With nearly 50 miles to cover today, we left at 7:00 in order to arrive at our first lock right as it opened at 9:00. We pulled away from our wall in Healey Falls and set course for Hastings, Lock No. 18 on the Trent-Severn Waterway. With a lift of just 9 feet, it was an easy start to the morning. We pulled right in and were quickly on our way. The Trent River opened into Rice Lake which has many small islands scattered along each side of the navigation channel. We weaved around Slaughter and Hardy Islands, keeping a close eye on our chart.
Rice Lake is 20 miles long and doesn't have much for scenery. When we spotted a small brown spot moving in the water, we both jumped to see what it was. Barry grabbed the binoculars and I grabbed my camera. As I was trying to get the Canon to wake up, Barry identified the swimming creature as a raccoon. He was cute and I would have loved to capture the moment, but, alas, my batteries were dead. I went downstairs and reloaded with fresh power.
The Trent-Severn Waterway channel is extremely well identified with tons of channel markers and other aids to navigation. It is also lined with homes and businesses that attempt to offer their own bit of navigational advice and/or heritage statement. Ice cream always gets our attention (but we didn't stop). There are always the "redneck" signs referencing bass, bite me, and, as seen yesterday, the Flofas. This was our second totem pole viewing (we saw one in the Thousand Islands).
Still bumming about missing my swimming raccoon picture, we spotted something brown off to starboard, at the water's edge. Our first thought was a deer, as it was the perfect color of brown. As we got closer, we realized that it was much too chunky for a deer. Barry guessed a horse. I told him too short and squatty for a horse. Then another animal came out of the woods and it became clear that it was a small herd of cattle coming down for a drink. Soon there were five cows and we had slowed down to idle, just to watch. It was another totally unexpected animal encounter and made up for the raccoon.
Out in the open water of the lake, we were able to run at our high cruise speed and cover some distance at a good clip for us (8.5 kts). We made a sharp turn into the Otonabee River, which quickly resembled the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway with its shallow and narrow channel, numerous side channels, downed trees and stumps, turtles sunning on logs, and tons of no wake zones. We passed a boat heading the opposite direction and they warned us of a large deadhead (mostly submerged log) ahead. Sure enough, we spotted it just inside the red marker and were thankful for the kindness of those Canadian boaters.
All the downed trees provided a perfect home for blue herons. We saw several today, so here is the daily heron photo. A little after seven hours since we started the day, we pulled into our final lock, No. 19, at Scotts Mills. The 8-foot lift was easy and I spent a lot of my time while in the chamber watching the mallard family that was locking through with us. There were eight, most of them adolescents that did not have all their feathers yet. This male was having an afternoon snack off of the lock wall while mom did a bit of preening.
Upon exiting No. 19, we went a short distance and tied up to the wall just prior to Lock No. 20, Ashburnham. Just on the other side of the chamber doors lies Lock No. 21, the Peterborough Lift Lock. It is the crown jewel of the Trent-Waterway and the world's highest hydraulic lift lock. We took a quick walk to the visitor's center and watched one lock cycle. We'll go back tomorrow and learn more about the lock, then go visit the town, and finish up with a concert in the park tomorrow evening. So far we've escaped much of the daytime rain from this crazy frontal system thats been in place for days. The barometer is stilling falling -- tonight its at 28.68 inches.
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