Ship's Log- Day 10- Saturday 10/17/15

Miserable Weather.

Small Island ---> Auberge Harris (St Jean

Sleet, Rain, Moments of sun, Windy

Eliot got up early (6:00) to make breakfast. We ate breakfast and went back to bed due to nasty weather (which had soaked all of Eliot's drying clothes overnight!). Eventually there was a break in the weather and we packed camp in a scramble and tried to leave before it started again.

As we were packing the boat, A man pulled up in a  duck boat with 4 other guys, all with guns. We make small talk, and big talk, about trapping, hunting, politics, and Kroka. He told us the following:

1) The current by Montreal is SO (fucking) STRONG IT PUSHES MOTORBOATS BACKWARDS.
2) The St Lawrence is SUPER (fucking) DANGEROUS and to "take care of her" to Eliot.
3) If we come to his house with Kroka, he's make the kids meat the "right way" to make them strong.
4) Email him when we get there, or he will send out the RCMP looking for us.

We had lunch on someone's dock in a patch of sun, and arrived in St Jean freezing cold, with a short time until dark, determined to find somewhere warm to stay the night. We paddled paddled up and down the canal looking for Wifi, and found a Auberge near the water. Portaging the first Lock, we met a nice lady named Linda who took our picture and offered us a bed at her house. The rapids don't look that scary, but we're already in the canal.

Figure we earned a Hotel bed after the snow. Drying off as much stuff as we can, and the  room smells terrible as a result. There's a very tasty apple tree in the yard! Hope to restock tomorrow.

Breakfast: Oatmeal and Apples
Lunch: "morale mix" (the good stuff, lots of chocolate), jerky PB tortillas, snackmix
Dinner: the only meal Bethany cooked the whole trip, veggie pasta in the Hotel!!!!


No pictures today, the weather was THAT AWEFUL.

The scale is, obviously, approximate :)

Voyage of the Black Snake Day 9

Ships Log: Friday, 10/16/15

Mud Point ---> Customs! ---> small Island just North of Ft. Lennox

Flying blind now, with only printed "google maps". Guy at Canadian Marina said we can maybe get map, cash, lighter in St. Jean. Hopefully that's tomorrow, and that's also were the first locks are. He says there's 2nd set right before the St. Lawrence that we didn't know about until now.

Eating Lunch standing because it's been raining and everything is wet! Fresh apples are a god-send!

Last night was brutal. Very very high winds on the tent, rain, and Bethany had a panic attack because her hands were going numb. Eliot got up to poop around 2AM, and it was miserable. Today we fought a strong headwind and waves to the river mouth. Had to bail out kayak at lunch.

Breakfast: Kasha and wet onions
Lunch/Snack: Wet trail mix and fresh apples
Dinner: Lentil rice veggie stew.

Tomorrow: St Jean? and Locks?

Our camp: hanging everything out to dry in the clearing weather. Turns out (see tomorrow), that it wasn't a great idea to leave it overnight.

Customs were very friendly, didn't even ask us to get out of the boat. On the other hand, it was very cold waiting for them to check our passports.

Found camp on a Island surrounded by marsh on one side and river on the other. A beautiful campsite, quite remote, although just across the river from town. 

Voyage of the Black Snake Day 8

Ship's Log, Thursday 10/15/15

One week in!

~18 miles covered: Grand Isle State Park--> "Carry Place"--> Mud Point

Tailwind, waves, cool enough we didn't want to stop anywhere too long, but not punishing. Sunny.

"Carry Place", the only planned portage of the trip, turned out to be a culvert under a road. We had factored in extra time for this and were happy to take the break and paddle under, getting out to slide the boat over debris collected at one end, without having to empty the boat.

Stopped paddling mid-afternoon to set camp. We are passed all camp sites we have marked on our map, so flying blind in this regard. It's a struggle: Stop now cause we have wet things to dry out, we see a good camp spot and we don't know when we'll see another? or push till dinner time cause the weather allows, and hope we find a decent spot to pitch a tent?

Today we said: "we'll start looking for a spot once we reach Mud Point, then we'll be sure to find something by nightfall".

Eliot spotted a "grandmotherly" looking lady out on her deck, we pulled over and asked if we could stay in her yard. She turned out to be a loquacious New Yorker named susan, who was absolutely grandmotherly. She plied us with cake, cookies, chips, and what felt like the entire contents of her nonperishable goods cupboard. She then said, "May as well get some work outta ya!" and gave Eliot work gloves and a wheelbarrow and told him where to haul the brush she needed moved and which scrap wood we should burn.

Ate:
-Kasha and ruined onions
-damp trailmix, sunbutter, apples, tortillas
-Susan's apple cake and chips
-spaghetti and tuna from susan
-oreo smores, cause susan's oreos!

Tomorrow?
The Border! ...And hopefully find a map, cause all we have for Canada is a zoomed out GoogleMaps printout!
Called Customs to verify crossing procedures- the guy said "go to the can-pass marina". We have no idea what this is, but figure we will know it when we see it.


Our campsite at Susan's on Mud Point:

New Year, Fresh Starts

Starting the UN "year of pulses" with 15 varieties of local beans in our chili:

Starting a Tiny House with a Tiny Bathtub:

Maple, to be sealed and strengthened with resin and maybe some fiberglass- boat style.

Plans= ongoing group effort.

This maple is practically an heirloom already. It's from a tree in Laura and Lyons' yard, felled before Eliot was born!

Tiny tall tub frame, plus seat. 

Tub TBC...

Voyage of the Black Snake Day 7

Ship's Log, Wednesday 10/14/15

~17 miles.

Winds SSW in morning to NW mid-morning (that's a tailwind turning to a headwind).

N. Burlingto Beach --> Colchester Point --> Grand Isle State Park

Relieved to make it out of Burlington. Waves still sizable and bailing happened more than once. Forced to stop in Colchester for 3.5 h. due to wind change and strong swell. Unable to get around the point 'till wind abated sufficient to push through.

While waiting, ate some snack, hiked 'round the neighborhood to the causeway/breakwater in hopes of discovering portage (no way!), then hiked back, harvesting crisp and juicy apples and pears from somebody's yard on the way. Took a nap. Got lots of advice from old men: careful of "7 foot swells out of nowhere", and "stay in the lee today"...etc. They're just jealous!

Had to have Eliot get out in wool socks and keens (and remember, it was cold) hauling the boat in the shallows to bridges through both causeways (cause he is heavier, wet anyway, and less susceptible to cold). Waterline is apparently a couple of feet lower than previous years (and our map). Lots of duck blinds in the shallows, as it's duck hunting season. A duck blind is a one-person platform covered in marsh grass and branches where you sit and drink beer and shoot at ducks. Some better disguised than others. We quickly learned that duck blinds mean "too shallow for the boat".

Picked some fat clams in said shallows while wading. Cooked them up alongside dinner- even had a lemon! but they tasted terrible and the texture was worse than the flavor. Left them out at the shore for the local fauna to take care of. Felt guilty. ("the time has come the walrus said...")

Arrived at waterside campsite near nightfall. Bathed despite the cold, because it had been a while and there was no-one to see. Did not inform the park personnel of our presence as we arrived after office close and left before it opened. No other campers in our end of the park.

Ate:
-ruined potatoes and pemmican stew
-waterlogged trailmix and apples
-tortillas and hard sausage
-ruined potatoes and pemmican stew, again (cooked furtively in the dark).

Took no photos: too cold, windy, thwarted, driven...

Tomorrow....long day?

Voyage of the Black Snake Day 6

Ship's Log Tuesday 10/13/15

No net miles. 10 minutes spent in boat.

Woke bright and early, as the sky was lightening. We broke camp, ate our oatmeal and apples, finished charging all devices (phones, headlamps) on campground plugs and packed the boat.

Wind and whitecaps were intimidating, but less so than the idea of being shore-bound all day so we set out. the proximity of beach was too comforting to justify paddling out around the rocky headland and the waves were washing over our splashproof, but not waterproof boat. We turned tail, and spent the remainder of the morning ashore, drying out our sodden food supply. The wind was stiff and the air was dry and our total losses at the end of the day amounted to a few dried potatoes and apples, a significant quantity of trail mix, all the home made dried onions and all the vitamins, packed to keep us strong. It was an epic pain, but not a disaster.

Learned: pack food small multiple bags if you want to minimize spoilage. This would have saved some onions and trailmix, and a lot of laborious sorting, drying and cursing.

Spent afternoon in town at the library (for internet) and grocery store (for plastic bags to double bag food, and hard sausage.

And that night we set camp on the point, for free, on diocese land, without permission, on the advice of an ex bum and a couple with backpacks who had tented there last night! It was one of my favorite sites of the trip. Good shelter in trees, lots of dry firewood, the thrill of trespassing...

Meals:
- oatmeal and apples
- soggy trailmix
- ruined potatoes and jerky stew.

It doesn't even look that menacing, does it! At the end of the beach is the diocese land where we camped.

 Beautiful morning!

 Getting suited up, in my usual attire, not suspecting that we would be back on shore within the half-hour. The rubber kitchen gloves over black fleece gloves were a godsend.

 The rescue operation. This is also where the (recently) ex- bum wandered along and gave us lots of advice.

 This is the vitamins. It's actually quite a small bag, just looks large. And the fact that they disintegrated almost immediately says a lot for their general digestibility!

Consolation prize for going nowhere today: maple creemies are a "vermont thing". Turns out it's just maple flavored soft-serve icecream.

Because Carol Wants to Know

Ship's Log, Supplemental:

Yes, the trip was fun!
Yes, it was beautiful!
Yes, we'd do it again! In fact we plan to, with summer camp kids next year (not the whole thing and not in October!)

We liked each other the whole time, got along better than at home, learned a lot, sang a lot, were mostly warm, if not dry...

On day 2 or 3 I turned to Eliot, paddling behind me in the Kayak and said (because it had been an item of contention, previously) "OK, this is great, we can call it our honeymoon!"

And it was.