June 29-July 1

On Friday we went to the Marina office in the morning and picked up our registration packages for the  AGLCA seminars. Shortly after the seminar started, to our surprise Roxanne and Wayne from Brockville walked into the room.  They had signed up for the seminars on Monday morning. Kim Russo, the director of the AGLCA chaired the seminars,

and made several presentations herself. The seminars covered the topics of Life of a lockmaster, an overview of the TSW, travelling in Georgian Bay, and finally a talk on how to sell your boat.  There were almost 100 current loopers in attendance.

That evening we went out for dinner with Roxanne and Wayne to Tomassos,

although we had only met them a week ago, it is amazing how well we get along, especially Wayne and Andy.  They are in the process of looking for a boat, and hope to loop in the next year or two.  Who knows maybe we’ll end up seeing them when we loop again in 2020. Being this close to the Trenton base, we had planes flying over the marina quite frequently.

On Saturday morning, we were awoken at 5:15, by a thunderstorm, Andy rushed out of bed when he heard the wind coming up, as we had left the chairs out on the back deck, after last night’s nightcap with Wayne and Roxanne.

On Saturday, the seminar was more geared to people planning to loop, and there were 80 people in attendance.  The topics included an over view of the entire loop, how to buy a looper boat, special information for Canadians,  a talk about Marine electronics, and 4 gold loopers talked about their individual trips and the associated costs.  Andy and I spoke about our trip just before lunch.

 

The presentation went OK, however I was having issues with the computer remote- it was advancing slides  without me touching the forward button. I spoke first, and then Andy spoke at the end about our costs, and myths.  In the afternoon Nancy and James and their children from living life, spoke about their loop.

 

We  had met them before they had started in 2016 and then again last summer.  It was great to see them again.  After the session was over, a number of people currently doing the loop, came up to the club house and Andy and another boater from  the Barrie area showed people their favourite anchorages and channels to use while exploring Georgian Bay and the North Channel.

Just before 6, Glen Cavers arrived, he is going to come up the TSW with us.  Andy will drive him back to Trenton, once we arrive in Buckhorn. That evening Glen drove us to Bellville for supper.

We left Trent Port Marina at 7:25  and arrived at lock 1 at 7:50, we had to wait until 9:00 for the first lock up.  Glen and I handled the ropes for locking and Andy drove the boat.

We were joined by a gold looper boat called coconuts.

We were out of lock 1 by 9:20, lock 4 by 10:35, Lock 10 by 3:10 and lock 12 by 4:15.  We were tied up at Campbellford municipal dock by 4:25.  Making a new record for us on the Trent by passing through 12 locks.  It was a really hot day, and lots of people were playing in the water.

Happy Canada Day Everyone!!