All the way to Desoronto

From Cobourg, we finally were able to sail to Presqu'ile Bay...a spinnaker ride of 30 miles! We love this area and it was tempting to spend a bit more time in Presqu'ile. We know we can be back here, however, as it is a great destination for the fall, when the leaves turn golden and red and birds are migrating...

Going through the Murray Canal was uneventful...except for the new fee being set at $4.95 (!!!!!!!!!!) which had us laugh pretty hard.  You are supposed to place your money in a little pouch handed to you by the bridge master while passing the bridge.  And they would give change - if needed!  Why not making things easy for every body and charge $5.00???? Anyhow, our next anchorage was in Big Bay (just made it in before the next thunderstorm), located between Belleville and Desoronto and lastly, Desoronto. Definitely very far from big cities here....

Good bye Toronto

We felt happy with our stay in the big city and we left early on a sunny morning, admiring its golden skyline.  The islands were serene and we caught glimpse of a coyote walking on the beach!

Our next destination was 55 miles east...in Cobourg, Ontario. We had stored our dinghy on deck for the trip as we find that it slows us down ...especially on no wind day like that one. The lake was calm and we arrived in Cobourg at the end of the day, finally enjoying swimming after a week of not being able to do that in the Toronto harbour...

Toronto

For us living in a small city like Kingston, it is tremendously eciting to spend time in a metropolis like Toronto. We had a "program"....the firs t item of which was to visit the Art  Gallery of Ontario in order to see the Picasso exhibition.  The Picasso: Masterpieces from the Musée National Picasso, Paris featured more than 150 highlights from the Musée’s unparalleled collection, including paintings, sculptures, prints and drawings. It was quite captivating despite the fact that we had seen several pieces of Picasso before....but the timeline of his work was very well reprensented here. In the same gallery, we enjoyed another exhibition, this one by the contemporary Chinese artist Zhang Huan: Ash Paintings and Memory Doors. 
Another fun activity was to meet a friend at the new home for TIFF (Toronto Internation Film Festival) which is a beautiful, welcoming five-story complex at the corner of King and John Streets in the heart of downtown Toronto. we had lunch in its Oliver and Bonacini restaurant and enjoyed the fashionable Toronto crowd!
Besides our long walks in the Chinese quarter, Queen street east and west and Spadina street, we also visited the International Jazz Festival at The Beaches and took the opportunity to visit yet another part of Toronto.https://www.google.com/search?q=the+beaches+toronto&hl=zh-TW&rls=com.microsoft:en-US&prmd=imvns&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=4RQkUJynN_GEygHNtYGYBw&ved=0CG8QsAQ&biw=1280&bih=849

As we had our folding bicycles on board, we used them to tour all the Toronto islands. And what fun it was! Among the highlights, there was the second oldest lighthouse of the Great Lakes, at Gibraltar Point.  The Island Lighthouse is the oldest landmark in Toronto. From its site on Gibraltar Point, it has watched most of Toronto's history unfold; its light beam has, for more than 150 years, been a welcome guide for the mariner into the Harbour of Toronto. And it appears that the lighthouse keepers and his family became the first inhabitants of this area, slowly drawing more and more people to its quiet land. There are
over 600 residents and 250 houses on the islands. We toured both communities located on Algonquin island and Wards island.

We ended our bike tour with a huge ice cream cone while looking at kids having fun on the rides of the Centreville Amusement Park !!!!

Getting to Toronto and its islands

 Toronto's harbour is busy with ferries, offers a great skyline and the rumours of the big city fill the air...until you penetrate the green oasis of the Toronto islands.. It is an amazing contrast!
After a day of strolling in the busy and dusty streets, we enjoy returning to the boat and enjoy the serenity of the anchorage.

At night, the CN tower profile was visible from our boat, not letting us forget that the big TO is just around the corner.

Our stay in the Toronto Islands

We left early next morning, not being able to imagine drinking our first coffee while smelling guano!!!! In order to get to the Toronto Islands, one has to enter the Toronto Inner harbour...see map. We sailed from  number 17 ...and made our way to a secluded little bay where we were undisturbed for the 6 following days. The red dot on the map indicates our anchorage.

Oak Orchard or Toronto???

We leave Irondequoit very early (6am) and make our way west. The 15 knots winds soon stop and we are left motoring. As a cold front is forecasted for the next day, we decide to take advantage of the fair weather to make our way to Toronto...only 80 miles to go! 

Anyhow, this was not the best of passages: we had no wind for 8 hours (contrary to the weather forecast), with a overheating engine (because of a broken impeller…) and with an automatic pilot on strike…But this was not all: when the wind came up, it did with 15 -20 knots from the south west and we found ourselves unable to keep tracking to Toronto. Then the big thunderclouds towering over the cities of Toronto and Hamilton for the last couple of hours decided to move our way and we had squalls and thunderstorms creating 5 to 6 feet waves accompanied by heavy winds and forcing us to head more and more away from Toronto! When the whole thing blew over, it was 11pm and we could finally resume our course towards our destination…and entered Toronto harbour around 2am. Ah! That beer tasted good wth leftover sandwiches! A feast barely disturbed by the overpowering smell of the cormorans inhabited islands.

So good that you cannot smell this photo!!  Just too many cormorans breed in the region, destroying all vegetation!

Irondequoit, NY

We are inching our way west in the hope to get to Oak Orchard,NY and from there, to cross the lake to Toronto (50 miles). Rather than stopping in Rochester where it is not possible to anchor, we venture in Irondequoit Bay, 5 miles east of Rochester. It is Sunday and we expect a lot of commotion and traffic in the area (we remember too well the zillion of power boats zipping in and out of inlets in Florida on weekend days!). But the crowd here is well behaved : they actually respect the 5mph speed limit in the canal leading into the bay. The area is attractive with a fjord look…meaning, it is not easy to anchor because it is very deep except ..when you are on the beach. Heiner manages to find a spot – he always does! – besides moored power boats and people standing in water with their drinks.

Chimney Bluffs and Big Sodus Bay

Today was the perfect day for "walking about"....First we biked and revisited the tiny village of Fair haven: it is reminiscent of New England sea side villages with pretty wooden houses. We then left the bikes on the beach at the State Park and proceeded to walk in direction of the bluffs. The rocky beaches are strenuous to walk...and then a bit in the forest...and then back to the beach along the bluffs. The following pictures are ours (yesterday's were taken from the internet)...pretty amazing geological structures! After 4 hours of this walking about, we were really happy to come back to the boat and go for a swimm...

Tomorrow, easterly winds should give us an easy ride to Great Sodus Bay, only 15 miles west from here.

Already planning ahead for our visit of Toronto, we phoned the Harbour Centre Marinas and were shocked to hear that it costs $20.00 to dock your dinghy there for 3 hours. $20.00!!! Canadian hospitality????????????????????  But then, parking is expensive in TO!

Little Sodus Bay

Early rise this morning: 5h30 am. The northerly winds were just beginning and we had a nice ride for the first 38 miles of our trip. At about 14h00 however, that was it: no more! We started the engine and just motored, surrounded by too many lake flies...We passed the Chimney bluffs, an amazing geological sight: born in the ice age and sculpted by erosion and glacier, those bluffs are the highlight of the area.
We are currently anchored in Little Sodus bay and the water is 27C!!! Beautiful swimming! We will spend the day tomorrow wandering around or biking around..not sure yet. Life is good.

Relaxing in Cape Vincent

We came to Cape Vincent for the French festival but also because it was a nice place to relax and to get in the cruising mode for our three weeks circumnavigation of Lake Ontario.  As I previously stated, the village is beautiful, very relaxed (when the crowds are gone) and it has a public library with a great deck overlooking the lake where one can have access to Wifi 24/7!

Here I am sitting and downloading the photos for our blog!

Fireworks

The parades day ended with a marvelous firework! The best thing about it was that our boat was anchored in such a way that the fireworks exploded right ABOVE us!!! What an amazing experience!

La Bastille day

So far away from France but so close! Every year, on La Bastille day, the small village of Cape Vincent celebrate the alliance between the American and the French because Cape Vincent almost got to be the nouvelle patrie of Napoleon..before he choose to escape to Elba, instead. Well, tant pis for Napoleon ... and too bad for us, North Americans - we could have our French baguettes every morning instead of soft (gummi) bread. Anyhow, here in Cape Vincent, they decided that the French presence of the late 18th century (up to middle of the 19th century) was worth a celebration. It is now called the Festival francais and draws crowds of near 10,000 people every year.  Bands of all kinds, from Big Band style to Scottish Bagpipes march through the beautiful trees lined streets of the village.

Canada Day!

The weather was picture perfect for Canada Day on the water. On this day, many Canadian boats choose to fly a large Canada Flag in the rigging.  We opted .... as self-declared Canadian ambassadors, to fly the flags of all the countries we had visited with La Buena Vida.  It made a nice colurfull display.  And then we went into town (Gananoque) to get some pulled pork!