We reached our first lock on the Trent-Severn about 2 hours later. We started at our normal cruise speed of 8.3 mph, but as we got into the earliest approaches to the Trent-Severn, we slowed down to 6.2 mph (or 10.0 kph), which is the normal speed limit for much of the waterway. The waterway is about 245 miles long, and we plan to spend 3 plus weeks in it so there is no need for us to hurry. Our first lock (photo at left) is Lock Number 45 and we will count down to Lock Number 1 at the other end. When it was our turn to lock through, we also had to wait for the road bridge to swing out of the way, which it is doing in the photo. The clearance under the bridge was less than we require at 18.5 feet, but when it is only smaller boats locking through, the bridge does not have to open. Once the bridge was open and locked, we got permission to enter and tie up to the "ropes" on the side. The ropes are actually plastic coated cable, which are very clear unlike the slimy lock walls. We are going up about 40 feet so we were too low to watch the lock keepers manually close the gates, but we had seen them in action during our road trip here two days ago. This lock is the smallest of the TSW locks, and we learned another important rule here that is new to us. We are required to shut off all engines, including the generator if it had been running. I suppose that since these locks are so small (about 80 feet for Lock Number 45) compared to 600 to 1,000 feet long for many of the other locks that we transited coming from the Gulf Coast there may be a danger from carbon monoxide.
After we went through the lock we continued a
whopping .4 miles to the Starport Marina (photo at right).
We did not call ahead because we were not sure when we would get off in Midland nor
how far we would want to travel for the day. So we took our chances, and we were
lucky to get one of two spots left at the marina. The office, store and fuel dock are on the left and in the background on the right is one of the nicest lounges with spotless bathrooms that we have ever had. This marina is very friendly and service oriented. It seems like every time I turned around that there was a staff member asking if they can be of service. Trust me -this is very unusual! We are officially in the village of Port Severn, but as far as I could determine, all that is here other than the marina and the adjacent restaurant is a couple of houses and a closed restaurant. However, we did go to the restaurant between the marina and the lock. It was the same one that we had eaten lunch at 2 days ago. The big change is that we did not have access to the dinner menu when we were here before. The Admiral had grilled pickerel and I had grilled perch. Wow, our dinners were definitely a huge step up from the fish 'n chips on the lunch menu.
The photo on the left shows the transom of Lucky Us in the center, and the boat on the left that is covered with ads for its sponsors. This boat travels around this area and provides music for local marine oriented events. The boating season here is only about 3 months so competition for visitors is keen, and there are many local events, such as large raft ups of hundreds of boats and beach parties where this boat goes to provide music (and showcase its sponsors logos). Fortunately, it did not have its large speakers deployed with the sound cranked up while it was docked near us...
What better to end our first day on the Trent-Severn than to visit the ice cream shop next to the restaurant and eat our favorite ice cream while enjoying this marvelous sunset? Then it was back home to Lucky Us and call it a day. I was really tired even though we had only travelled a little over 12 miles. It was one of those days where we were busy almost all day long. It was mainly little things, but there was a seemingly endless stream of them.
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