A Start to Our Adventure

Anchored off Grenadier Island

Sal finished his last night shift and headed to Brockville Monday evening after cleaning the house and getting all the last minute things from home that I had forgotten. The boat was docked at Brockville City Marina after a three day shake down cruise with my mom. We had a great sail out of Brockville Friday afternoon with an east wind giving us a smooth run past Mallorytown. We anchored on the North Side of Grenadier Island for the night. Neither of us slept well the first night as we were not used to the sounds and the feel of the boat. But up at 8 am we did a few chores, mostly finishing the plumbing on the holding tank so we could finally use the head (our cedar bucket was not going to do the trick much longer!). Our wind had all but died as we vainly tried to sail past Rockport. A busy Saturday morning on the water forced us to drop our sails and motor through the narrow cut under the bridge to the USA and past Ivy Lea. We anchored off Cedar Island by four and the heat gave us incentive to see how the water temperature was. Refreshing but a perfect way to cool off after a sunny, hot busy afternoon. Another quiet night anchored all by ourselves. We left Sunday afternoon having to start our journey back home as we needed to be back in Brockville Monday morning to do the exchange. Not quite as busy on Sunday we quickly made our way back under the bridge thanks to the strong current, and this time anchored on the South Shore of Grenadier Island. We were just starting to get into the cruising groove and our trip was almost over. Unfortunately another dead calm day led us to motoring back to Brockville.

Mom doing dishes

A little unwanted excitement in Brockville as I found out the hard way that this boat does not turn so well. Only a little scrape on the tip our bowsprit but a well-learned lesson: A full keel has a wide turning radius. I filled up with diesel, water and got our first pump out which must have irritated my plumbing job as I discovered an unwanted leak the next morning.

Sal at the helm

Monday morning had us doing a lot of running around as we did some final groceries and stowage of all the gear that Sal had brought from home. A last minute plumbing job, fingers crossed, looks to have fixed our leak. We headed out of the harbour without any further destruction and pointed our bow southwest, right into a 10-15 knot wind. We motored through the Brockville Narrows and once past, raised the sails. Time to test how close she sails into the wind. It took a few tacks to get the feel of the boat when I head an unwanted pop from overhead followed by a slight splash. A quick look up and down into the water confirmed we had lost in the water the “boot” holding our upper shroud to the spreader. Not a catastrophe but we decided we had better stop sailing as the top part of the mast had an ominous bend to it and though it wasn’t super windy we decided we better not risk it.

Under full sails

We anchored again off Grenadier Island for the night in hopes of a calm morning so I could go up the mast and see if I could figure out a way to secure the stay to the spreader.

Phil came to our rescue again in the morning and was able to go up the mast and use some wire to secure the stay, then did a quick check on the mast head then showed us how our self steering system works. We headed out shortly after with renewed enthusiasm and wishful thinking that it would be the last of our issues.