13 June 2014 (Pictures Soon!)

Friday the 13th!! We both slept poorly due to the thousands of mosquitoes that had invaded the boat. I had left the pilot house window open with out the screen in place and they had come in to invade us. We sprayed the back of the boat and the front cabin to kill the ones inside. We attacked the ones in the salon with swatters and soon we had the upper hand over them.

We pushed off the dock about 9 and headed across Lake Katchewanooka to Young’s Point and the Lockside Trading Company. It’s set up as a reproduction of what a 1900′s trading company would look like. They have been in business since 1987 and have clothing, furniture, giftware, toys, etc. Plus they have a little cafe that serves ice cream and coffee. We passed, but we have been a fan of the Kawartha Dairy ice cream.

At the lock we talked to the owner of a small boat that he was taking by himself from Lake Ontario to the Georgian Bay. We admired his boat and his boating skills.

The southern end of Clear Lake is pretty boring. But about 2/3 the way across we saw dozens of islands ahead of us. Some are small with just a few trees, others are larger with 6-8 houses on them. One of them has a church on it. Aptly named St. Peters-on-the-Rock has a dock for all the worshipers.

The pictures don’t really show how beautiful this area really is. The clear water lets you see the rocks below (YIKES!), the pink limestone is stunning. The ever shifting shoreline as islands occlude each other as our vantage point changes.

We are soon in Hell’s Gate, a series of over a dozen islands that you need to wend past. It’s a well marked channel and we went slow so we didn’t miss any of the sharp turns. The maze of tiny islands is very cool. After watching the GoPro time lapse I wish that we had shot as a real video or faster than a frame a minute. It has been the best scenery on the entire trip.

After clearing Hell’s Gate, we would have turned right and gone for a short drive in Stony Lake but opted to stay the course. Most of the places to visit / stop at don’t open until after 21 June.

We are soon at Lock 28 Burleigh Falls. We had to wait for two house boats to clear the lock, but got a chance to see the houses perched along the walls of Burleigh Bay.

Passing through Lovesick Lake were more islands and we were soon at the Lovesick Lock, #30. It’s named after the legend: The story depicts a young Indian woman named Polly Cow, daughter of “Handsome Jack” Cow, who was the good looking, charismatic Indian Chief of the early 1800’s. “Handsome Jack” Cow was one of the most powerful chiefs in the Kawarthas.

Polly inherited her father’s physical beauty and was reported to have been the most beautiful Indian maiden of all. She fell in love with an Indian brave, who rejected her love. Heartbroken, she fled to a deserted island on the lake and nearly died of lovesickness. No one knows what became of this beautiful Indian maiden, therefore after many centuries, the lake was named “Lovesick”

Or you can take the flip side: Richard Faun, a native young man, fell in love with an Irish girl, Katharine O’Donahue. When he was rejected he paddled to an island and pined away until his friends found him and he went home.

After hearing all the details from the Lock 30 lock master at Lovesick, we were on our way across Buckhorn Lake. We had hoped to stay in Buckhorn, but with the start of Summer places are starting to fill up.

Around 3 PM we landed at Gordon’s Yacht Harbor, Bobcaygeon awaits!

The place to go is Bigley’s Shoes. They boast that they have 10,000 pairs. They fill up three store fronts, one with kids and high fashion Women’s ($400+), one with womens shoes and the last is men’s. Susan was able to find Sperry Topsider’s and Keds on sale.

We did some more browsing and ended up at Just for the Halibut which wasn’t the fish and chips shop we expected but a nice family restaurant. Dinner was good and it’s a popular place since it was packed when we left.

Back at the marina Susan had spied the laundry facilities and wanted to wash the bug spray smell out of the sheets. So she headed there with while I chatted with our new dock neighbors.

Saturday started off with a trip for breakfast at a little cafe we had spied on the way through town. I then headed off to the local Virgin Mobile dealer to get a SIM chip for wireless in Canada. Not as easy to do as we thought, but were able to make it work.

Saturday was “Unlock the Summer” day with a 5K walk / run, the Lion’s club pushmobile races, model boats, a band, etc. A pretty festive occasion. We couldn’t stay since we were on the fuel dock, so we headed off.

As we floated out the end of the dock the band said “What a great day, look at that huge white boat sail by”. We gave a toot and a wave and were off to Fenelon Falls.