July 21…it all works out!!! Floyd was up early (as usual) to re-mount the dinghy (which is still leaking…he says…”I’ve just begun to fight”.) 8AM and we are outta here…only boat on the blue line until 8:45…two or three loopers circling…and the house boat on the wall making noises.

Just a word about house boats…we have nothing against them…really…but they are overweight and always under powered…add that to the fact that this is houseboat rental heaven!!! They pay, watch a 5 minute video, and are turned loose in the canal system. Most never venture very far from where they were rented…and thanks goodness they are clearly labeled so you know what you are dealing with…but in the locks…OMG…we’ve seen them backwards…but most of the time they resemble the pin ball in the pin ball machine. So, in conversation with Looper friends TRANQUILITY who spent the night on the wall with these guys, we hear that they partied until 3AM and now are up, swigging coffee and smoking cigarettes in preparation for heading into the lock. OH JOY!!! Lockmaster takes charge immediately …house boat first …once he lands, then TUMBLEWEED, then fellow loopers MUSAL TUG, and PENNY PINCHER…seems to work…and the three couples on the houseboat quickly become our friends…we have this tiny lock and then comes the Peterborough Lift Lock, an engineering marvel that consists of 2 big pans of water that literally lifts boats 65 feet in the air. Once again, same order…though there for a moment we thought PENNY PINCHER was going to have to buy us a new dinghy (coulda worked) but I was quick with the boat hook and they managed to get stopped.  Our looper friends stopped here so we traveled the next 4 locks with the houseboat. They stopped at noon on a wall to rest up and prepare for the night …kinda made us glad to move on. We are all alone in the locks…wind picks up…but Captain Floyd is not worried. We push on…11 locks today…almost 50 miles…and wind!!! We make Buckhorn at 4:30 right on schedule but there is no room on the walls…well, there could be room if the houseboats weren’t so spread out. Lockmaster suggests the marina a mile ahead…phone and radio calls go unanswered…so we just pull up to the gas dock where we are greeted by SPIRIT, SEQUESIOUS and NEARLY PERFECT.  Mr. Grumpy, the marina owner, appears and finally relents to let us stay on the gas dock, no electric and the dog must stay on the gravel walkways. Oh, and $5 discount. I should mention that there are acres and acres of grass. It’s a trip keeping Dakota on the short leash but he seems to get it.

We make nice with the Loopers, cook supper, and crash. Tomorrow we only have two locks…then two nights at Fenelon Falls. Though folks have warned us that finding space on that wall is hard to come by…get there early. So we are planning to head out at 7AM…make the lock at Bobcaygeon when it opens…and be in Fenelon Falls around noon. If that fails, there is a marina there. We are getting together Wednesday and Thursday with Jim and Elaine, from London ON Canada. We meet them at the Looper Rendezvous two years ago and really hit it off. They follow the blog and have texted/e mailed several times. We are excited to spend some time with them.