We spent the night at Fraser Park Marina. Bobbie visited the nearby library for one last look at e-mail. We were able to walk to a convenient grocery store to re-provision and treated ourselves to dinner in a restaurant. We were up early and ready to start the Trent-Severn on Tuesday, July 5. The canal runs mainly north and west through rivers and lakes with only 10 of its 240 miles in a man-made ditch. The locks on the Trent-Severn are smaller and older than any we had done in the US Rivers or the New York Canal System and proved to be the most difficult. Many of them were manually operated. They were turbulent and moved the boat around as they filled, so we got in a good workout keeping the boat from hitting the walls. The Waterway also provided great views high up at two parallel lift locks, one at Peterborough (going up) and one at Kirkfield (taking us down). Lock #44 is the Big Chute Marine Railway which literally lifts the boat out of the higher body of water (or lower if going south) and transports it over a road and down (or up) into the lower body of water. This was great fun for a hot day in July! On four of the nights on the Waterway we tied to the lock walls, which are part of Parks Canada. We enjoyed the Lock #34 wall in Fenelon Falls on a Sunday. We arrived there in late morning and got the prime spot on the pier from which to visit the town, shop and watch the rental houseboats maneuver the locks all day. On five nights we anchored in different good-sized lakes through which we passed. The small towns near the canal made for great daytime stops as well. We visited the Chocolate Factory outlet store in Campbellford, the Laundromat and grocery in Hastings, the Library in Lakefield and marina service docks in Bobcaygeon and Orillia. We left the Trent-Severn on Thursday, July 14 and motored to nearby Penetanguishene where the mast has just gone back in and where we will attend the Loopers rendezvous this week. In crossing Georgian Bay the ten miles to "Penetang", we crossed our path of last summer. We have now done every mile of the Great Loop but will not make our claim until we reach our point of departure which was Duncan Bay at Cheboygan, Michigan in August 2004. We expect to spend the next two months cruising in what is still our favorite area, Georgian Bay and the North Channel. Jim and Bobbie Wooll
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