6/16/2008 -- Leamington to Erieau, Ontario -- 48.4 Miles
We awoke thinking we'd be making an easy, short trip to Pelee Island to anchor or dock for the night. Instead, the weather forecasts called for wind direction and intensity that would make the island's only dockage and anchorage areas untenable. Time for plan B, which entailed heading to Erieau, the next deep draft harbor down Ontario's Lake Erie shoreline. As we had originally planned a short trip for today it was almost 10:00 before we were ready to cast off our lines. We had a long way to go with our new "Plan B".
Erieau turned out to be a great choice. We had a wonderful reaching and quartering sail (off the wind) around Pelee Point, followed by about 30 miles of downwind wing and wing sailing in a fresh 20 knot breeze. Most of the day was spent in the 6's, with periods in the low 7's, and one time hitting 8.9! Hmmm, our hull speed is 7.2 ... any chance we were a bit overpowered when that dark cloud passed by?
While underway we placed a cell phone call to long time GLCC member Sheridan Atkinson who lives nearby. Later that evening Sherry and his wife Susan drove down to our boat for a glass of wine over stories of past days cruising the Great Lakes. It was a special treat to be able to spend some time with them.
6/17-18/2008 -- Erieau to Port Stanley, Ontario -- 43.4 Miles
The winds held well on Tuesday the 17th, with an 18-22-knot northwest quartering breeze all the way to Port Stanley. We ran most of the day in the 6's with some occasional 7's and a couple of bursts above 8 again as the edge of a cold front came through. These bursts of wind sometimes brought a little mist, but nothing of concern. A couple of these cells left behind a 15-20 minute window of lighter winds, with boat speed dropping into the 4's, but with a little patience the speedo was back in the 6's again.
The cold front also brought very welcome cooler temps, and with them the promise of more stable weather. We were getting tired of the 90+ degree days and constant threat of late afternoon and evening storms from the overheated atmosphere.
For our sailor friends, especially Carl & Joyce, Larry & Judy and Bill & Sylvia who plan to be coming through this way later this summer or next, we would simply say DON'T MISS PORT STANLEY. This is perhaps the busiest commercial fishing harbor along Ontario's Lake Erie shoreline, a commercial harbor for smaller grain and coal freighters serving this part of Ontario, and best of all, a haven for boaters.
The numerous commercial fishing operations up and down the Canadian shore of Lake Erie do complicate sailing a bit. We had to be constantly on the lookout for commercial fishing nets throughout the area. But the catch makes for some great eating. Perch is billed as the lobster of Canadian Lake Erie (see photo), and the analogy is a good one, although probably not in the way intended. We're getting in some good practice for dodging lobster pots in New England this fall.
Entering the harbor we carried depths of 15-17' or more for most of the way to the bascule bridge, which opens every hour and half hour. Just past the bridge lies the Kettle Creek Marina to your immediate right. Beyond this marina the water is a bit 
thinner, but we saw lots of sailboats which probably drew 4-5' moored there. The shower/rest room facilities and well-kept grounds at this small, family-run, marina (John & Fiona) were about as nice as we've seen anywhere. Yacht club groups from the states are known to frequent this marina on weekends, so call ahead for space. There are also options of tying alongside the west quay below the bridge (fish tugs take up most of the eastern wall). In good conditions one can also anchor in the outer breakwall area.
We loved Port Stanley so much we decided to stay for a lay-over day. The city was founded in the early 1800's and quickly became one of the most important Canadian trade ports on Lake Erie. Today Port Stanley has turned its attention to tourism and is home to a thriving arts community with huge historic murals on many buildings, numerous quaint B&B's, equally numerous good restaurants, a historic tourist train, and of course scores of gift shops.
The city also is host to the Port Stanley Festival Theater, of which we'd been hearing rave reviews at each port along the lake. Although tickets were sold out, we were able to get into an afternoon performance of the comedy "Perfect Wedding", when one minute before show time the box office called a couple who had not yet arrived at the theater, learning they had forgotten they had tickets that afternoon! Their loss was our gain ... a delightful performance.
After dinner in one of the local restaurants (the Kettle Creek Inn, where we could also get internet access) and attention to some still-undone boat chores, it was early to bed for our longest run on Lake Erie the next day ... over 70 miles.
6/19/2008 -- Port Stanley to Port Dover, Ontario - 73.9 Miles
Thursday morning dawned crisp (in the 60's), slightly overcast, and windless. We caught the 6:30am bridge opening and headed east under power and autopilot.
East of Leamington all the way to the Welland Canal on the Canadian side of the lake, the chart shows scores, no, probably hundreds, of submerged natural gas well heads well offshore, typically in 50-60 feet of water, with equally numerous under-water gas pipelines bringing that natural gas to facilities ashore. A few of the wellheads are marked with a very small spar (see picture), but most have no markings on the surface. Some Americans we met said there were gas fields beneath the lake on the US side too, but that we weren't drilling like the Canadians. We're not sure if that was speculation or geological fact, but this appears to be a rich natural gas field for the Canadians.
The farther east we went the more wind farms we saw on the lakeshore. Based on our informal observations this year and last, it appears the Canadians have been much more aggressive than the U.S. in harnessing wind energy, but perhaps the current energy crunch will spur U.S. wind power infrastructure too.
Speaking of wind, a breeze started to slowly build after about 2 hours, allowing us to motorsail with reduced revs but still maintain speeds in the 6's for the next 6 hours. The last 4 hours the breeze built to the18-20 range again, as some cells passed around us, allowing us to shut down the engine and sail in the high 6's and low 7's the rest of the way in.
As we proceed further east on the lake we're finding greater depths. We ran in about 50 feet of water most of the day, but to the south and east the bottom goes down to over 100' ... not very deep by Lake Superior standards, but much deeper than we've seen in a while. The water is also becoming much clearer the further east we go, which we particularly noticed in the Port Dover harbor.
Tomorrow we'll be leaving on our last Lake Erie leg, as we proceed from Port Dover to Port Colborne at the Lake Erie entrance to the Welland Canal.
6/20/2008 -- Port Dover to Port Colborne, Ontario - 46.8 Miles
The winds had eased considerably from Thursday, but still provided enough of a boost to motorsail above 6 knots while turning the engine at only 2000 RPM (our normal cruising revs are about 2600 or 2700). The lighter winds also made for flat sailing, so Bill cleaner waxed most of the house and Judy sanded the cockpit coaming for a coat of Cetol (similar to varnish) when we were in port.
Our arrival in Port Colborne completed the Lake Erie leg of our trip: 253.2 miles this year, plus 50 miles last fall after our exit of the Detroit River, for a total Lake Erie cruising distance of 303.2 miles. See the following Chart Snap for a capsule of our Lake Erie route.
Port Colborne has two marinas adjacent to each other, entered from just inside the breakwall leading to the Welland Canal. We decided to stay two nights in order to gather more information about locking procedures and to pick up some straw bag bumpers as suggested by the Great Lakes Cruising Club canal report and others. On Saturday we learned from marina staff that no one had seen a straw bag bumper used in over two years! We'll have to see how it goes with the bumpers we have.
Locking down, where the water simply is drained from the lock, is reportedly much simpler than locking up, where huge jets of water coming from one side fill the lock with water ... and heavy turbulence. At least three crew members are required to keep the boat under control while locking up, so couple-cruisers like us either have to hire a 3rd deck hand or enlist a volunteer to go with them. Locking down, like we're doing, can be done with just two crewmembers.
We spent the day finishing up waxing the house, putting a coat of Cetol on the cockpit coaming, doing laundry, making a few Skype calls home, and walking up town. Port Colborne is fairly small, but with a number of restaurants and pubs lining the canal waterway so diners can watch the ships pass. With all of our running around we never had gotten around to breakfast or lunch, so we stopped at a local eatery for Brunchdin (our one meal of the day) at about 4:00pm.
6/21/2008 -- The Welland Canal -- Port Colborne to Port Dalhousie -- 29.7 Miles
We awoke at a little after 5:00 a.m. but decided to stay put for a little while until a black cloud cleared out and the winds dropped back down to facilitate getting off the dock. When we did get to the pleasure craft tie-up just above the lock 8 bridge, we called Seaway Control on the phone provided, and were told to hold there until about 11:30 because of canal traffic. Hmmm ... nothing like hurry up and wait for our 8-lock drop of roughly 325 feet. There's no waiting on the Niagara River, but we suspect the canal would be a lot safer than the falls :-). We decided to wait.
The GLCC Welland report also talks about a $20.00 per lock ($160.00) cash-only lockage payment, collected at lock 3. We found that the Seaway now has a credit card payment machine where this year $25.00 per lock ($200.00) is collected. We guess that's progress, coupled with a dash of inflation. Pleasure vessels used to be able to play the exchange rate with those cash payments, as the canal took their fees in either Canadian or US currency and you could chose which currency (no exchange rate) was most advantageous. We're not sure yet if our credit card was charged in Canadian or US dollars, but it doesn't matter much as the Canadian $ is close to par with the US at this point.
As the last of a series of up-bound freighters exited Lock 8, Seaway Welland called us and told us to cast off for the first lift bridge (see photo). We were on our way. Our only other delay for the day was at lock 7 where we had to wait 30 minutes for a barge and tow locking up.
We passed through all the locks alone. Apparently pleasure boat traffic is pretty light in the canal until around July. The canal will group pleasure boats together for locking through the canal, but will not lock a pleasure craft with a freighter. We did meet three power boats who were locking up to Erie together, but we weren't aware of any other down-bound pleasure boat traffic.
We were a bit intimidated by the canal before today. We had heard stories of deteriorating canal lock walls, turbulence, slimy walls, difficulties meeting freighters, etc., but we experienced none of that. Lock 8 (the first coming from Lake Erie), is a "leveling lock", to deal with any differences in Lake Erie water levels from the design level of the canal. For this lock we simply held the boat in the middle of the lock under power while we dropped about 4 feet. It was so smooth that Judy hadn't realized we'd been lowered, or that the entry doors had closed behind us.
Photos:
1. Entering a typical lock
2. Getting our bow and stern lines from the lock's line handlers before locking down
3. The scenic view while tending lines on the way down
4. The lock almost fully down
5. The lock exit opening to the next lock in sequence
6. Victory! Bill gives a thumbs up as we exit lock 1 into Lake Ontario
After lock 8, each of the remaining 7 locks dropped us approximately 45 feet. Sequences of red and green approach lights dictated when to enter or when to stand by (e.g. another boat locking up, or the lock re-filling). Some locks had port-side lines, others starboard-side, which required we re-position our bumpers from one side to the other 4 times. Upon entering a lock, one simply approaches the line handlers along the wall and stops the boat there, taking one bow and one stern line from them and taking a light turn on a cleat with each. Gloves, preferably leather work gloves, are a MUST. We had them but Bill hadn't yet put his on when pulling to the wall at lock 7, and got a nasty rope burn as wind kept pushing the boat while we were trying to set the lines. Subsequently we kept the gloves on through the rest of the trip, and used reverse more aggressively to hold the boat until everything was set. We kept the engine running in neutral through each locking, in case some quick adjustments under power were required. They were not.
Locking through to the Port Weller exit to Lake Ontario took us just under 7 hours in total, plus over 4 hours waiting to start. In addition we spent another 1 1/2 hours waiting for the wind in the marina to ease down, and then another half hour getting to Port Dalhousie to dock for the evening. All together it made for a long day. But as our reward we're now in the last of the five Great Lakes ... Lake Ontario!
Watch our next posting for Lake Ontario experiences.
