TRENTON to BLUE HOLE Anchor / Thursday, June 23 (Day 154)

Admiral's Log:     9 am, Thrs. 6/23/16
                         Air Temp:   59     Water Temp:   71
                        Winds:   2 mph
                        Speed:   4.8 knots

We are on our way down the 240 mile Trent Severn Waterway! Another highlight we have been looking forward to. Beautiful sunny day!

Our route starts at Trenton, Lock #1 (far right corner) going across the page to the left

Then we continue from right to left and end at the upper left corner at Severn River, Lock #44

The Bridge says "Gateway to the Trent Severn Waterway"

Some people have done this route in 5 days, but that is pretty much non-stop and not stopping to smell the roses.  We figure we will take about 2 weeks. There are so many cute little towns and stuff to do along the way.

We went through locks 1-7 today. The lock masters as so friendly and helpful. The young lady at the first lock even took photos of us for me. Once you are raised up to the top the lock, the lock masters come and talk to us; ask where we are from, ask about then Loop etc. 

This was at the first lock where we bought our 10 day pass. 

This was also in the first lock, YUCKO!

This first lock was kind of intimidating. It was our first one for one thing, then they squeezed four boats in at one time, we all had to tie on the right side (starboard), plus one boat had to raft onto us. 

Mike has to get me in position on the stern (rear of boat) where I can grab a plastic coated cable and hook a line around it to keep us from moving in the lock. Then he has to shut down the engines, run to the bow (front of boat) and loop his line around a cable. Takes a couple of locks to be able to figure what cable to grab. But I got the hang of it pretty easy. Boat hooks come in quite handy in these situations!

Rowe Boat approaching the lock

Vagabond, Rowe Boat and Phase II, with 4th rafting to us and Phase II

Lock master taking our pics before we are raised up.

Lori from Phase II

Mike all the way up.

The gates are turned manually which is kind of cool. I even got to help!

Some locks take 2 people to manually close the gates

Harder to push than you think!

All the locks have cute little parks and tie ups and even bathrooms, incase you have to wait a while or even over night if you miss the closing time. The Blue Line painted on the wall is where you wait for the lock to open.

You can really see the water level difference here.

Each lock master takes great pride in how their area looks, some even have competitions 

Blue Line painted on the walls before each lock

Crazy Canadian kids in the cold water.

When we got to our anchorage around 3:30, Mike and I lowered our dingy and tried our hand at a little fishing. No luck, but it was a nice quiet, peaceful afternoon. Leftovers for dinner and a little reading before bed.