Lake Champlain > Hudson River > Home

Courtney drove up from Burlington, left her car in Champly, Quebec, and Ubered in Montreal to hang out with us for a few days. We left Montreal on June 28 with a favorable 2 knot current and cruised down the St. Lawrence - basically due north - only to turn almost 180 degrees and head basically due south toward Lake Champlain.  When we made the turn, we were at Latitude 46°. That's north of Moosehead Lake in Maine and Prince Edward Island in Canada. Nice job, Egret. We dropped Courtney off in Champley and looked forward to meeting her again in Burlington.  

You never know what you're going to see when you're cruising.  Here's a line dancing class in Champly, Quebec.

We love Canada, but we also love getting back to the US.  Sadly, the US was not as excited to have us back as we were to be back.  It took almost an hour to activate a flawed App, be told that I needed to delete the App and reinstall it,  and upload all the information that I had just deleted.  After all of that, it was time for a little celebration.  It might also be time for Roger to get a haircut.

I have a rule that I never have a Cheesesteak when I'm outside Philly.  It's just not right. It can't be the same. It might be unhealthy. Wait, a cheesesteak, by definition, is unhealthy. Well, I obviously broke down, biked 23 miles on our collapsible boat-bikes, and had a cheesesteak.  I have to say, they were very legit. But the 11.5-mile ride back to the boat was not fun.  

It was fun to catch up with nephews, Andrew and Kyle, while in Burlington.

Coming down the Hudson River, we wanted to cut across the top of Manhattan through the Harlem River.  The railroal bridge tender at the beginning of the river had other ideas.  The bridge would be closed for the rest of the day.  No problem, we'll go around Manhattan. It always provides such iconic views. 

When we finished the Great Loop in May 2023, I never finished the blog entries for the Loop.  I think I left everyone off in South Carolina. 

Here is the conclusion to our Adventures on Egret 2.0. We traveled approximately 1400 miles at an average speed of 9 knots through 4 states and two countries.  We transited 102 locks (ok, it should have been an even 100), rising a total of 713 feet.  We spent 4 nights on anchor, 20 nights on free walls at the locks, and 25 nights in marinas. We saw one child, two nephews, one Philly neighbor, and one college buddy, and met lots of new friends along the way. That's a wrap - thanks for reading!!

Ottawa and Montreal

After 126 miles of rivers, canals, and lakes, and 47 locks, the Rideau ends in Canada's capital, Ottawa.  It's a stark contrast from the rural setting of the Rideau to the urban setting of Ottawa.  Horns are honking, sirens are blaring, and bridges need to be raised to let us through.  After our quick trip down the flight of 8 locks in Ottawa, we decided to stay across the river in Gatineau. It's a bit easier on Millie as there isn't a constant stream of people walking by the boat whom she feels compelled to introduce herself to.  

One more picture of the Ottawa flight of 8 locks, this one from the perspective of a tourist.

"Maman" (French for Mom) is a thirty-foot-tall spider who greeted us upon our entrance to the National Gallery of Canada. 

Parliament has been under construction for 24 years and should be finished by 2032 - no rush.

Cheers! From Chapteau Laurier.

Halfway down the Ottawa River, we came across Chateau Montabello, the largest log cabin-style building in the world. 

The foyer to the Chateau.

And they serve a pretty nice dinner.

Our first lock on the Ottawa River is a giant guillotine-style door.

We were very thankful that it didn't have a mechanical failure at the wrong time.

Thursday, June 25, was a super-long day for us.  We had reservations at two locks on the St. Lawrence River, 4 PM and 6 PM, but before we got to those locks, we needed to transit two other locks and travel about 75 miles. If we made it through the first two locks, we would have time to spare and could pull over to grab some fuel.  As we approached the guillotine lock, they told us it was being inspected and that we would need to wait three or four hours. Ouch! We don't have that kind of time.  Just as our contingency plans were being finalized, we were given some good news. The lock would be open in an hour.  We would need to rush, skip the fuel stop, but we could make it to the reservation.  Everything worked well - we didn't make any wrong turns! And, we made our reservation on time.   

After our mad dash, we are happy to be on the lock wall of St. Lambert's Lock.

Fun to walk around Old Montreal.

Also fun to have Courtney on board.