Day 133 to 134 to and at Bobcaygeon, ON

      We left Fenelon Falls at 8:55 am to head to the blue line to wait for the 9 am lock opening.  They saw us coming and they opened the gate before we made it to the line.  Very quickly we were headed down, and the photo at the right shows us exiting the lock surrounded by concrete walls that are part of the dam. Usually when you exit a lock on the down side it is an open area so this view was a little unusual. This is the second lock in a row where we are going down rather than up, and it should be "downhill" until we are out of the TSW.  The weather is cloudy and a little windier than forecasted, but our hopes are to make it to Bobcaygeon, Ontario about the time people are required to leave for the day which is 11 am, since this is apparently a popular stop.  We hope to get hydro (electric), and we also hope to stay two nights because tomorrow is suppose to be stormy.  We checked at the marina close by Bobcaygeon, and they don't have space for us until Monday so that is not an option. 
      The photo at the left shows the view back at the Fenelon Falls Dam and Lock. All in all, this was a very nice stop for us. Anyway, the distance for today is 15.1 miles, which will take us about 2.5 hours since we are pretty much planning to travel at the nominal speed limit of 10 kpm (or about 6.2 mph). The lock master for Bobcaygeon happened to be at the Fenelon Falls Lock this morning as we locked through so he knows we are coming, and we were hopefully this might help us secure a spot.  It never hurts to be optimistic, but we had our fingers crossed as well.  The wall space with hydro is after we go through the lock so we will have two locks today. 
      Our trip was relaxing as we did not speed up for the couple of times when we were not in a No Wake - 10kph speed zone. We went past our most unusual "Beer Store" in Canada to date (photo at right). The decorations like the barefoot diver and an ogre of some sort on the hill, are what drew our attention to this drive-up location. Big orders must be a problem as this is quite a high bank, but I guess if the craving is big enough...

      As we got near to Bobcaygeon, we passed this house with a boat house and large deck that looked like it literally covered the whole island. That or perhaps they have artificially expanded the island???

      We got through the lock at Bobcaygeon about Noon, but all of the spaces with power on the wall were taken. We tied to the wall on the other side, and although we were in the sun, there was a nice breeze. Late in the afternoon we had some great news, as a spot opened up on the wall. The Admiral was taking a dip in the water to cool off when she noticed the empty spot.  We started the engines and dropped the lines to move the boat in record time.  I was not taking any chances so we backed away from the dock and kept going on around 180 degrees and right up against the wall on the other side of the channel. As we were tying up, the boat next to us kindly volunteered to move his boat up about three feet so we could get the complete side of our boat on the wall.  Otherwise we would have been hanging out past the end of the lock wall. Now we are hooked up to power and the air conditioning is on - hallelujah!  Before moving we had both taken naps with doors and windows opened, but the 'feels like 95 degrees' temperature made for a miserable time. The lock wall had these PVC pipes to pass the power cords through (photo above right). This safely eliminates a tripping hazard, especially at night in poorly lighted locations.

       For dinner the Admiral found a local diner that was having a Friday (Whitefish) fish fry (photo at left). The restaurant (or café) is normally open for ony breakfast and lunch, except of Friday when they only take reservations. It was definitely a "Ma and Pa" operation with homemade potato salad, coleslaw and wonderful pan fried Whitefish. The meal has to rank right up there as one of the best ones that we have had on the trip so far this year.
      Then it was back to the boat to see how the "party" was going. I had not mentioned the three houseboats with about 14 young men who were tied near us and had been partying all afternoon... Fortunately, they had gone off to drink elsewhere, and they did not return until after we had gone to sleep. We were now really grateful that we had electricity so that we could run the air conditioning and close the windows to keep the noise out!

       The next day was rainy as predicted so we were happy that we had decided to stay an extra day. For lunch we went to "Just For The Halibut" for lunch (photo at right). The Admiral used both her slicker and an umbrella, but our legs and feet still got soaked in the sometimes heavy rain. We both had broiled halibut for lunch, and it was excellent. On our way home we did some shopping including a metal crane for the sun room at our home back in League City that is a good 4' tall.  We also bought a two person foam pad for lounging in the water. The satellite TV stopped getting its signal because of the weather and the two channels from over the air also  were not coming in so we watched a DVR movie instead.   We pretty much spent the rest of the day on Lucky Us and thereby avoiding the rain.

      There was a small park area adjacent to the wall, and when walking Lucky, I noticed several small tree stumps that had been left after beavers had cut down the trees (for example, see photo at left). Someone had put plastic barriers around the bases of the small trees to thwart the beavers, but obviously, this did not deter the beavers from cutting down several 3 or 4 inch diameter trees.
      The weather prediction for tomorrow (Day 135) is good so it looks like we will be off in the morning...