We’re in St. Pierre (French island off the coast of Newfoundland). Arrived yesterday and found out that a storm was approaching. Having cleared into customs and immigration, we headed out to a mooring and prepped for what we thought would be a nasty but manageable bit of weather…

At 5:00am this morning, it’s blowing 40 knots and the boat is swinging around all over the place. So, we get up and make coffee – and of course the cat thinks it’s breakfast time therefore (some chance!) – so I’m standing in the companionway enjoying my coffee when all of a sudden, whump, whump, whump…. The top of the jib has come unfurled and is now taking an absolute beating in the winds – which seem to top out just shy of 50 knots…

In trying to gain control, I managed to overpower Laurie’s wisdom and a turning block for the furling line – fighting furler with tight jib sheets in 40+knots is stupid – and resulted in the complete destruction of the turning block! Finally came to my senses and released the jib sheets – no idea how they’d gotten so tight anyway – and started reeling in the jib with the big sheet winches. By now there was no furling the jib – she looked like a gonna.

I managed to wrap three spinnaker halyards around the flogging sail and finally at 8:00 am gain a modicum of control again – at least it was quieter…

We came off the mooring once the winds had abated to just 30 and headed for the dock where we tied up and rested…

With the help of crew from a neighboring boat we managed to pull the sail down and brought it into the cockpit where we could evaluate. Turned out, the only significant damage was to the UV luff covering and Laurie and I set about the sewing machine and got it fixed and back up on the furler!

It’s now 5:00pm, we’re exhausted and ready for some serious alcohol consumption!

 

On Saturday we motored the 10+ miles up the fjord which is White Bear Bay – with steep sided hills plunging into the water with depths to around 1,000ft. Pretty neat and very Shepton-esque. At the top end, the water shallows and the geography flattens out into an open “moorland” as the guide describes – the only problem being that the moorland is once again thigh high scrub – difficult to walk on/through.

Still, we came into the open bay and anchored in just 12ft and spent a lovely evening watching out for eagles, bears, moose, etc. We also audited the fish stocks and can reliably report there are no fish here either!

Sunday dawned rather cloudy so we decided that rather than head for our next destination Francois about 40 miles east, we’d stay another day and chill out. Very lazy!

Monday we set off for Francois, but with the wind coming straight out of the east, we decided to head back to Ramea to take advantage of tomorrow’s westerly wind (which will unfortunately be accompanied by rain). At least we get laundry done and are able to catch the wifi!

We set an alarm for 5:00am so that we could take advantage of good wind – and get into Francois before the heavier stuff arrived – but at 5:00am it was raining cats and dogs so we waited till 6:00. At 6:00 it was still miserable so we cancelled and stayed the day! Mostly we did boat chores but in the afternoon, Roland stopped by – he’s the relief lighthouse keeper – and I thoroughly recommend any OCC boats visiting Ramea to look Roland up (he’ll come and visit you on the dock for sure!) – he’s a mine of information – and if he’s inclined and you have a guitar aboard, he’ll regale you with some Newfy  music!

 

Ramea turned out to be a very convenient stop. Tied to a dock, with electricity that cost just

$10CDN per night, with grocery store, restaurant, laundry facilities and post office all within about 100 yards! Another community that is Outport-ish, reliant on the ferry and with an aging population, everyone basically talking about when ‘they’ll’ close it and how can I get off this island… Even so, they have a new school – with 30 students and 4 teachers. It seems all of Newfoundland that we’ve encountered so far has been devastated by the moratorium on fishing – which back in 1994 essentially closed down the industry.

Ramea is quite pretty and the town has established a 5 mile boardwalk around the entire island so it’s possible to actually get out and see the place without getting your feet wet in the bogs. Numerous planks are engraved with people’s names and for $20 you too can have a plank – it’s their way of supporting the upkeep of the boardwalk. We bought 2 planks – one for us and one for the boat! The boardwalk winds around to the lighthouse at the southern point and we’d been invited to visit by Roland, the relief lightkeeper, who kindly gave us a cuppa tea and a tour of the light itself.

Click on photos to enlarge…

At the dock we were frequently visited by various townfolk – all very nice with their tuneful accents.

We spent four nights in Ramea getting batteries fully charged and making repairs to our Monitor Windvane (self-steering gear) in the hopes of avoiding a costly replacement somewhere down the line.

We set off across the bay just 4 miles to White Bear Cove – a 12 mile long fjord which ends in a wide open expanse with numerous cabins dotted along the shoreline. It was Saturday – so we were allowed to fish – but I don’t think there are any fish in this part of the world!

We left Ingonish at 3:45pm on August 8^th heading for La Poile, Newfoundland some 105 miles to the north east. We were able to sail as soon as we cleared the narrow harbor entrance and maintained the rhumb line pretty much the whole way there. Overnight we reefed down to two reefs in the main and flying the small jib – not because we really needed to, more to make sure we didn’t arrive too early! As dawn broke, Newfoundland was clearly visible – and there was no fog! The engine was called for as the wind dropped and we motor sailed the last 3 hours. La Poile is not visible from the coast, but as you travel up the bay, it suddenly appears on the port side – a small Outport of maybe 100 houses, accessible only by boat. We anchored right in front of the town in 60ft of water at 8:30am on the 10^th.

La Poile is one of just a few remaining Outports – the others having been resettled to more populated towns, with the government buying out households – apparently the going rate is $250,000 but the whole community needs to agree to move with a 90% majority vote.

The little village was quite active, with small fishing boats coming and going – mostly it appeared headed off for socials rather than fishing as the fishing season was due to open in a couple of days. We wandered the paths – along which people walked or rode ATV’s – from one end of town to the other was less than half a mile… So we ventured into the wilderness – but walking is rather challenging – with soft sphagnum moss under foot – very soft going. Fortunately for us, it has been very dry recently so we were able to walk without getting wet. I’m sure at other times the “paths” would be completely untenable. As it was, with the thick ankle to kneed deep vegetation at every step, it really wasn’t great walking.

People watching from the boat was great fun. It seems that all the men gather at the Fire Station each evening for a coffee klatch and witter away hours together. We later guessed that the women did similar – probably at the shop. The shop was an interesting collection of basic necessities and it seems everyone has an account there – as we saw notebooks for each lady in town – Elsie, Laura, etc – presumably with a continuing tally of what was purchased.

Only about 90 people live in La Poile these days and only three kids go to the school, so we’re guessing it’s days are somewhat numbered.

We had a very relaxing stay, attending to various boat projects, the laundry in our home made washing machine and Laurie baked some out of this world granary bread! The anchorage was very calm – until the third day when it started to blow about 25knots and for quite a while I was concerned we had dragged anchor so made good use of our new golfing distance measurer – very handy – and which confirmed that if we had dragged, we were no longer dragging.

On our final evening in La Poile I couldn’t resist heading over to the coffee Klatch – up until then we’d had very little interaction with anyone so I was determined to fix that. Had a very pleasant chat with various inhabitants – half of whom thought we’d dragged anchor and half didn’t – so it seems they’d been watching us as much as we’d been watching them! I also met with the ferry captain and mate – who park the ferry every night in La Poile, but actually live elsewhere – but live aboard during the week. I was able to quiz them a little about our upcoming sailing itinerary – and it sounded like Grand Bruit was a worthwhile stop to make – especially since the ferry no longer goes there, and the wharf is apparently in good condition…

So we raised anchor – I was relieved to see that in fact we had not dragged at all (it’s all rather deceptive when lying to 250ft of anchor rode) and left LaPoile on the August 13^th – opening day of the fishing season (everyone is allowed to catch upto 5 Cod each day of the weekend only) – and headed the short distance around to Grand Bruit – pronounced Grand Brit so it therefore had to be a good place to visit! Grand Bruit means great noise in French (an even more appropriate place to visit therefore!) – on account that there’s a cascading waterfall at the head of the harbor – sounds great! This Outport was closed in 2012 but our guide said that one family returns for the summer…

The village is tucked away behind outlying rocky islands and we picked our way carefully through the rocks on either side until Grand Bruit appeared in a narrow entrance. As we approached it was immediately apparent that more than one family was in residence as the fisherman’s wharf on the west side of the harbor had 4 or 5 small boats tied alongside and there was lots of activity on the dock. The ferry dock on the east side looked indeed to be in excellent shape so we made for it, tying alongside using the humongous ferry cleats.

We’d arrived on a spectacular day – beautifully sunny – so we didn’t waste any time walking through the town, over the bridge with the cascading waterfall beneath, to the fisherman’s dock where we met and chatted with various of the locals. The Newfy accent is quite difficult to follow – but very tuneful – and they are certainly a happy lot.

The walking trails have become seriously overgrown, but we took a walk back into the ponds – lots of small freshwater lakes – and hiked up to the two pimples at the top of the hill overlooking the village. Again, we were walking on sphagnum mosses and were getting quite accomplished at it now! The scenes from the pimples were super – we’d picked a great day!

The following day we picked our way at low tide across to an adjacent island that houses the town’s cemetery – with headstones dating back to the early 1800’s – and as late as just last year! As we came back a fellow (Winse) chatted with us and mentioned that he’d seen some Caribou on a neighboring island – would we like to go with him in his boat to take a look? Absolutely!

We sped over to the island, dodging reefs and hidden rocks and there they were – two does… Winse had said that there was also a buck – with a full rack – and we suddenly spotted this dead tree that moved!

 

 

 

 

We couldn’t get a good look at them from the boat, so Winse took us in to the rocks and I jumped off and stalked my first Caribou! Not a bad effort for a first time! What an impressive animal! We left the Caribou in peace and came back to the boat and whiled away the afternoon playing cards!

August 15^th we made our way on a windless day to the next bay – an uninhabited bay with apparently great walking trails, Cinq Cerf Bay… The entrance to the bay is quite narrow and for the first time I found myself dealing with a GPS that plotted us as being on land – while gingerly navigating a narrow passage up to our anchorage. We dropped anchor in 20ft – surrounded by a cliff on one side and a rocky shoreline on the other in Coullet Cove  – and we were the only boat around.

We quickly got the dinghy out to go exploring – anxious to find the four freshwater ponds that the guidebook mentioned were swimmable (the sea up here is at 55F – no thanks!). Laurie rowed us to the small beach where we dragged the dinghy to safety and set off for our walk along the excellent trails… Except there weren’t any. The vegetation was even more thick than we’d seen before – and wetter. We hugged the rocky coastline for a little while, but that soon became untenable, but we managed to find a moose path up – and found the first pond… It was so dark with peat that you couldn’t see more than about 6” below the surface – not to our liking – and the two other ponds we found were also black as black – our skinny dipping plans had to be shelved!

After lunch we explored the rest of the bay by dinghy, hoping to find an area where we could land and take a reasonably straightforward walk – but everywhere we stopped, the vegetation was thick. Sure we could have had a go at it – but it didn’t seem like there was going to be much reward, so we headed back to the boat for a well deserved cuppa!

Checking around the boat later I looked over to the beach and saw a black bear! Got a great view of him, but of course, needed better so got in the dinghy… as soon as I started the engine, even though we were downwind and a couple hundred yards away, he was immediately alerted to me. I motored around to his left and he started to saunter off, but I did manage to click the shot below. I motored back to the boat and as soon as I spoke to Laurie, he took off like a shot!

The following morning dawned bright and sunny and I was up early scoping out the beach and surrounding hills for more bear – and guess what – there was another one lumbering down the hillside towards us. Unfortunately before it got close enough it took a turn presumably towards the fresh water ponds so we lost sight of it.

We left the cove a little later and headed towards the metropolis of Burgeo (and therefore a laundromat!), sailing with full main and Spinnaker arriving eahead of schedule in Burgeo, only to find a buslting metropolis that smelled of fish! Everywhere we went stank and we were unable to find a suitable anchorage out of the smell, so we opted to just leave and head for our next planned destination – the island of Ramea some 12 miles off shore. Another metropolis, it also boasted a laundromat, grocery store and WiFi!!!

We arrived to find just one small spot available on the town dock – so grabbed it and went exploring…

On our last day in Ingonish and Cape Breton, we took advantage of wonderful weather and went for a walk up Franey – a local hill/mountain. The track up was very well maintained, but it was still a fairly challenging walk with the steepness. On the way up we bumped into a couple of the local beasties – the first were Grousey looking birds that turned out to be Spruce Partridge – a really stupid bird that you could basically walk up to and clobber if you needed to – actually referred to as a ‘survival bird’ – so if you ever get lost up here and are in need of sustenance – look for one of these beggars (though I understand they’re not very tasty).

The second beastie was not someone to mess with – bloody great big moose – right in the way. Unfortunately, before I could switch to a sensible lens, he’d ambled off into the thicket.

The views at the top were great – we could see for miles – though it would have been cool to look down on Toodle-oo! from here… (blocked by another hill).

         

 

Off to Newfoundland in the afternoon…

We left Baddeck and went back to Maskells Harbor where new friends Frank and Shelley aboard OCC boat Bear Keeper were anchored. Had a very nice evening aboard their boat – the last we’ll see of them for a while as our paths now diverge…

In the morning we left, headed for Ingonish – which is in the Gulf of St. Lawrence – but first we had to get out of the Bras d’Or lakes – which turned out to be no mean feat as we got to the narrow end and the current was rushing against us. We had wind against waves – leading to standing waves as we went under the bridge – quite a heart stopper – so we decided we’d put in for some shelter at Kelly’s Cove just before the final narrows out to the Gulf, awaiting favorable tide. Just as we’re coming in to anchor in the cove – which was wide open to the 25knot winds we were in – and therefore to be considered a dangerous lee shore, an engine alarm sounds due to high water temperature! We immediately shut the engine down, pull out a small jib to give us steerage and go right into the cove, turning head to the wind as the depth came up to 25ft. I rushed forward to drop the anchor – which thankfully grabbed hold quickly. We were secure!

I quickly assessed that the engine was short on water – so gave it nearly half a gallon! I can hear Mike Eslinger in my ear right now – you should always check your engine levels every time you start the engine sonny!!!

Anyway, while in our anchorage, getting beaten up by the wind, we found out that the current turns favorable 3 hours after high water – so we waited the couple of hours and then left with much less drama and headed out into the Gulf sailing once again dead down wind but this time with just a jib out, making 6.5 – 7 knots right on course.

We arrived at Ingonish in the early evening and anchored at the bottom of a ski slope. The whole area reminds me of Scotland. Unfortunately we’re challenged with lack of cell service and internet and I’m still unable to get emails and weather files via the SSB. So in the morning we decided to move to a more populated anchorage in the north bay – but the diminutive anchorage was just too small for us to anchor behind the breakwater in any reasonable depth, so we came back across the bay and anchored right under the Keltic Lodge on a rock bottom (tough to get it to set) and clambered up the rip-rap shoreline and found wifi and an excellent hiking trial to get weather files – and some exercise!

We opted to head back to the harbor for safe anchorage – good job as our anchor was set tenuously at best!

We’ll probably head out to Newfoundland tonight for an overnight passage to La Peoil – I don’t expect we’ll have any wifi for the next several weeks therefore…

Pictures below from around Ingonish – click on them to enlarge…

What a lovely location! After St. Peter’s we didn’t suffer any fog – that in itself was a welcome change! The lakes are quite large – and the sailing turns out to be very good – especially if you wait until the afternoon for the wind to develop. With very flat water, it’s easy to get some very nice speed in just 10 -12 knots of wind.

There are islands all over the place and where to spend the night is all about deciding what you want to look at and which direction you want protection from.

So far, our favorite destination has been the Crammond Islands where we anchored in a channel between two islands – bounded by shallow shoals at either end. The entrance was one we had to be careful with – and in view of the previous evening’s activities, we were seriously conservative.

We were in the Crammond Islands with the Squadron Fleet – so I think we had 11 boats in the anchorage – Toodle-oo! remaining firmly in the center, in the deepest part – as far aways as possible from the mosquitoes and flies – and in the deepest spot so that if we dragged, it would be an uphill drag in all directions! It was only 45ft. Others searched out the shallowest areas close to land – and some seemed to have some difficulty.

Once again we observed some interesting Squadron behavior… One boat arrived a little late and decided it was going to raft up to another anchored boat. Little did they know that the anchored boat was on it’s third attempt to anchor. Sure enough, soon after laying a veritable spider’s web of lines, the anchor began to drag. When they finally noticed what was going on, there was no time to untie all the lines, so the upped anchor and did a really good impression of being a catamaran as they drove around the anchorage seeking a spot where they could attempt another landing. When that failed too, they separated and anchored individually – good call!

We had a nice circumnavigation by dinghy of the two islands – and were rewarded when Laurie spotted a Bald Eagle. We got another sighting a little later as we enjoyed Cheese and Wine aboard Toodle-Pip!

We sailed out of the Crammond Islands once the wind had filled in and had a lazy sail (genoa only) up to Clarke Cove. We anchored in a very secluded bay and were delighted to find out that this was apparently a Bald Eagle roosting spot – we were treated to an Eagle for the evening. In the morning when I check to see if it was still about – it wasn’t – instead a Juvenile (black head) had taken up residence and was squawking for food! Soon we had two Eagles to admire.

From Clarke Cove – whose only downside was that it appeared to be a Ski-Doo hangout – we sailed (lazily again) up through the Barra Straight Swing Bridge to Maskells Harbor, another very secluded anchorage – filled with Squadron boats.

We’re now in Baddeck where we’ve been for the last two nights – and probably will be another couple… We had an entertaining evening at a Caleigh and then a tremendous event last night – the last playing of the Bells of Baddeck – a musical play about Alexander Graham Bell – in whose museum the play was held. We hope to visit the museum tomorrow.

We’re struggling with communications – our SSB won’t talk to the computer so our shipboard email is down – as is our ability to get weather information once we’re in Newfoundland. So we’re trying to fix that issue before proceeding…

After an extremely foggy start in the morning which saw us taking refuge in Canso for a couple of hours (allowing us to get a good shop in at the local Co-Op), we crossed over Chedabucto Bay/Straight of Canso to St Peter’s where we had a short wait for the canal to open for us. Being at mid tide, the rise in levels through the single lock was just inches.

We spent three nights on a mooring at St Peter’s Marina taking advantage of laundry, showers and wifi and managed some minor repairs to the monitor windvane, did another shop, sampled the best crab we have ever had and then pushed into the Lakes proper, through St. Peter’s inlet, a winding channel leading up to the lakes.

The wind was light so we opted for the Spinnaker, flying it for all of 30 seconds before the wind completely died with no signs of return. We bagged it and headed towards Malagawatch harbor – tucked well in behind several islands on the western side of the lake where our guide told us to expect to see Bald Eagles.

The entrance to Malagawatch was convoluted and one had to stay alert to stick within the channels or run the risk of running onto the shoals. We got to the designated anchoring spot and all of a sudden the depth sounder starts doing weird stuff… while the chart said we were in 30 ft, the depth sounder went all over the place – and right up to 3 ft! – 3’6” less than we need to float! So we backed out and anchored in a stable 30ft. Not a soul in sight. Not a Bald Eagle in sight either however! Then one by one they started visiting… two species of biting flies – a large black one and a large green one. Even though we were equipped with multiple fly-swatting weapons, we couldn’t keep them at bay, so we decided retreat was the best option and we weighed anchor and left.

We slowly re-traced our exact path (as told to me by the electronics aboard) back out of the anchorage when all of a sudden we come to a screeching halt. We’ve run aground. I try to back off – no joy – stuck fast. We launched the dinghy and loaded her up with 200’ of chain and our main anchor and I headed out to open water and dropped everything over. (Now, that would have been an interesting event in the Green Demon!!!) We brought the anchor rode back in with the windlass until the chain was bar taught – she could not bring the boat around and out. Even with engine power assist.

By now the afternoon wind had filled in to 10 to 12 knots  – so we decided to try to heel (lean) the boat with the sails – thereby reducing our effective depth and giving some more motive power to getting out. We raised both Genoa and then the main sail and she leaned, and we stayed put. OK, we need a kedge!

Kedging off is not something we’ve done before (we were attempting to do it in Scotland when Bertie came to our rescue with his big dinghy) and entails setting an anchor at 90 degrees to the boat and attached to the top of the mast so that you can lean the boat over, reduce effective draft and float free of the shoal… Fortunately, since our Scottish escapade, I’d done a lot of reading about how to set the anchor/rode up properly – so this time around we were more methodical. We assembled our ‘Fortress’ anchor (should be perfect for this silty muddy bottom) and attached our 300ft long drogue rode which we brought to one of our main winches by way of two snatch blocks – one attached to a masthead halyard, the other to a padeye on the deck. Again, I took the dinghy out and laid the rode out and finally dropped anchor probably about 200 ft away from Toodle-oo!

We set the anchor with the halyard block down low and winched in till the rope was tight – thereby setting the anchor, then we slackened a little and raised the halyard to almost mast height and then started cranking the winch…

Meanwhile, we’re still getting bitten by nasty flies!

It takes a lot to heel Toodle-oo! and we were monitoring the heel with an irritating iPhone App that kept yelling the angle every time in changed – 10.2 degrees, 10.3 degrees, 10.4 degrees, 10.5 degrees, 10.6 degrees, 10.7 degrees,… I was having to crank pretty hard to get just this level of heel – so we augmented with our electric winch, getting her over to about 15 degrees, before that winch started to complain.

We weren’t getting anywhere except more concerned. I called Sydney Coast Guard to establish the current tide level – it took them about 15 agonizing minutes to come back with “there really aren’t tides in the lake, but currents affect water-level and best guess is that you’re at high water. (Not what we wanted to hear).

Meanwhile, we’re still getting bitten by nasty flies!

I carried on winching the kedge and hauling on the bower anchor and every so often trying to motor out… After some time Sydney Radio came on asking if we needed assistance from Halifax Coast Guard – we told them we were still trying and would let them know soon. I think this discussion spurred me on a bit as I cranked the boat through 25 degrees of heel…

Meanwhile, we’re still getting bitten by nasty flies!

Finally, after 2 hours, the boat suddenly began to move and all of a sudden we’re off!

Crack!

With the boat able to move, she quickly fell in line behind the main bower anchor while meanwhile our kedge anchor was now a stern anchor and the rode from masthead to anchor went right through our wind generator’s blades – severing one blade at the root! Rats!

So now, something else we’ve never done – deploy and retrieve more than one anchor!  But it proved pretty simple (even if it did take another hour!) – drop back on the main anchor until we could retrieve the stern anchor – which was absolutely buried in soft gooey and stinky mud. Once up, we brought in the main anchor and we were finally off!

By now it was approaching 7:00pm so we went across (the deepest part of) the inlet and anchored in a bay like area in about 40 ft. The flies were finally dissipating (bedtime for them?) and we were able to sit out in the cockpit and reflect.

It had certainly been an unexpected incident. We don’t think we did much wrong to cause the event and in the end I was pretty happy about how we’d managed to get out – though next time, perhaps I’ll remember to turn off the windbugger to save the $360 replacement cost of the blades!

We slept well!

Our morning in Jeddore started early – the commodore aboard a Nonsuch, ‘Magical’ blew his foghorn at 6:15am to rally the troops for the sail to Macleod’s Harbor – some 30 miles or so up the coast. I got up to find out what the racket was about and went back to bed.

We got up at about 7:30 and as I’m walking over to make the coffee, I glance out to see Magical and 3 other boats circling ‘Voyageur C’ who was pulling up his anchor. They’d all been circling sine 6:15 waiting on the whole group to be ready. Sure enough when at about 7:45 Voyageur C was ready, he led the procession of boats out of Jeddore towards the afternoon’s destination.

We weighed anchor about 90 minutes later and trailed the group. It’s a long ride back to the ocean, but as soon as we were there, the wind filled to a nice 10 – 15knot run so we were able to turn off the engine and enjoy a really nice sail eastward.

We caught the group (the largest of the other boats was 36ft compared to our 44 so it’s not surprising we caught them) after about 25 miles sailing with main and poled out genoa, but as we did, the wind shifted somewhat to being dead downwind slowing our progress as the genoa was now covered by the main – so we had to move the pole from port to starboard – an onerous affair – and once again got going.

We passed the line of boats – finding out as we did that the fleet was actually motor sailing! That’s cheating in this sort of wind! Anyway we jibed over at the entrance to Macleod’s and was probably an hour ahead by the time we dropped anchor. The shelter from the westerly wind was pretty limited but at least we had a good set with the anchor, so we were happy for the evening. When the group appeared, they did not feel the same way and so anchored in another spot a mile or so down the way… As we listened to the radio chatter, it became evident that after two hours of trying, one of the group had still not successfully anchored and was therefore invited to raft up (tie up) to another of the anchored boats… what a palaver!

We left early the next morning in fog, destination as far east as we could get. The forecast was not great so we had a plan B and plan C should we need to put in beforehand. In the end we opted for plan B as the waves were rolling us all over and after a period with 30+ knot winds from right behind us (awkward motion) it dropped off to less than 10 and left a massive swell, so it was altogether uncomfortable so we motored into Fisherman’s harbor where we launched the dinghy and went for a walk in search of a WiFi signal. 2 miles later, nothing gives so we went back to the boat. OCCer John Van S was just anchoring when we arrived and we invited them over for arrival beverages – which we enjoyed in Toodle-oo’s cockpit as the rest of the group arrived and provided excellent anchoring entertainment!

In the morning, the fleet left early once again and once again we left an hour plus behind them – destination once again, as far east as we could get. As it happens, we managed to get to the tip of Nova Scotia (before it becomes Cape Breton) and took the narrow channel (Andrew’s Passage) up towards Canso, having the fleet in sight as we did so. However, whereas they carried on to Canso, we opted to stay the night in Glasgow Harbor, just short of Canso and enjoyed weird noises of Seals yelling at each other – and had a magnificent fly-by by a Bald Eagle!

Our anchorage was very pretty – we were happy and settled in for the evening in Glasgow Harbor, just short of Canso.