Quinte Bay Cottage - Trent Refuge - Bluffers' Park Home Again

view from visitors' dock

Five days at Quinte Bay Yacht Club made Yondering feel more like a cozy waterfront cottage than a sailboat.

The weather was not favourable. In fact, downright nasty. Either way too windy, or raining, or high waves. So we stayed put for five days in Belleville. The window of our departure narrowing, and narrowing, and then almost disappearing. One option was to leave the boat and return to work, coming back the following weekend to sail home.

So... A week at the "cottage" to relax and unwind. We watched the entire Season 1 of Game of Thrones and the Shackleton DVDs. I tore through several novels.

calm before the storm on the Murray Canal

Luckily, for several of those days we had good company. Kaarina and Mike were there with Medina for three of the days and Mike fixed Medina's engine. And on Friday night, Lyn and Mike showed up on Sunglimmer. Great dinners were had.

Since Kaarina had her car, we were able to drive into Picton one day. At that point, I realized I hadn't used a credit card for 2+ weeks. I think that must be some kind of record. A situation that soon reversed when we visited a few shops.

Saturday morning Medina and Yondering set sail early. Or rather, we started our motors. The idea was to get through the Murray Canal before the next storm hit, tie up and overnight in relative safety, and then bite the bullet for a very long push back to Toronto. Hoping for favourable conditions.

This time, we stuck to the sail plan. Saturday night we weathered the storm with Medina also tied to the wall. Lots of fenders, lots of wind, lots of rocking. Sunday morning we woke first light and started our motor at 7:15 a.m., shutting it off about 9:45 pm in our own dock. Sunrise. Sunset.

15+ hours coming home to Bluffers

Weather on Sunday was a bit of everything. Fog. Sun. Cloud. No favourable winds for sailing, although we did try to catch a breeze.

Luckily the lake was fairly flat for most of the trip, but bouncy around Pres'quille. The wind shifted directions from North, North West, North East. I think we even had a whisper of a south wind.  But it wasn't too strong, so we were able to make progress at 5 knots.

A few records were set with our Summer 2014 cruise of Lake Ontario.

Longest time in recent memory not using a credit card; longest time on a visitors' dock; and longest day motoring on the lake.

Stories for a winter's day.

Another 1.45 hours to go before tying up in our BPYC slip