Saturday, July 18, 2009
We weren’t passing St. Catherines when I was last able to get internet, we were passing trois-riviere. Rick has just gotten up from a nap and taken the wheel as I was trying to lay down and read. We have now hit 10.5kts a new record and if we keep this up we could be downtown Quebec by 8pm. This could be my last day on the water, probably going to need a few hours tomorrow and than we will have time to refill the propane and gas for the generator and give the boat a good clean for its next leg. Dave, Jay and Blair plan to leave at 7am and meet us in quebec city, it will more than likely end in a good night out before I head home.
‘WE HAVE REACHED’
We are at marina Portneuf. Our neighbours are a young couple Gilles and Nancy, this is their home marina and they gave us lots of advice. We have prebooked our slip for the night in quebec at basin d’louise and apparently we have a large projection show that is put on every night downtown and we will be able to see it from our boat. They also helped us with the tides, we are now into 10 – 12ft tides. We ordered and had pizza delivered to the boat that was an excellent suggestion from them. Gilles has built his own boat, all steel with a volkswagon engine and their plan is to train it to vancouver and do the coast there. We also had a funny experience with the boat between our boat and theirs. The old guy has had his 27.7ft bayliner for two years, he only used it twice last year and he hit 13 boats (we thought this was exageration, until we witnessed him in action). His daughter had told rick to not touch the bow line, so he left it, and the father reversed with it tied panicked jammed it in forward and ran the boat right up onto the dock and swung the stern in Gilles boat almost running right over Rick. Knowing this would happen Gilles and Nancy were on their boat and managed to prevent any damage. Later on a crowd of people gathered on the dock in fromt of the entertainer and we realized they were there to help him dock. Including rick and i there were 9 people on the docks to help including the marina manager and 4 people gathered on a near by catamaran to watch the event. They had 4 people on the bow with two lines attached, he came in way to fast almost put two people in the water and with all that help still hit the dock, almost hit us and luckily Nancy and one other person were on their boat and if you can believe they didn’t have a stern line ready, the old lady handed me a coiled rope not attached to anything as I was stretched across the water trying to pull them in, thankfully Nancy was kicking their stern towards me. Later on Gilles informed us this guy had to be informed that he had to use his holding tank and couldn’t pump straight into the marina, aparantly he thought because he had an older boat the rules didn’t apply to him, two years of owning the boat and he still doesn’t even know if he even has a tank. Rick and I laughed about the event for hours as I took a 5-0 win in our final crib match.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Rick has now been aboard for a month and it has been two weeks for me, we will reach my goal of making to quebec city before I have to return home. It has been a short, but great adventure, a true trip of a lifetime. I enjoyed my time getting to know Ray (who graciously handed over the title of #1 to me) and I enjoyed or nightly ritual of sipping sambuca and eating pie. Rick has been an excellent captain, never making me feel uncomfortable, monitoring his weather and he has prepared the boat to perfection for this trip. We have spent time learning all the ins and outs of the gps and radar systems and have become quit comfortable with their operations just in case.
We have reached the downtown quebec marina. We had one last lock to go through to end my trip, the marina is well protected and is the only thing on the other side. It is with out doubt the biggest marina I have ever been in. The boats are huge.
Rick and I have cleaned the boat, done a oil change and cleaned the racors, she is now ready for the next leg.
Dave, Jay and Blair arrived at 5:45pm, we will reprovision in the morning before I leave.
This trip has given me the full mix of feelings, the excitment of being on the water and the challenge of doing it day after day, missing my family (Julie and Dylan I love you both, see you soon and thanks), the joy of the birth of my niece, and sadly I don’t think this trip will end without the passing of my grandma.
I look forward to returning home where I will post my final blog of this trip and update all the photos. From here on out the posting will be from Dave or RIck. I hope you have enjoyed our trip to this point and thank you all for following along.
Dennis Bedford