Well we have now logged over 2000 nautical miles and have had quite the adventure, sometimes more of an adventure than we want! When we left Toronto in June we were pretty naive and thought this would be an easy trip. We have found that it is a lot harder than we imaged and even though there has been great days, there have been more bad days than we want!

Bruce raising the American Courtesy flag

We are now in the United States, having left Yarmouth in the evening for a night crossing into Bar Harbor, Maine. Mike and Liliane(Zero Gravity) had left early in the morning to go to Gran Manan. We decided to skip Gran Manan and meet up with them in Bar Harbor. The night started out with great clear weather and a beautiful full moon. About 7 hours into the trip, the fog began to appear again. We were hoping once we left Nova Scotia we would also leave the fog behind. We arrived close to Bar Harbor in the early morning. Bruce was asleep in the cockpit and I was at the wheel when I saw a lobster trap floating in the water. The next thing I knew they were everywhere! I quickly woke Bruce up and he drove while I directed him around all the lobster traps. This was not an easy job as it was still very foggy and I had to open up the enclosure to see all the traps. This meant that not only was I tired, but I was cold and wet! We managed to get into the harbor around all the traps and tied up at the town dock to wait for customs to clear the boat. It was at first frustrating trying to get ahold of them but once we did it took about 2 hours for them to get to the boat. The customs officer was great and issued us a cruising permit on the spot and was gone in now time. We went out to a mooring ball and decide to go for a walk around Bar Harbor and have a rest in the afternoon. The city of Bar Harbor is on Great Desert Island and most of the island is a park that has all sorts of biking and hiking trails. J.J. Bean (sporting goods store) provides a free bus called the Island Explorer all over the island and it is a great way to get around and see everything. We returned to the boat after our walk and thought we would sleep and then have a nice quiet dinner. The next thing we knew it was 8:30 at night and we had slept right thru dinner! Mike and Liliane arrived that same evening a day earlier than we thought. They were on a ball when we got up having arrived at about 8 p.m.

We spent the next day exploring Mount Desert Island by bus. We took the bus to Northeast Harbour. Mike and Liliane had to wait out most of the day on their boat waiting for customs to clear them as there was a cruise ship in and customs was busy with them so they were unable to come with us. We were all staying another day so we took the bus into Southwest Harbor. We had lunch together and went to a couple of Marine stores as there always seems to be something we need.

We left with Mike and Liliane the next day and went to a beautiful anchorage on Marshall Island. We had hoped to visit Isle Au Haut but the anchorages there were not good for the winds that were forecast. Marshall Island in uninhabited but had a nice beach to dinghy over to and take a short walk.

Zero Gravity at anchor in Marshall Harbor

We left Marshall Harbor early the next morning for Rockland, Maine and this was by far the worst day we have had since leaving Toronto! Rather than head out to open water, we took a couple of thorofares thru some beautiful islands but also thousands of lobster pots. A book I am reading "Sailing Away from Winter" calls this coast the confetti coast. The lobster pots are so plentiful that it looks like someone thru a bunch of confetti into the water. Sailing around these pots makes for a very stressful passage. We both have to be on the lookout constantly for pots as well as other boats and buoys as well as navigate to our destination! Bruce is definitely not getting his morning and afternoon naps in anymore and that makes him a bit testy! We finally got the perfect wind to sail and we were afraid to put our sails up as that would give us one more thing to think about and we were already on overload. Many boats were passing us under full sail and plowing thru the pots. We couldn't believe how they didn't pick up the pots.

This did however build up our confidence and we decided when we passed through all the thorofare that we would put the sails up and sail the rest of the way to Rockland! It was a great sail the rest of the way until we took the sails down and realized that we must have a pot wrapped around our rudder as we had no steerage. When we put the boat in gear, it also made a horrible noise so we also figured that we had a pot around our prop! So much for the $200.00 blade we installed before leaving to cut any ropes that got caught on the prop. Luckily we were in open water and not in any danger of grounding. We called Boat U.S. which we joined before leaving home as they over free towing to members, but there was not a Boat U.S. operating out of Rockport. We got ahold of Zero Gravity and they sail that they would come back and tow us into the Rockport Harbor. Just inside the harbor was a safe place to drop the anchor and take a look at the problem. As they were swing around to put us into the wind to drop the anchor, their engine quite and they had picked up a pot also. They quickly dropped the anchor beside us and now we both had big problems. We felt terrible as they were helping us when it happened. Liliane and Mike are experienced divers and Liliane offered to suit up and go have a look at both boats. Bruce was very happy about this as the other option was for him to go into the water. Once in the water, she realized that she would also need tanks as the ropes were wrapped tightly around and she would have to spend some time under water to cut them. She manages to free Zero Gravity in about 15 minutes, which seemed a lot longer, and then swam over to our boat. It took much longer for her to free our boat and by this time she had been in the water for about 45 minutes. Even with a wet suit on it is a lot of time to be in water that was only 18 degrees. By the time she surfaced she was freezing and a bit hypodermic! We quickly brought her onto our boat and she got into a hot shower and then we wrapped her up in blankets and made some hot coffee! She was shivering so much, she could hardly talk.


Liliane in the water off Zero Gravity!

Our friends from the Mary T, Amy and Ken, were also in Rockland so we moved the boats over closer to them after we were free and we all went out for dinner together. This was the day that I was ready to come home and feeling quite homesick as I was missing a family get together for Bruce's mom's 85th birthday as well as, another friend's mother's 80th and Lindsay's first day back at school! Everything that could go wrong, was going wrong and we were both getting fed up about this time and feeling exhausted from it all! However, once we thought about it, we realized how much worse it must of been for Liliane as she was the one that had to do all the work freeing us! If she was still willing to keep going after all she had been through, we certainly could too! After a nice meal with friends and a good nights sleep we felt better. We stayed in Rockland for an extra day and took some time to get groceries, fuel and clean up the boat a bit.

From Rockland we motored over to Boothbay Harbor and anchored off the town. It was a really cute touristy town with lots of shops etc. We travelled with Mike and Liliane again and we all went out to dinner.

We left early the next day for Falmouth Foreside, which is just 5 miles outside of Portland. Our friends Brad and Anita have a good friend here that set us up at the Portland Yacht Club for the night. We had a drink with Drew on the boat and then went out to dinner with Drew and his wife Vicky. Drew and Vicky lent us their car for the next day and we went into Portland's Old Port to browse and go to another Marine Store! It was Drew's birthday during the week and Vicky was planning a surprise birthday dinner at the yacht club for him on Friday night. I sort of blew it by asking them to join us for dinner on Friday night and Vicky was forced to tell him about the surprise in order to explain why they were busy and not able to have dinner with us! They invited us to join in the birthday celebration at the club for dinner. What we didn't realize is that they also invited about 20 other members of their family also. We had a great time and enjoyed meeting so many new people. We then went over to Drew and Vicky's for cake. I must say, I have never seen a bigger carrot cake in my life! All I can say is Drew better get ready for next year's celebration if this year is any indication of the party's Vicky puts on for a non milestone birthday!

We will probably leave tomorrow with the Mary T, as Zero Gravity went a bit further than us the last couple of days. We will likely catch up with them again hopefully. We are working our way to Marblehead where we will leave the boat and fly home from Boston. Drew thinks that this would be our best bet and we agree. He has also given us tons of other advise and contacts which will come in handy as we continue our trip South. Will probably be home next Wednesday or Thursday if the weather forecast is right.

We left Oak Island on Wednesday morning for Port Mouton which turned out to be one of the nicest anchorages we have been in. The beach was beautiful hard sand and we dropped the dinghy and went in for a walk. It seemed like every boat in the harbor was heading South and we talked to a french couple who had left France about 7 years ago on their boat and were still sailing. I thought we were doing something adventurous until you talk to others who have done so much more. We also met a couple in Shelburne who have been sailing for 11 years. They started off in Hawaii and have been sailing ever since. They work about 6 months of the year and sail the rest. He is a RN and likes to get a job in an emergency room if possible. We also met another couple from the States on the beach and they were heading to Shelburne. We later met up with them there.

On Thursday we were not in too much of a rush to get going as we had only about 35 miles to put in. We left about 1100 as we were also enjoying some beautiful sunny weather. The sun had been shining for a record 5 days in a row and although the nights were cool the days were warm with no humidity. We knew that the sunshine was only forecast to last another day so we fiqured we would get to Shelburne while we could as we would rather be stuck in a town than in the middle of nowhere! It was a wise decision as we have been here since but plan to leave tomorrow morning for a long day to Yarmouth. This crossing can be very difficult so we have waited to get a perfect forcast to do it in. When we picked up our mooring ball at the Shelburne Yacht Club, Bruce looked around and said "Look who's here". Right in front of us was Zero Gravity again. We had hoped to run into them again soon but thought that they would be on their way to Yarmouth. They had a couple of long days so decided to stay here. We also moored beside the Mary T, Amy and Ken's boat, the couple who we had met on the beach in Port Mouton. When we went up to the clubhouse to register, we ran into Liliane and Mike from Zero Gravity and they too had just met Amy and Ken so we all decided to go for dinner. During dinner, Amy and Ken mentioned that every Friday on their boat was pirate Friday and they would dress up and talk like pirates. We thought it sounded like fun and invited ourselves over for drinks the next day which just happened to be pirate Friday.

On Friday morning Liliane, Mike, Bruce and I set off into town in search of piratewear We lucked in at a discount store and got everything we would need for our pirate night along with some water ballons to use as amunition. We commenced our night with a water assault and then boarded the vessel for drinks and appetizers. We had a lot of fun but decided if the kids could see us, they would probably tell us to grow up!

On Saturday, the club was having their annual Chili Cookoff and potluck dinner so we decided to participate in the judging and eating. They had 12 different chili's to try and we tried them all! You had to vote for the best chili, the hottest chili, and the best dressed chili chef. Another great evening of meeting other boaters and having a good time over a great dinner.

Today we are getting ready for our departure to Yarmouth

I didn't get this edition posted so will just add to the old one before posting it. We got away from our mooring about 0730 along with Mike and Liliane and had a great day for crossing over to Yarmouth and going around Cape Sable, which seems to be notorious for giving people a hard time. The trip took longer than we anticipated and we didn't pull into Yarmouth until about 2030 that evening. It was getting a little tight for us as our navigation lights were not working so we didn't want to travel at night. We had a safety net in Mike and Liliane as we could follow them in if it got too late. We just made it and there was a beautiful full moon. The crossing was uneventful except it was cold as the water temperature is only 9 degrees! We had to take a mooring ball as the docks were too small for us. We called it a night and would get together again with Mike and Liliane in the morning as they invited us for brunch. We were able to move over to a dock in the morning as a large boat left early and that was the only spot we could take so we moved over so we could get power and charge up everything. We had a great brunch on Zero Gravity and then Liliane and Bruce went for a message and I went for a much needed pedicure. Bruce hurt his back the last time I sent him up the mast and has been having pain ever since. We will leave Mike and Liliane here as they are going to Gran Manan and we are going to do a night crossing to Bar Harbor tomorrow night. The weather is supposed to be good and the moon is full so it should go well. We fixed our nav lights today so we are all good to go. I can't seem to be able to comment on the pictures. The first one is a picture of Selbourne Yacht Club and then there are our assault pictures on the pirate boat and some full moon pictures. One isn't very good but it has Zero Gravity in the background.
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Mike and Lillian on
Zero Gravity. Notice the PCYC Burgee

Sue's brother Tim and his wife Monica outside their bar foc'sle

The adventure continues. Bruce's friend Mark from Halifax (the guy we went out to watch the fireworks with) came for a visit on Friday. We took the dinghy into town to meet him and of course everyone was talking about the storm the night before. Many people had lost power due to lightning strikes and Tim and Monica had lost a lot of their electronic equipment at the bar so Tim was busy getting new stuff set up so people could again use their credit and debit cards at the bar. We met up with Mark and decided to go back to the boat for a late lunch. Mark had brought enough food for a week but again failed to bring his wife with him. He does assure me that she does exist but I have yet to meet her. After lunch we decided to take the dinghy over to another of Mark's friend's boat who was anchored in the back harbor of Chester. We had a great time with them and then went into town to check out what was happening there. By this time it was getting too late to return to the boat for dinner so we decided to go to Tim's bar and have a drink. We ended up eating there and decided to wait there until 10 p.m. when the band was supposed to start playing. The weather was cloudy all day and we had brought a flashlight with us to get back to the boat after dark so we weren't worried until Bruce and Mark noticed that the fog had again rolled in. We decided that we should go back to the dinghy and get to the boat before it got too bad. By the time we left and arrived at the marina the fog was even worse then we had ever seen it. It was too late to make it back to the boat even though it was just in the next bay as we would have become too disoriented in the fog. We were contemplating our next more which was possibly getting a hotel when a boat came into the dock and offered to tow our dinghy and bring us back to the boat. They had a much bigger flashlight and also had a boat over in the next bay so we took him up on the offer. We would never have found the boat on our own and were very happy when we were all on board Con El Viento again. It was only after the other boat left that we realized the both Mark and Bruce had slipped the guys some money for bringing us over. The 10 minute trip resulted in a $70.00 tip. This was one of more expensive lessons!
Saturday of course was beautiful and sunny because it was the day Trevor and Allison were to go home. We borrowed Tim's car again and drove them to the airport. The flights were pretty full but Allison was booked and Trevor was flying standby. Poor guy waited thru about 5 flights and would have made the last flight if they didn't load restrict it as they were short 1 flight attendant. Lindsay ended up picking up Allison at the airport and Trevor went to Mark's house for the night. He tried the next day on one of Mark's guest pass as Mark was going to Toronto to work so Trevor would have better seniority but he still did not make it so he returned to Chester in Mark's truck. Bruce would again have to borrow Tim's car and go back to the airport and fly home with Trevor s Trevor would never make it home otherwise. We decided to move the boat over to Oak Island Marina first so that I could be on a dock while Bruce went home. I really needed to do laundry and it would be easier to do from a dock. Bruce and Trevor finally made the last flight out of Halifax on Sunday night. Bruce got home and 0100 and had to be back to the airport at 0700. As everything happens at once, Sunday night we finally caught up with Lillian and Mike off off Zero Gravity who we have been trying to see for the last couple of weeks. They just arrived about one hour before Bruce had to leave but it was great to see them and I did get to have a good visit with them. They left the next day before Bruce got back but hopefully we will catch them again along the way.
On Monday afternoon we returned Tim and Monica's car and invited them out to the boat for dinner and a sleepover. I think they enjoyed getting away even if it was for a short time as they had just had an incredibly busy week at the bar as it was Chester Race Week. We decided to take today off and enjoy the Oak Island Resort. They have a indoor and outdoor pool, hot tub and spa. The weather has been sunny since Saturday and there is no rain in the forecast until Friday. It has been cool at night but great for sleeping. Tomorrow we will start out again early and take 2 days to get to Shelburne. We will probably go to Mouton Cove tomorrow as Richard and Susan told us it is a great place to anchor as it is in front of a beautiful sand beach. We haven't decided where we will cross over to the States or when we will cross yet. We will make that decision in Shelburne.

We are back in Halifax and arrived again to rain and fog! We had a great time at home and finally experienced some summer weather. We are beginning to think that it may be the only summer we get. We had a great time at home and saw quite a few friends and family. I made it up to Sault Ste. Marie to see my mom for a couple of days which was great as it has been a while since I have seen her.
We brought Bruce's son Trevor and his girlfriend back to Halifax with us as he was on holidays and Allison had just finished university and really needed a break after a couple years of solid school! As I mentioned, we arrived to rain and fog but since we had not planned on going out until the next day, we didn't let it bother us too much. We rented a car at the airport and on the way back to the boat we stopped in Sackville to pick up our brand new 2.5 horsepower engine. I didn't know I could get so excited about a new toy but we now had wheels so to speak to get from our boat to shore again. This would make anchoring out enjoyable again especially since we now had a working generator. Before we left for home Bruce had washed all the boat and left it all clean for our return, so clean that the birds fell in love with it and must have spent many hours crapping all over it. The boat was just covered in bird poop so the first thing was to wash it all over again. Of course that chore went to the newest crew member, Trevor. The captain just loves delegating chores. Thank goodness it had been raining for a while and it wasn't too baked on. I think you get the picture. Bruce had gone to a sail maker and found someone who would sail our ripped sail cover in a couple of hours so we dropped off the sail cover and went for groceries and picked it up on our way home. We were feeling good that we now had everything fixed that we wanted fixed before we started out again when we found our anemometer lying on the deck of the boat . How it didn't fall in the water we will never know! Bruce will have to go up the mast again unless he can find another mast monkey to do it for him, so everything is not fixed yet. We decided to drive the car into Halifax and drop it off downtown as the Busters were on in Halifax. We would then take the ferry back and a cab to the boat. The weather was so bad however that when we got downtown wearing all our rain gear, the Busters had been cancelled due to bad weather. We walked around, had dinner and went back to the boat fairly early as we were all tired as we had gotten up at 4 a.m. to catch the flight and Trevor and Allison had gone to bed at 2 a.m. Even the young people need more than 2 hours sleep at night.
We woke up the next morning to you guessed it, fog and rain. We were not in a hurry to leave as we were only going about 40 miles to Chester and the weather forecast called for the fog to lift about noon. We pulled out of the harbor about noon and it didn't look too bad till we passed the first bridge and we couldn't see much. There was a boat following us and we called them to see where they were going and they were going the same place as us. They were from Halifax and used to navigating the harbor in fog so we thought we would take advantage of the local knowledge and follow them! Poor Allison, her first time sailing the Atlantic and we had fog the whole way. We had hoped to take the Sambro Channel which would have cut some and is supposed to be a good channel to spot some whales, but the fog was too thick to see all the markers so we went the long way around. As we approached shore we expected to come out of the fog as this was what usually happened to us but this time we had fog all the way in. It was really ere approaching an anchorage when you can't see any boats around you. Again we were very thankful for our chart plotter as Bruce, Trevor and Allison watched for other boats and I drove into the anchorage! What an initiation cruise for Allison. We may stop getting company if these things keep happening! We now have a new first to add to our list of firsts - first time anchoring in fog! Since it was too foggy to take the dinghy to shore or even find shore, we had a great dinner and went to bed early to finally catch up on our sleep.
We finally woke up to sunshine on Wednesday morning and to a beautiful view of the area. We decided to stay put for the day and explore Chester. It is a very busy town this week as it is Chester Race Week and I think everyone with a sailboat is here his week. We met up with Scott and Marie Sterling from PCYC (Texas Belle) who are here with their kids helping out with race week. We also went to the bar in town that my cousin Byron's brother-in-law Tim (Sue's brother) and his wife Monica owns and met up with him and his wife and family. It is the second oldest bar in Nova Scotia and the oldest in a rural town (Picture to follow.) Chester is a cute little town and we enjoyed spending the day. We had hoped to go back for some nightlife later but the winds picked up and we changed our minds as we thought we would get too wet going back and forth in the dinghy. When we got back to the boat we tried to fire up our GPS and for some reason it would only bring up the first page and then shut itself down. We tried it a couple more times and nothing. This is the worst possible piece of equipment to have not working! It is almost impossible to try to navigate thou fog without it and a good day can turn foggy in an instant here. It is also bad timing as we have company and would like to travel around the Bay. Why do these things always seem to happen to us at the worst possible time???
Thursday was another great sunny day but we couldn't go anywhere till we made arrangements to have the GPS fixed. The company telephone support is in California and did not open until 0800 which is 1200 here. We called and they told us that they have never heard of this problem before and we should pack it up and send it back. This was kind of what we were expecting as there are very few authorized service dealers around. The closes one is in Vancouver. We went to Tim's bar and talked to Tim about using his car for the day and possibly going into Fedex in Halifax to send it back. While there, Bruce met up with someone who knew someone in Halifax who sold the same GPS system that we had and gave Bruce his phone number. Bruce called the guy and he said he would bring us a new GPS on Friday and send the old one back to California for us to be fixed. This meant that we would now own 2 GPS's but we figured it was better than waiting for one and we would always have a spare which we probably will never need if we have it. The GPS problem solved, we decided to take Tim and Monica up on the offer of their car and drive to Lunenburg and Mahone Bay. We had a great day exploring the area by car and again were very happy that we have met such great people who are always willing to help out when you need it. We dropped the car off and went in to have a drink. The sun was shining and it was a beautiful day. By the time we finished our drink, the fog had rolled in. It is impossible to imagine how quickly the weather changes here. We made a beeline for the dinghy and headed back to the boat while we could still find it. I forgot to mention that while going to shore to call around about our GPS, we ran out of gas in the dinghy. Of course the spare gas was on the boat as the guy we bought the dinghy from told us a tank of gas would last about 4 or 5 hours and we had only used the dinghy for under 2 hours. I do have to mention that I did suggest we take it with us the first day and was told we wouldn't need it. I do hate to say I told you so!! We got a tow into the club and things could have been a lot worse if we had brought the dinghy in the night before, we would have been stuck in the dark and wind trying to row ashore. We have really initiated Allison into the world of boating! She has been a great sport as this is the first time she has spent any time on a boat.
We were all snuggled in our beds on Thursday evening when a huge thunderstorm struck. It was the biggest storm I have ever been in. I got up and wanted to go to the cockpit to watch the storm but it was so severe, I couldn't get past the companionway! You could feel the electricity in the air and the lightning was so bright it hurt your eyes. The thunder and lightning were right on top of each other. The surprising part was that Trevor slept thou it! The storm lasted for at least an hour and a half!
Today, Bruce went to shore to meet the guy who was bring us the new GPS and it works!! Yes. We are back in business.



Lunch in Lunenburg at a great little pub and a picture of the Bluenose coming into port in Lunenburg.

Trevor is the only brave one to go swimming. The water temperature is 18 degrees!

Halifax harbor in the rain

Halifax Harbor and bridge

We have been having a great time in Halifax visiting old friends and family that we have not seen in a long time. Everyone has been so generous offering cars, inviting us for dinner and just making us feel so welcome. Thanks so much to everyone!

Bill Graham picked us up at the club on Sunday and we had a great night with them. Their home is right on a lake and although the fog just wouldn't go away, we could see some of the lake once and a while. Sharon cooked us dinner which was delicious and we spent the night at their place. They have 2 yellow labs and they invited neighbors over who have 2 black labs. Lindsay would have been in heaven had she been there as one of the black labs was only 7 weeks old. On Monday, Bruce made a few phone calls and set up an appointment with the mechanic to come and fix our generator (finally) . Bill and Sharon then took us for a drive to check out the Dartmouth Yacht Club and make arrangements to move the boat there. They did not have a dock for us so we would be on a mooring ball. We decided not to move the boat yet as we needed to be on a dock for the mechanic. They then took us to a beautiful old Officer's Mess for drinks and lunch. It is the oldest mess in Canada and used to be a stable for horses. After lunch we went back to the club and had dinner with our friends from Denver as they were leaving the next day for the South Shore. On Tuesday we said goodbye to our new best friends twice as just as they were leaving the docks, 2 customs officers came running down the dock and asked they to return to the dock as they had no record of their boat entering Canada. The boat had been here for 3 years and they had cleared in Summerside so once they showed them their documentation, they were once allowed once again to leave the docks! Nothing like a little excitement on the docks to start your day!

Here is a picture of our friend from Denver rowing over to have dinner with us.

Bruce and I were to meet Bill again in Dartmouth and drive him to the airport so we could use his car for a couple of days. We managed to take a city bus all the way from the Royal Nova Scotia to the ferry dock in Dartmouth without getting lost or on the wrong bus so we thought we were doing well. We drove Bill to the airport and then went onto visit my Uncle Frank and Aunt Rita who I haven't seen in about 19 years when we had our last family reunion. They also invited their daughter and her husband and son over for dinner. I had never met her son and husband before so it was a great night of getting reacquainted with family. Dinner was also wonderful Aunt Rita!

On Wednesday morning the mechanic arrived at 0900 and by about 1030 her thought that he had the problem fixed as he had found a faulty bleed screw and a couple of leaks in the lines. He started the generator and let it run for about a half an hour and declared it fixed. Bruce walked him to his van to fill out the paper work and I decided to do the dishes. As I was putting the water in the sink, the generator started to die again. I quickly yelled to Bruce and he chased the van yelling to the mechanic to come back. He managed to get his attention and he returned to work the rest of the day on the generator. By the end of the day, he was still trying to find the problem and decided to take the lift pump off and take it back to the shop and test it. He told us he would be back the next day again. This put a wrench in our plans as we wanted to move the boat over to Dartmouth and go to Mahone Bay on Friday. The mechanic was back on Thursday and he said the pump was working so he was back to square one. The only thing left to check was another bleed pump that we never use. This ended up being the problem so he bypassed this pump and everything has been working fine since. The generator is now running better than it ever did. It only took 9 hours of labor to fix it. So much for a $50.00 fix in St. Peter 's.

We decided to run the dinghy engine into Sackville to a Mercury Dealer and leave it there to be fixed while we had the car. We talked to him about trading it in for a 2.5 horse power engine when he fixes it as we are finding the 9.9 to be too heavy and a bit of a pain to put on and off the dinghy. A 2.5 we could leave on the dinghy and davits which would make things a lot easier. Hopefully we can work a deal out with him when we get back. We came back for lunch and let the generator run for over an hour and everything was great so we decided to leave for Dartmouth while the weather was good and leave Mahone Bay for Saturday. The sail thru Halifax harbor was great and we met up with Sharon and Rudy (neighbor of Bill and Sharon's who also has a boat in Dartmouth) Rudy lent us a bridle for the mooring ball and Jeremy (the dock hand) helped us secure it to a mooring ball. We kept Sharon overnight on the boat and had a quiet dinner with her as Bill was still at work.

On Friday Rudy gave us a ride back to the Royal Nova Scotia to pick up Bill's car and then came back to Dartmouth in time for Bruce to have lunch with another old friend of his from Pem Air, Bill Wingfield. Bill's wife had a cold so I opted out of lunch and had a relaxing lunch on the boat by myself. We then left the club in time to pick up Bill at the airport again as he had a layover in Halifax. We went back to his house again for the night and dinner. This time Bruce and I did the shopping and made dinner for them. It was still foggy and I still have not seen the view from their deck! Bill jokes that every time he comes home the fog or rain move in and once he leave that the sun shines, I am beginning to believe that he isn't really joking!

Bill's check-in was at 0720 on Saturday so we had to get up early to drive him and then go on to Mahone Bay to visit other friends and return their charts finally. We had all had showers when the phone rang and Bill's flight was delayed until 0945! Some things never change when you are flying and we sure don't miss those days. We were all up so decided to leave a little early and have breakfast on the way. We finally make it to Mahone Bay about 1100, just in time for lunch with our friends! No, we didn't eat again, we actually turned a meal down for a change. Blair and his wife Laurie are renting a place for 2 weeks in Mahone Bay and also keep a boat in the bay on a mooring ball too so they have the best of two worlds there. Laurie's daughter and her friend who are 15 had entered in a cardboard boat building contest in town as the wooden Boat Show was on for the weekend so after lunch we all went into town to the show. The girls were given Styrofoam, cardboard and duck tape only and they had to design a boat and then launch it later and race the other homemade cardboard boats. The girls did a great job and came in second in the second race and also got the Titanic trophy! Good job girls. Last year's competition only had one boat sink but this year only one boat did NOT sink. The girls boat at least made it back to the dock in one piece and it was very nicely decorated.

Lunch with Blair and Laurie

Card Board Boat Race

Don and the girls, Don was a skipper on the Bluenose for 20 years.

One of the best parts of the day is that we also ran into our friends from Denver who we had said goodbye to a few days earlier. They were having so much fun in Mahone Bay that they were spending more time there than they planned. It was great to see them again. We also ran into Eric off of Mad Dash. I forgot to mention that when we were at the Royal Halifax, Mad Dash was on our dock and we recognized it from our club in Port Credit. I had forgotten until Bruce reminded me that we had bought his cradle for our boat from him when he left the club for Bermuda. It was great to see Eric and his wife again also. We left Mahone Bay and arrived back at the club about 1900. We met up with another friend w ho has a boat here and worked with Bruce, Mark Dinan. He invited us out on his boat to watch the fireworks off the Halifax Bridge. The fireworks were great and really different as we had never seen fireworks off a bridge before.

Today, we are heading back to Toronto for a week to 10 days. I hope to fly to Sault Ste. Marie for a couple of days to see my mom and sister and then back to Toronto for a few days. We probably won't return before the 13th of August and then will pick up our dinghy engine and head to the Mahone Bay area. It looks really beautiful and we would like to spend at least a week there.

Hi everyone, we are finally in civilization again with cell phone coverage and internet! We made it to Halifax today (July, 28) at about 4 p.m. and are quite happy to be on a dock again after 5 nights on anchor. The last few days have thrown everything from fog to wind and waves to sunshine, from cold to hot temperatures, just about everything except good sailing winds. Bruce is getting a little frustrated and he actually mentioned to me that he can see why some people end up buying a trawler as we seem to motor more that we sail these days! We are at the Royal Nova Scotia Yacht Club and it has a pool and a nice clubhouse so we plan to stay a few days, do a few repairs to the boat and see some friends and family.

We left St. Peter's on Monday and we were disappointed that we did not have more time to sail the lakes but we did see a lot by car and the weather did not really co-operate and with our generator and dinghy engine in need of repair, we did not want to anchor out but wanted to get to Halifax where we could get the work done. We also met a couple from Denver who were headed to Halifax and then to Maine and we liked the idea of travelling for a bit with another boat. We have really enjoyed their company and will miss them when we go our separate ways in Halifax. We forgot how fun it is to travel with another boat and it is comforting to know that you are not alone out on the water in fog and heavy weather! Our first stop after leaving St. Peters was an anchorage past the town of Canso in Whitehead Harbor. The weather had finally turned sunny and we had an uneventful, enjoyable trip. We have decided that we much prefer shorter days with lots of time left in the day to enjoy once we have arrived somewhere. We have been having dinner back and forth with Susan and Richard (our new friends from Colorado ) and are using their 2 horse power engine on our dinghy and it is working great! Unfortunately they don't want to sell it or trade it for our 9.9! The next day we left for Liscomb Harbour but we ran into quite a bit of coastal fog so decided to go into Country Harbour and anchor for the night. We left the next day and did make it into Liscomb but had a ruff trip with wind, waves and fog. Once inside the bay and then up the river, your would never know how bad it was on the water. We anchored in front of Liscomb Lodge in the river that has about a 2 knot current and is very narrow. Not something we ever would have done before this trip or believed we would have done. The lodge was beautiful with a pool, hot tub and great restaurant, which we made reservations for the next night as we decided that we could use a down day out of the wind and fog. It was an excellent decision as it was a beautiful, hot sunny day and we took full advantage of the use of the facilities. Chester, the marina manager, lent us his car and we drove into the small town of Sherbrook for lunch and some groceries. The one thing that has really made this trip has been the kindness and generosity of the people everywhere we go. We have been offered cars and rides by complete strangers who let us use their vehicles without even knowing our names! In St. Peter's the 2 guys who run the marina made us feel completely at home and invited us for fish chowder at the club one night and a pancake breakfast the next day.

We hated to leave but knew we probably only had one more nice day before the rain was back so we lifted the anchor early and set out for our next port, which was a small bay in Popes Harbour that a charter skipper had told us about as we would not have thought there was enough water in the bay by looking at the charts. It turned out to be a beautiful spot and it was also Susan's birthday so we had a bit of a birthday party that evening on their boat! We decided to try to leave by about 7 a.m. as the winds seem to be calmer in the morning and by midday pick up and make things uncomfortable as now you are in fog and waves. It was a good decision as by the time we turned into the Halifax Harbour it was getting rough again. The fog just sits off the coast so we are constantly in it as the wind has been from the Southwest and the water temperature is about 12 to 14 degrees, so it doesn't take much warm wind to create a fog bank. It does tend to stay just off the coast which makes it a lot easier to get into a harbour that is clear. The radar has been working great and we are getting fairly comfortable sailing in fog now. The locals say that around the 15th of August the winds will change and be out of the North so we should have better sailing and no fog by the time we start the South shore of the Island.

We have not decided how long we will stay here before heading on towards Mahone Bay but will soon make those plans as well as plans to go home for a week. Today Bruce's friend Billy Graham (not the preacher)is picking us up and bringing us to his house for the night. We are looking forward to a night off the boat as it is really damp here today.

We had a change of plans in St. Peters, as often happens when you are sailing, and we decided to leave the boat here and drive to Baddeck with Bettyann and Ray. We had got the boat fixed in St. Peter's and thought that instead of wasting a day for Bettyann and Ray, we would get started on our road trip right away. It was a beautiful day and we made it to Baddeck by lunch. We found a really cute hotel called the Telegraph Inn, had lunch there and made our plans for the day. We booked a lobster dinner at a nearby hotel and bought tickets for a ceilidh, which is evening of Cape Breton fiddle music, piano music and traditional dancing. That afternoon we visited the Alexander Graham Bell Museum as well as a few shops in town .

Our lobster dinner was great and they even had entertainment during dinner so we had a very long dinner as we wanted to stay and listen to the singer. (see photo above) After dinner we went across the street to our first, Bettyann and Rays second celidh. The music was really great but there wasn't any singing or joke telling and Bettyann and Ray said that the first one they went to was a lot better, but since we didn't have anything to compare it too, we thought it was good. We will have to try to get to another one again.

We left Baddeck early the next day as the guys had tee off times at 2 p.m. to golf at Highland Links, a course that had been highly recommended by everyone they had talked to so they were quite excited to try it. Unfortunately it poured rain all the way on the drive to Ingonish and we were really afraid that their game would get rained out. Neither Bruce or Ray had brought any rain gear with them so we stopped at a store and found a pair of rain pants for Bruce. He figured if he went there prepared, he wouldn't need to use it! After finding a cute 2 bedroom cottage to rent for the night, Bettyann and I drove the guys to the golf course, and yes by then the rain had stopped and the sun was actually in and out of the clouds. Talk about lucky!

Bettyann and I were left with nothing to do so we decided to check out the spa at the Keltic Lodge and was it nice! We booked a pedicure and they told us to come back in time to use the whirl pool and the sauna! They didn't have to tell us twice. We quickly got our chores done which included getting groceries to cook dinner at the cabin and beer and wine for apres golf and headed back to the spa for an afternoon of relaxation. It was great!

The guys loved the golf course and Ray played exceptionally well and beat Bruce. They are now tied at a game a piece with no time for a tie breaker.

We left our cabin on Friday for a very busy day. We finished driving the Cabot Trail, which was disappointing as the weather was rainy and foggy so we were not able to see a lot but we didn't have much choice but to leave when we did. We got to Louisbourg in the afternoon and went on a hour and a half tour and then browsed around for a couple of hours but it was a bit cool and damp. It would have been much better if the weather was nicer. We then drove back to the boat and ordered pizza for dinner as we were all exhausted!

Today is rainy and foggy (again) and the forecast is for rain for the next few days. We had planned on taking Bettyanne and Ray out on the lakes for a couple of days but have now changed our plans again as the weather is just too bad. They will now leave in the morning and we are just taking it easy today. Ray got an oil change and we will get groceries as we will loose our car after today. Our generator problems have returned and we now realize it is not the easy fix we thought it would be and may need a part from Halifax. We will decide on Monday where we will go from here. Hope the weather gets better.