June 17-23 

In doing some reading in the tour books, I have learned that the Thousand Islands Park, which is also referred to as the St. Lawrence Islands National Park starts at Kingston and go as far as Brockville,

it was our goal to see and stay at many of the Parks Canada islands as we could, or to at least cruise by them if we couldn’t fit on their docks.    The Thousand Islands are made up of 1824 islands, and to be considered an island it must have at least one living tree.  The islands were named around 1815 by Captain William Owen; since the war of 1812 was just over he wanted to commemorate the new British territory by naming the islands after the men and their ships.  He tended to group the islands together and called the western most the Admiralty, and named the islands after admirals of the war years i.e.) Forsyth, Bostwich.  South east of these are a long chain of islands which he grouped as the Lake Fleet islands and named them after ships and gunboats i.e.) Bloodletter, Niagara, Camelot.    West of Ivy Lea, lies the Navy Islands named after captains of the Lake Fleet ships i.e.) Mulcaster, Downie and Owen.  The last group of islands at the Eastern end are referred to as the Brock group, named after Sir Isaac Brock, and the men who served under him.  Other islands within the Thousand Islands reflect the names of local owners i.e.) McDonald island

As we were getting ready to leave Trident, I noticed these turtles sunning themselves on this log. 

Looked like quite the party.  I then looked down at these floating maple leaves, and saw this tiny turtle. 

We left Trident at 10:30, and stopped at one of the docks at Beau Rivage,

however being a beautiful Sunday, there were lots of power, sail and seadoos around making a lot of waves.  We stayed for a couple of hours and then thought it was time to move on.  We went back to Endymion, where there was space on the dock and tied up.  We had two other boats join us for the night.  It was a hot afternoon and I sat on the back of the swim platform with my feet in the water.  It was too cold to go swimming, and because I had seen at least two water snakes, there was no way I was going in even if it was warm.  I did have a couple of perch come and investigate my toes in the water.

On Monday morning there was suppose to be a weather front coming through with rain and strong winds-so we just stayed.  I read yet another book “the Help”—I’ve think I’m up to 10 books for the trip so far.  We could hear the wind howling, and there were white caps but we were sheltered at the dock.  Around 4:00 the rain started and it really cooled off outside.  The wind had switched during the night and there was some bumping on the dock.  Unforgettable Satellite, the   boat that was across from us on the dock, move in front of us on our side of the dock, as the waves were really bouncing them around.  The winds subsided as the morning went on and by 11:00, we decided it would soon be time to see some new islands.  We left at 11:30 and moved to Georgina Island,

which is very near the Thousand Island Bridge connecting the USA and Canada.

We arrived by 12:55.  We took a walk around the island as there were other docks on the south side,

but the current looked quite strong there and we likely would have had issues docking.   Where we were, the Gananoque and Uncle Sam Cruise ships came by ever hour or so- making waves; — thankfully they don’t run at night. In the evening, Andy tried fishing from the dock he had caught several fish, but without a net, kept losing them before he could land them on the dock.  At dusk I saw this   raccoon, by the shore digging in the stream-Andy figures he was either catching fish or clams.  The park’s signage warned of aggressive raccoons- not sure if this one was or not.    I later saw this bird- buzzard? eating a fish.   The traffic noise from the bridge didn’t disturb us at night.  In the morning before 7 a.m. the water was extremely calm, as no boats were coming down the channel yet.    I watched these 3 buzzards sitting on a tree near our boat for over an hour, it seemed like they were checking us out.    We decided to leave for another island at 11: 30, and cruised to West Grenadier, however the depth dropped off really quickly and we weren’t sure of what the depth was at the dock, so we backed out.   Instead we went back to Central Grenadier, where we had been the previous week.   There was a large boat at the end dock, where we had previously tied up, so we pulled into one of the finger docks.  The people in the large dock were only stopping for lunch, so once they left we returned to the end.    That evening, Wednesday, there were 6 boats at the dock.  They slowly left as the morning progressed, and by noon we were alone.  It was very peaceful, hot and calm.  I read another book, and Andy took the dinghy down, and paddled around the bay trying to convince the bass and perch that he could see in the water to bite his hook.  But they weren’t interested.   No one joined us on the dock for Thursday night.    Friday was very similar to Thursday; we were alone at Central Grenadier until it was dark.  We kept thinking because it was the weekend that the dock and campground would be full- but it didn’t happen.  When we got up on Saturday there was one boat that must have come in after 10 p.m.

On Saturday, I did a little bit of cleaning;   we had decided that we were going to the Tall Ships Marina in Brockville which was about 2 hours away. We left the dock shortly after 10:00, and travelled east; we were travelling on the edge of the St.Lawrence Shipping Channel and met this freighter.

Unknown to me we also were going to pass by Singer castle on the Canadian side, here’s a view from the back.    At about 11:40, it started sprinkling, and the closer we got to Brockville the harder the rain fell.  I saw the Parks Canada Island- Stovin, we had been told by some other boaters that we couldn’t go in there, because it was too shallow at the dock.   We saw lots of boats anchored or tied up at Sparrow Island,

one of the Brock group islands that are managed by the city of Brockville.   Brockville is one of the oldest incorporated cities in Canada, it was established by loyalists in 1784 as Buell’s Bay and was renamed by Sir Isaac Brock in 1812 to Brockville.  When we got to Tall ships, we stopped at the fuel dock and bought enough diesel to get us back to Buckhorn.  Once we were tied up, we changed out of our wet clothes, found our rain jackets and went in search of lunch.  The first place we stopped was Don’s fish and chips, which had been recommended by several people, however it was a take-out place and we didn’t want to have to go back to the boat to eat.  Instead we went Buds on the Bay, afterwards we wanted to explore downtown and started by walking through the railway tunnel.  The tunnel runs 0.3 miles under downtown Brockville and was built between 1854 and 1860 and connected the industrial waterfront to the outlying areas.  Here are several pictures from different parts of the tunnel.

We did some more walking around downtown, which was full of very old brick buildings. 

It was doors open Ontario, so we also visited the First Presbyterian church.   The very tall steeples on top of the church intrigued me from a distance. 

The woodwork, stained glass and painted motifs on the ceiling were amazing.  This church was built in 1848 and expanded in 1879.  It holds about 750 people.

We did a little bit of shopping on King Street and then returned to the boat.  After showers and a couple loads of laundry we went out to the Union Jack pub for a late supper.  Sunday we will begin moving westward.