St. Lawrence to Ottawa River June 27

We left Montreal on Saturday June 27. To get back to our route we had to back track about two miles, do a 180 turn to the right, and head up into the St. Lawrence seaway canal. Within a few minutes we reached our first lock.


I was a little apprehensive about this portion of the trip from Montreal to Ottawa, and it was mainly due to the locks. There are two locks on the St. Lawrence seaway that are "industrial strength" size locks and I wasn't quite sure what to do at each lock. But we learned fast. We pulled up to the Saint Lambert lock pictured. We had to tie up at the floating dock, climb the ladder to the phone booth and call the lock master to tell them we were wanting to lock through. Also, we had to purchase a $25 lock ticket at the credit card machine in the phone booth. This was later given to a lock worker in the lock. (although we found out later that they will take actual cash.)





These locks for ocean going vessels looked huge to our little boat. In these locks the lockworkers threw a polypropylene line down to the bow and stern and tie it to a bollard at the top of the lock. Sometimes it took a couple tosses to get it down the 60-70 feet to us. As we had worked out, Kaye handled the stern line and I handled the bow line.










At the St. Catherine lock we had to wait for a large freighter to come out. While our boat seems small in the lock these freighters look like they barely fit.












After about 25 miles on the St. Lawrence we reached the Ottawa River. There were two locks on the Ottawa.


The 65' Carrillon Lock, with a dam on the left side.















An unusual lock in that the lock door raises up.




Inside the lock, we were tied up to a floating dock. The lock seemed huge and these ladders going up the inside give some idea of the scale.










Our first night after Montreal was tied up on a canal wall at the Saine-Anne-de-Bellevue Lock. This was part of the historic lock system so it was covered under our Seasonal Pass. We met a couple from Ontario that were intersted in our boat. We gave them a tour. We were surprised at how many people have admired our boat. We think that the shape (tug like) is unusual for Canada. As of the date of this blog entry, we probably have given 5- 6 tours to people who seemed interested in it, including a government lock operator. Maybe I should be asking the American Tug company for referral commissions.

Our other interesting experince at Saint-Anne-de-Bellevue, besides the town we walked through, were the Mayflys. At first I thought there were flower blossoms landing on the boat. The next morning we learned about Mayflys that covered the top surface of the boat and with the dew did not sweep off easily. We understand these insects with large transparent wings and long tan bodies live for only about 48 hours. They were pretty but a nusiance.