LAKEFIELD

At anchor in Cameron Lake, woke up completely enveloped in dense fog. I could tell the sun was up, but not where it was, and the shoreline cottages near where we anchored were non-existent. Although we could have weighed anchor, there was hardly any point, since the lock did not open for another hour and a half at 9 AM. After coffee, I took advantage of the wet boat and wiped it down, getting at least some of the accumulated dirt off of her. Every morning I try to get rid of all the cob webs on the boat. I even bought a special brush to use, which demolishes the webs without harming the finish on the boat. I am convinced that if I just let the spider webs go, I would never have to secure anything to the boat - everything would be totally encased in webs.

Combining spider webs and fog...

 Right at nine AM the fog lifted, so we pulled up the anchor and headed over to the lock. We were through the lock by 9:30 and on our way. As we go through the locks, we are surprised by the number of comments we receive about our boat, especially from those who remember the boat heading north the first part of July. Not only the lock attendants (who remember which boats we went through with, as well as our position in the lock) but also from locals who spend a lot of time at the locks watching the boats go through. It's not unusual to here someone say "How was your trip? Did you enjoy it up north? Where are you off to now?" Of course,what many people notice is the hailing port under the name of our boat. They usually ask "Did you bring that all the way from San Francisco?" Thus starts the conversation of how we bought it on the East Coast, have been cruising on & off for three years, have been from New England to the Bahamas and back again, and now are enjoying Canada. All this in a space of the few minutes it takes to go through a lock. Elaine is up at the bow handling the bow line while I handle the stern line, so we don't always hear each other's conversations. It would be interesting to know how much alike, or different, our comments are.

Since it is Sunday, and the weather was nice, there were many, many boaters out on the water today. This includes the ones who just rented a houseboat on Friday and are still learning how to handle it (don't go through the locks with them!). Then there are the unique operators who totally ignore almost all of the rules and are very entertaining to watch, as long as they stay their distance, although, at times, I had to take evasive action. I am really amazed that there are not more boating accidents around here.

We targeted a lock to stay at for the night, but when we got there, we found a busy highway running right next to it, so decided to head on down river to Lakefield, a very nice little town which we had stopped at, just to look around a while, on our way north.  After being on the water an extra hour or two, we tied to the lock wall, then walked the short distance into town for dinner at Cassis Bistro. It was a very nice meal, and a restaurant we would recommend if you are in the area…