PETERBOROUGH SITES

(No photos today - only internet access is via incredibly slow phone service!)

Morning in Peterborough and have a to-do list for the day. One thing is to buy a new pair of deck shoes. I love the pair I’ve been wearing the past several months, but toes showing through the front suggest they are beyond repair. I have this thing about selecting great, comfortable deck shoes, but when they wear out, I can never find the same shoe. It has happened again, so I’ve got to buy something today while we are in a large town. Also on the list is a visit to the Canada Canoe Museum. The area in which we are cruising has been known for many decades as a center of canoe and kayak activity. Canadian Olympic gold medalists in both canoe and kayak actually live in Peterborough and several world renown canoe manufacturers have been based in this area.

So, after an unsuccessful quick trip to the local boat store for deck shoes, we rode our bikes over to the museum. It was a very impressive facility, with an incredible collection of historic canoes and kayaks as well as a hands-on approach to keeping the tradition of building them alive. They have restoration projects, children's workshops, educational outreach programs, a complete course in birch bark canoe building and much more. I was very impressed. But they didn’t have deck shoes, so after our museum visit we biked on over to the local mall where I found a pair of deck shoes, although not the same kind I had just worn out.

Back at the boat we got ready to head off again and left the marina about 1:30 in the afternoon moving on towards the lift lock. As impressive as it appears from the shoreline, I have to admit, it was a bit of a disappointment to go through it, only because it was so effortless. In many of the locks we have traversed, we have had to deal with severe currents, strong turbulence, other boaters with  questionable maneuvering skills, slimy walls. etc, etc, but this was a piece of cake. The approach was dead calm water, we locked through with a commercial tour boat, there was absolutely no turbulence or water movement, and the only issue was being side by side with the tour boat, with only inches to spare, and getting our fender board caught on his side cleat as we were exiting the lock. Elaine handled it well, and we got through the lock without issues. It’s really like going into a big bathtub and having the tub and all lifted 65 feet in the air to the next river level.

We moved on up the waterway, going though several more conventional locks and talking with the lock attendants as we did so. We always ask their advice on places to visit, where to tie up and what to watch out for. Today, we got the advice to tie up above lock #24. All the other lock attendants are jealous of the new washroom and shower facilities at #24. So we stopped on the upper side of #24 and are taking advantage of their new facilities. It’s really pretty incredible how friendly the lock attendants are. They helped us tie up to the wall, offered to move a picnic table over by the boat, and came back as they were leaving for the day with the keys to the new washroom so we could use it while the lock is closed overnight.

We are the only boat here, so we have had a quiet evening barbecuing steaks and sipping wine. It’s calm, quiet and so much more peaceful than listening to the ruckus at the marina last night…