We fired up the engines at 6:30 and pulled out of the marina, so that we were in line for the 7 am opening.   We proceeded past Cedar island and down the Bateau channel towards Ivy Lea.  We arrived at the restaurant dock and gave Karl a call.  He arrived on the boat around 11:00.  He rechecked the generator connection that he had done in Ottawa, he also reviewed the electrical diagram that Andy had sketched out for the boat.  We wanted Karl to disconnect the water heater, battery charger and refrigerator from the inverter loop.  Karl also gave us some advice on Andy’s plan for additional solar and the possibility of changing from lead acid batteries to lithium ion.   He also looked at our VHF radio, as Andy has been having issues with it recently. We ordered Pizza from the restaurant for lunch, we looked around for our Wayne and Roxanne’s boat- but didn’t see it in any of the slips.  Karl was finished by 3:00 and then we were off to look for a parks dock to tie up at.  We lucked out and found a spot at 3:40 on Georgina island with a couple other boats- Alabar and Betty on the main dock.

  We soon found out that Alan and Barbara knew several other boaters that we had met over the past few years- small world!  The L- dock on Georgina and the back dock was full, mainly Quebecers.   There were 5 or 6 boats anchored and rafting behind the island as well.

On Saturday morning, Andy made scones, cooking them on the BBQ.  Later in the morning we had front row seating for the Poker derby race by the noisy high-performance boats.  With the great view we also were the recipients of the wakes from these boats, and all other boats passing in front of Georgina. 

The poker run ran from Kingston to Prescott and back, so we had high traffic again around 2:30.  In the evening the boat traffic diminished.  On Sunday morning, we moved to Hill Island and found a spot at the end of the dock.  This island dock was also full of Quebec boats.  We turned on our generator to re-charge our batteries for about 45 minutes, and I got rid of garbage and re-cycling.  In the thousand islands there are only 4 designated islands that allow generators and have other amenities.

We were in contact with Scott and Megan from the sailboat Betty.  They had wanted to come to Hill, we had arranged that once they got near, we would vacate our spot, so they could have it, as they had an 18-month-old son that needed to be off the boat in order to stay occupied.  When they were within 10 minutes of the dock, we pulled out.   There was another cruiser that raced them to the spot but Betty prevailed and was able to tie up.  We proceeded westward.  We cruised by Mulcaster island and there were no spots.  We continued on to Gordon island, and tied up on the outside dock at 1:30, as there were a couple run-about type boats on the inside. The wind was starting to blow, and rain was predicted for Monday.  When the second run-about was ready to leave, they assisted in moving to the inside.  Andy let out the anchor, and we attached it to the inside dock cleat.  Andy had also rigged up a rope from our port stern line so that as he backed up and let out more chain that ran along the dock, I could tie the port side line and pull it in as he moved forward.  This intricate maneuver worked and we were soon tied up on the inside of the dock.   We were joined on the dock by a houseboat rental a little later.    It was a hot day; I went into the water multiple times to cool down. The winds had died down a little in the morning, and the rain had not begun, so we decided to move a little more east.  We left Gordon and proceeded towards the group of Admiralty islands near Gananoque.  We lucked out when we were near McDonald island, a boat was just leaving one of the slips, so we pulled in at 9:15 and tied up. 

We had gone about 6 miles. 

 The boat next to us was Elysium, who hail from Crates in Belleville.  We had seen their Bay liner there on our last visit.  We also met up with Splash landing which we had seen several times on the Rideau. Andy contacted Just Wright and told them that there was space at McDonald, they arrived in the early afternoon.

 We had drinks with them, and caught up on where they had been and what Perth was like.  The wind increased as the day progressed, we were glad to be tied up. 

On Tuesday morning, we went over to say our goodbyes to Just Wright and learned that they had a visitor during the night- a raccoon.  It had dug up one of their plants. 

We decided to leave around 9:15 headed for Cedar island.  When we were about an hour into our trip, we heard back from Prinyer’s cove, and they had a spot for the night so we continued on.  We arrived at Prinyer’s at about 1:30, having gone almost 40 miles from McDonald.  

  I did a couple of loads of laundry. In the evening we were included in the burger night that is held every Tuesday during the summer.  We met a lot of the neighbors from around the marina as well as other boaters.

On Wednesday morning, Andy learned that our doctor had passed away about 6 weeks ago.  Andy had been trying to call his office for the past few weeks trying to make an appt for October.  We called our neighbor from Winnipeg, to find out where his doctor was.  We called Lakewood medical centre and filled in new patient registration forms.   Just before 11:00 we left the marina and proceeded westward 18 miles to Hay bay.  We anchored behind Ram Island in 15 feet of water around 1:00. 

Andy tried some fishing, and I relaxed and read a book.  None of the fish were interested in what the old guy was offering, so we settled on BBQ steak for supper.  We were joined by two other boats at the anchorage before nightfall.

On Thursday morning, we weighed anchor at 8:35 and proceeded out of Hay Bay and entered the main channel headed for Deseronto.  Our depth instrument was acting erratic showing negative depths when we were in 30 feet of water, this problem continued for more than an hour.  We arrived at Crates Marina in Belleville at 11:45 and went directly to the gas dock for a pump out, fuel and our slip assignment.  We were tied up by 12:15.    We had lunch, and then Andy called his friend Enno to see if he could take us for some groceries and to refill one of our propane tanks.   Enno came around 2:00 and took us around Belleville to complete our tasks.  We stopped at Tim Horton’s for coffee as well.  We were back on the boat by 4:00.  I went and put in a load of laundry, and Andy looked at some of our Garmin components.  It seems like our VHF radio only transmits on channel 16 and 68. We also have a fuel leak on the starboard engine, and the people at Crates were too busy to look at it. Will have to try somewhere else on the TSW for this issue.   We caught up on some missed episodes of Coronation Street and then Andy watched the highlights of the Blue bomber game against Montreal. This morning we will be heading back towards the TSW.