Our life after living on a boat.

We started blogging in earnest when we decided to sell our houses and move onto a boat. We had many wonderful adventures aboard our Nordhavn 46 named Salish Aire . Seven years have passed and we have sold Salish Aire, purchased a house near the southern tip of the Salish Sea and often travel around North America towing Salish Airstream. It seems a good time to start a new blog about our further adventures but leave our boating blog intact for those who want to refer to our adventures on the boat. (http://salishaire.blogspot.com)

Saturday, May 20, 2023

Chapter 6 - Onward to Ontario



Our last entry was written long, long ago and now that our travelling has restarted in earnest some catching up is due.

Quick summary:

·        My back recovery / rehab continues as I continue to work to increase my back strength and flexibility.  The pain I now have after fast walking for about 2 miles is muscle pain from inactivity not nerve pain.  The nerve pain only visits when I forget and make a twisting motion.

·        After months of slow mental and physical deterioration my mother passed on during the early hours of May 29th.  Helping care for her had been a huge drain on our energy (both physical and emotional) and I think both of us had done much of our grieving as she deteriorated.  When I checked on her at the nursing home after she had expired I saw for the first time in months the face of a woman at peace.  We have chosen to delay her memorial service until July when all of her family will have had time to recover our energy and good memories.

·        In January we flew to Anchorage, Alaska to visit with close friends.  More on this trip later.

·        Our next outing was a two week cruise from Ft. Lauderdale Florida to San Diego California.  More on that trip later.

·        Our Albin trawler has continued to be rehabbed and is now sitting in our daughter’s driveway in Welland, Ontario where we towed her with the plan of launching her this Monday to travel on the canals and waterways of Ontario.

In my mother’s memory I don’t want to include a photo of her in her debilitated state because that does not show the very energetic woman she had been all of her life.  Instead I will share the only photo I am aware of from her and Dad’s wedding. It was when Dad took a day of leave as an Army Air Corps Recruit to go to the San Antonio base chapel to get married.  Mom made the comment a number of times that she and Dad needed to argue more as it was so upsetting to me the time I saw them upset with each other (because it was such a rare occurrence in their more than 70 years of marriage.)

Ivan "Lee" an Mildred "Mitty" Gregory
Married March 28, 1945
Ivan Lee Gregory November 28, 1925 - January 4, 2016
Mildred Katherine Gregory March 9, 1927 - March 29, 2023

We had collected enough air miles that we figured we could get to Anchorage at minimal costs and visit the house good friends from when we lived in South Everett had just purchased and were eager to show off.  We also planned to visit friends from when we were just married and watched a senior citizen housing project building in Seattle sharing duties with them.

Deanna and her husband Mike moved to Anchorage to be closer to his job base (he is a 747 captain for a major package hauler).  Deanna moved there to see the animals; we visit Alaska to see the scenery and if we see animals that just makes the trip that much better while Deanna moved there to see the animals and if there is some of the most magnificent scenery in the whole world, well that’s a nice extra.  In her previous life Deanna was a zoo keeper in one of the best job to person matches in history.  They now live on a hillside above Anchorage and look out at Cook Inlet over the city from their main windows and out to mountains every other direction.  Mike had recently bought into a partnership to own a Piper Super Cub which he gave me a ride in after we swept off the snow and let the engine get good and warm.  I may have felt pretty cramped physically in the seat behind his 6 ft+ frame but I soon felt pretty free looking out at the scenery around us as we flew up river and over a couple glaciers.  We did see a couple moose during our visit (none of which waited for a good photo) but don’t tell Deanna that I was most struck with the scenery.

Mike's Super Cub

Squeezed in the back seat of Mike's Super Cub watching the glaciers go by

One of the walks we went on so Deanna could show us a moose

View off Deanna and Mike's deck looking across Anchorage towards Cook Inlet

Back when Clarice and I were married we were poor-as-church-mice as the saying goes.  To save our pennies (they were still valuable back then) we traded answering emergency alarms at night in a senior citizen apartment house every other night for our room rent.  On the opposite nights another recently married couple the same age as us had the same arrangement.  Thus began a very long friendship with Bruce and Tina who moved to Alaska many years ago and clearly enjoy sharing their love of the state.  They took us to lunch at a remote resort in an old gold mining area.  The views were simply amazing over the snow covered ground.  Next they took us to their cabin on Big Lake.  We have been there before but never in the dead of winter.  We can see why they hold this little piece of heaven so close to their hearts.

View towards Cook Inlet from Hatcher Pass Lodge

Cabins of Hatcher Pass Lodge

Looking from Bruce and Tina's cabin deck across Big Lake

Tina inside The Cabin

After a week away we returned back to Lacey where our friends/pseudo Godchildren and pseudo Grand Godchildren had been caring for the house and Jarvis.

Stephanie who has lung cancer and continues to run 
for exercise (and sanity) shows off her T shirt that says it all.

Our next grand adventure was going on a cruise with someone else piloting the boat.  We never have seen ourselves as “cruise ship people” (we now know they really exist in large numbers!) but one of the bucket list items we weren’t able to complete while we owned Salish Aire was taking a ride through the Panama Canal.  Part of our promise to each other when we sold the boat was that we would plan to take a cruise through the canal at some point so we found a good price and went for it.  Our cruise started in Ft. Lauderdale Florida and ended in San Diego California.  We also talked our close friends Grant and Linda into joining us ( the cruise dates just happened to include their Valentine’s Day wedding anniversary).  The trip was something we are really glad we did but we are not so impressed with the cruise ship lifestyle that we will go straight from one ship to another (or stay on the same ship for the return journey) as many of our shipmates were planning. 

In preparation for the trip I read up on the history of the canal and watched lots of YouTube videos.  In a sense I was amazed that we crossed from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean in a few hours’ time but on the other hand I was surprised at how low the continental divide is and how that “little hill” led to the deaths of so many many people when they tried to cut it down to size.  I never imagined that from Gatun Lake which comprises most of the canal you could look out and see the oceans not that far below.

We enjoyed the food of which there was lots.  We quickly learned to limit ourselves at the buffet and to make sure we included fruits and salad with each meal.  Crossing the Caribbean to Cartagena Columbia the water was quite rough – so much so that when the movement of the ship matched the frequency of the swimming pools the water would come splashing over the sides.  We had both looked forward to Cartagena after years of fascination with the idea of this perfectly shaped  natural bay protecting the riches of Spain before they were shipped from the New World to the Old. On the ship we both spent a lot of time getting some much needed exercise walking around the decks and swimming in the pools.  At our southern Mexico stop I tried snorkeling next to the cruise ship wharf and quickly was reminded what a few years of deconditioning due to nerve damage will do (Clarice has refused to allow me to even consider going back to SCUBA diving until I build up a lot more endurance.) Once we reached our final stop before San Diego we had a chance to meet up with the new owners of Salish Aire who own a Casa in Puerto Vallarta.  Since we had explored the town a lot while visiting with Salish Aire we decided to spend time talking over a meal about our boating experiences (they have crossed the Atlantic on a sailboat) and giving them some hints on caring for their new boat.  We have since spent a lot of time visiting with them on the boat and coaching them on her various systems and have come to consider them good friends with common interests.

"Our" ship the Holland America line Zaandam

Walls of the old city of Cartagena

Friends Grant and Linda with Clarice walking the wall of old Cartagena

The buffet where we spent a lot of time

Grant looking over the rail.

One of the two pools on board 
(affectionately called the "Cow Pool" by our group)
(Panama City in the background)

Clarice and I were excited to see The Canal after having it on our bucket lists so long,
 we were up before moonset to make sure we didn't miss anything

The first bridge we passed under on the north (east - Atlantic) end of the Canal

What is left of the years of work at trying to build a sea-level canal by the French

We used the original locks.  3 locks up then 3 locks down. 
We will be locked through on the right as soon as the freighter and sailboats get to level 2.

The electric "mules" make sure that the ships stay centered in the locks
(they do NOT tow the ships which traverse under their own power)

Looking back as we are raised up in the third lock at 
a Carnival cruise ship about to enter level #1.



Our first look at Gatun Lake as we exit the third lock
(The islands used to be jungle mountain tops - now they are isolated by water)

Entering the Culebra Cut (AKA Gaillard Cut)
The hilltop on the left is the continental divide
 (shortened several times from its original height).

In the Culebra Cut terraces which were dug to try to keep the mountain out of the water
are clearly visible.  Despite all efforts dredging is constantly required as slippage continues to this day.
(White signs on the hill are for visual navigation by the pilots.)

Large earth movers continue the process of cutting back the very unstable soil
of Culebra Cut (often a layer of basalt overlies clay and sand)

Entering the first lock on the south (west, Pacific) end of the canal.
The geology did not allow for consecutive locks like on the Atlantic end so a small 
lake separates the top and middle two locks.
(The lock staff in the row boat were there to take our lines to shore (they missed)).

Mandatory selfie

The South end of the new locks only have 2 steps in the flight so the 
ships ride high above us as we are between the upper lock and the lower 2 of 
the original locks.

Entering the Pacific Ocean. The single large new lock on the left
and the old (original) locks on the right. Holland America paid many
thousands of dollars 2 years in advance to reserve our passage time. We went 
through the old locks because we fit AND it is much less expensive.



Passing under the last bridge of Panama before we set course for Mexico.

Our shipboard romantic photo.

Meeting the new owners of Salish Aire in Puerto Vallarta

After two weeks we arrived back in the USA.  We disembarked in San Diego near where we had lay at anchor while waiting for the hurricane season to end so we could push on to Mexico a couple years before.

The next couple of months were spent finishing the rehab work on Hyacinth The Boat and working around the house.  I have also agreed to be the Junior Warden at St. Benedict Episcopal Church (which translated from Episcopalese) means I am in charge of buildings and grounds. 

The house projects included getting the yard ready for spring and filling the garage walls with blown-in insulation which has long been on the todo list.  After we blew in the insulation we tidied up the sheetrock and painted the walls and ceiling with white primer so the work area is now much brighter and friendlier to work in.  We also used the blower to fill the underside of our under insulated hot tub which seems to have made a huge difference in our electric bill!

Blowing insulation into holes in the top of the garage walls

I bought a new chair set - Jarvis approved

We broke down and got a second car - its electric - We LIKE IT

Grant and Linda, Our official Godchildren 
(Andrew on the left and Jamie second from the right)
and their children and Jamie's husband

Hyacinth the granddaughter and Jarvis in Grandpa's lap

Hyacinth in her special play place

The tulips are up - it must be time for our Spring trip

On May 10th I finished another set of medical appointments and we headed out to Ontario via the northern USA states. We took more time than we usually do crossing the continent.  We visited friends along the way and spent a couple of nights in Montana before crossing into North Dakota where we stayed at Theodore Roosevelt National Park.  (This is a definite return-to park as we were pleasantly surprised at all it has to offer (including buffalo and wild horses wandering through the campground).)  Most of the way we stayed in either HarvestHost.com sites or BoondockersWelcome.com sites which saved us a bundle of cash and we got to meet some really nice people.

A HarvestHosts.com site in a field in Montana bordering the Clark Fork River.

A HarvestHosts.com site in Montana at GreyCliff Grist Mill

Much of the route follows rail lines so the trains become a bit of 
a travelling companion through the prairie states.

Buffalo in the Theodore Roosevelt National Park campground


We also stayed at my aunt's place in upper Michigan where as a child I spent many hours playing with my cousins in the woods and fields.
 

Now I understand my Dad's appreciation of trillium flowers 
when I saw them growing by the hundreds throughout the forest floor.

The "farm" looks virtually unchanged from when I was a child

The hardwood forest where I used to play with my cousins as a child.


Over the past year one of our boat related projects was changing axels on the trailer so it would accept new brakes and adding an electric-over-hydraulic brake actuator.  This project was a continuous challenge as if became clearer as the project moved along that our trailer was never really designed for brakes.  To us on the West Coast the idea of a boat trailer without brakes is ludicrous, dangerous, and illegal as we have mountains to cross.  To the folks east of the Rockies the idea of fighting with maintaining brakes on a trailer made to be submerged is purely crazy as trailers stop just fine on flat land.  Also the trailer is painted steel which is guaranteed to rust quickly in salt water.  We had originally planned to swap out the trailer for  a used galvanized or better yet, aluminum trailer when we initially got it back to Washington but being the middle of Covid when everyone wanted to go boating (it was considered being safely isolated) no trailers were available for any reasonable price.  Instead we put money and labor into it until we were convinced it was ready for cross nation travel.  We were soooo wrong.

This brings us up to the present.  We have been planning for months to tow the boat to our daughter’s house in Ontario Canada, travel the waterways of Ontario and then attend our grandson’s graduation from high school the end of June.  We initially started the trip by crossing Snoqualmie Pass and all went well.  At the Eastern side of the pass we stopped and I had a phone meeting for church business at a closed diner.  On the way out of the diner we hit a huge pothole and probably should have stopped as the thud was really loud.  Instead we pulled the trailer over Sauk Pass with its curvy downgrades (carefully controlling our speed by gearing down) and ended up at Clarice’s long time friend’s home in Wenatchee where we discovered that one of the brake calipers had broken clean off and broken the hydraulic brake line in the process.  We did an emergency repair at Myra and Clint’s house and then drove on across the Rockies with only one axel having brakes.  We stopped at some very neat places and really enjoyed our crossing of Montana and the plain states blissfully unaware that we now only had about 1 ½ functioning brakes.  When we discovered the damage at Erin’s house we threw in the towel and found a really nice used trailer locally and have spent the last 4 days madly working on it to make it fit under our boat.  We believe we are now ready to move on (the old trailer was given away for scrap).

We believe our woes started pulling out of our first rest stop in Washington 
when we hit a really big pothole.

In Wenatchee we went from a 4 wheel brake system to a 2 wheel system.

Despite the challenges we arrived safely at our daughter's house in Welland, Ontario.

The process of switching from the old trailer to the new 
was more than a minor challenge but at this time we believe it is ready.

So now that out poor old diabetic and blind (but happy) dog is getting oriented to the house (he quit rolling down the basement stairs) it is time to tow the boat to Trent Port Marina at the southern end of both the Rideau and Trent-Severn Canals on Monday (the end of a Canadian holiday weekend) and begin the next phase of this adventure.















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