Assembling the fleet…

On Sunday morning the fleet was ready to move out and begin the Trent-Severn adventure. We would travel in pairs since these small locks could only accommodate two boats this size per lock through. Seabatical would be our partner.

We would be limited in most places to a maximum speed of 6.6 mph and it would be long day with passage through 12 locks. Here are some pictures of the passage.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Above is the name of the boat ahead of us in the lock. Can anyone tell me what it means and its origin? Later that day Xemxija would drift outside the channel in these unforgiving waters and hit a rock with their single engine prop. Mangled it beyond repair. They will be laid up for days if not more.

This was a very special day. I always thought the Loop should be relaxing with stops to picnic and get ice cream and experience adventures. But up until now it has been anything but relaxing for me. Well today turned a page.

 
 
 
 
These two little boys out with their grandfather for the day had never been on a boat. I asked the lockmaster if we could take them aboard before we pulled out and he consented. They were thrilled.

 
 
This is how they open many of the lock gates. Pure manual labor. We pulled over above one lock and waited to take pictues of Joe and Tara locking through. I even was allowed to work the gate for them.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
At Lock #7 the lockmaster said there was a great little ice cream store across the bridge and we could just leave the boats in the lock and go get some. So we all walked over including the lock personnel and we treated them to ice cream. I had Tiger Tail. Never heard of it before but in Canada it is big. After Vanilla, Chocolate and Strawberry were introduced the first mixed flavor to come out and it was Tiger Tail. Orange ice cream with licorice swirls and friends it is delicious.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
On the way to the ice cream shop we saw kids jumping from an old abandoned bridge tressel into the canal. I mentioned that I would love to do that and the lockmaster said I could. Jan then said something to the effect that no-one need worry because I would find a way to weasel out of it. Well you look and tell me who’s the weasel now!

 
 
It was exhilarating! I would not want to do it again and told Tara that she had better get the money shot on the first try because standing up there it was a long way down. I now hold the record for being the oldest person ever to jump off that bridge. The kids were suitably impressed and nobody is going to call me a weasel by gum.

 
 
I have better shots that Tara took if I can figure how to move them to my file. Stay tuned.

Little did my amazed audience know that I was an old hand at bridge jumping having done it with my daughter Kelly in the backwaters of north Florida. She and I went on an odyssey during the mid nineties and saw some kids along a country road doing it near Wakulla Springs. I wonder if she remembers. She was a brave little thing, still in middle school, when we jumped into a natural spring from a concrete bridge along the roadside.

 
 
We ended up at Campbellford home of the world’s largest Tooney where Jan and I went to dinner at Rubbs and had ribs.

 
 
What is a Tooney you ask? In Canada the smallest paper currency is a five dollar bill. Then you go to coins. A Tooney is a two dollar coin and a Looney is a one dollar coin. Now whether they got Warner Brothers permission to borrow from Looney Toons I do not know. TTTTTThat’s all folks!