has been dropping rapidly due to the lack of rain and hot days.

Sorel had a Metro within walking distance where we were able get some provisions i.e. Beer

Lac Saint Pierre

July 12.  6:00am Decided to get an early start as stronger winds were predicted that could make for uncomfortable sailing on the shallow lake St. Pierre.  Again we got stuck leaving the marina, though Oliver was able to push the bow of the boat so that we were able to motor out.

As forecast, the winds did pick up and once we were near Trois Rivieres we were able to sail without the engine running using only the genoa. 

The guidebook suggests that one should leave Trois Rivieres several hours before low tide in Quebec City. Based on our boat speed that would have been the time we were to be in Trois Rivieres and since it was early in the day and everything was going so well we decided to continue on to Quebec City.  With 15kt winds and the current and tidal flow we were able to do 10kts with only our genoa sail.  We continued like this for half the way when we started to fall behind the tide.  At that point we began to motor sail and maintained an average speed of 7 to 8 kts.

A couple of times along the way we encountered some freighters that left such a large wake behind that we got soaked in the cockpit as we crashed through their waves. 
Quebec City YC
By 8:30pm we arrived at Quebec City YC. We covered 98nm that day, our longest run so far.  There we were able to negotiate some reciprocal privileges, one night free and $30 per night for the rest. 

Quebec City
The next day we went into the city where I said good-bye to Oliver, who headed back to Montreal, and I did some shopping at the waterfront Marché.  After the trip into the city it was pool time.
Because of the tide and the current in the next stretch, I decided to wait a couple of days so that I would not have to got through the night, but would be able to travel in day light. This allowed me to enjoy a couple of the hot days by the pool of the club.

Race night @ QCYC, fleet races and tacks through the mooring field then heads accross the wake of a freighter and up river with the tide and then back against the tide, very entertaining.

Good-bye Quebec City


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