After our enexpected delay in Saint-Ours, there was no way we were going to make it to Montréal today with both the wind and current against us, so Canada’s second largest city is going to have to wait, and it’ll be Saturday Night in Sorel instead!

We exited the Richelieu into the St. Lawrence River to the following sites (felt like we were back in the big leagues again)…

It’s quite windy today and the anchorage prospects in our range did not appeal, so we decided to get a slip at the Parc Nautique de Sorel (Sorel Marina, $1.80/ft/night; water, power, showers included; laundry $1.50/wash or dry). To stay clean, lately we’ve been swimming in Lake Champlain and the Richelieu River, so it’s about time for a hot shower.

We’re cooling our heels a little bit now that we’re settled in a marina – our first since Castleton-on-Hudson – so I have some time to post a few of the stories we have backed-up.

For starters, here are some pics from our travels in the Champlain Canal, Lake Champlain and the Richelieu River…

So we chose the Champlain Canal for the route home, which was good because it turned out a few of the locks in the Erie Canal were closed due to recent flood damage.

This is goofy (because I’ve maintained our ship’s log quite religiously for most of this trip) but I ran out of pages (the supplemental ones I photocopied in Miami), so I kinda said “Screw It” and threw up my hands and quit recording everything somewhere on the Hudson River.

So I might have some of this chronologically wrong.

We left Troy, NY on July 14th and entered the Champlain Canal.

It was similar to our Erie Canal experience on the way south, in that the lock masters were very friendly and helpful, and we were joined by a little bit of commercial barge traffic here and there between the locks (actually, there was a lot of barge traffic between Locks 5 and 8, as there is a major dredging project happening there this season).

No other pleasure boats traveling with us, though (unlike the canals in Québec, which are very well-used by pleasure boats).

Our only over-night stop on the Champlain Canal was at Fort Edwards, where on a first-come, first-served basis, there is free 48-hour dockage. We managed to squeeze in and made a few new friends while we were there.

We got going later than usual the next morning, still hoping to make it to Fort Ticonderoga on Lake Champlain.

I forget what time we arrived in Whitehall, New York (’cause I’m not writing anything down anymore), but I do recall that it was the last lock in the Champlain Canal…

After Whitehall, northbound you enter The Narrows of Lake Champlain…

We made it to the anchorage near Fort Ticonderoga about an hour before sunset, so we had time for our third -maybe fourth- fresh water swim in about a year (our first few were at Wade ‘n Kim’s cottage on Lake Wallenpaupauk in the first week of July). It was great, especially after the hot, stuffy day of motoring we’d had.

We got going early the next morning, and here are some of the last sights before exiting the Narrows of Lake Champlain…

We left so early that morning because wanted to get to Burlington, VT early in the day so we’d have time to explore the town some.

I’ll save Burlington for another post, though…