077: The Thousand Islands!

On July 2^nd we left Kingston, ON and headed fifteen n/m’s over to McDonald Island in the Thousand Islands (“TI”) area of the St. Lawrence River between Canada and the U.S.    The TI is considered a side trip on the Great Loop, but we consider it a “must see” trip for the beauty and nature.   The Canadian side of the TI is the preferred side due to eighteen islands that are part of the Canada Parks system as opposed to the U.S. with few state/national parks.   All of the Canadian Islands have some limited docking facilities and bathrooms.  None have power, and only four of them allow you to run a generator.   Absent any docks, you find a nice spot to “drop the hook” and anchor, and some islands have mooring balls.

On the way to McDonald Island:

We spent two days/nights at McDonald Island hiking the trail that goes around the perimeter, reading, and swimming off the boat.  I actually went in the water, while Nancy was in the water almost as much time as she was on the boat.   We were able to use our generator at McDonald, so that was nice.

"Glamping" facility:

 
The dock:

On the 4^th we made the short 1.5 n/m trip over to the town of Gananoque to re-provision, pump out the holding tank, and sight see.   We visited a small boat museum, toured the area and Nancy went for a swim at the local beach.   While Hygge has an ice maker, it doesn’t really work unless plugged into shore power, so we were low on ice and I actually broke down and bought a bag (which for me is like paying for car rental insurance).

Gananoque:

On the 5^th we went the five n/m's over to Camelot Island and stayed for two days.  There is a absolutely beautiful small bay with four mooring balls on Camelot, but they were all taken.   As we made our way around the island to the dock area, they were all full but people started waiving at us as one boat was just about to leave.   We “hovered” around for about five minutes and then pulled into the just-vacated space.  Now the Canada Parks guide clearly says no generators allowed on Camelot, there is a big sign that says no generators are allowed, but none of that stopped the lady in the sailboat next to us from telling me, unsolicited, twice that “no generators are allowed.”   (She didn’t seem to care much for powerboaters.)    In fairness, they were a nice couple and very interesting.  Her husband works for Habitat for Humanity in Canada, and they have been all over the world building homes.  They absolutely raved about Jimmy and Roselyn Carter and the good work that they have done with Habitat for Humanity and the virtual elimination of Guinea Worm Disease (),   They also had nice things to say about Garth Brooks ("worked on a housing project, humble guy, played music for us, worked just as hard as everyone else, etc. etc.").   Camelot Island had a short but great hiking trail.  On our first hike we saw that two of the mooring balls in that great bay were now open and we were tempted to move Hygge over there, but inertia proved too strong of a force and we stayed on the dock.  

Absent shore power and the use of the generator, we shutdown the portable freezer and the wine cooler that we have been using as vegetable storage.   With the extra boost from the portable solar panel we have plus the larger capacity panel I installed two winters ago, we were able to maintain battery levels sufficient for the needs of the boat and the refrigerator, but not enough to run the coffee maker and microwave (oh the humanity!).   (I went on Amazon and ordered a French press so we can boil water with the propane stove in case we ran into the no power/generator issue again.).

 We didn’t do much but hike that trail, swim off the boat and read, it was perfect.

 Camelot Island:

 

On the 7^th of July we ran back to Gananoque to add some more provisions and do laundry. We had a nice dinner at a local place (umpteenth wood-fired pizza meal of the trip), and Nancy went back to the beach for a swim.

On the July 8^th we made the fourteen n/m run to Grenadier Island.   Unfortunately, the hiking trail ran adjacent to a marshy area and our hike had to be aborted soon after it started due to the swarm of bugs around us.   There was a very nice swimming beach and I actually stayed in the water for more than my usual five minutes.   Nancy, of course, rivaled the ducks in time spend in the water.

We passed by this gentleman and I guess his grandson heading from an Island to the shore:

Lighthouse:

Grenadier: Island:

The highlight of this stay was meeting two lovely Canadian couples who invited us over for a pot luck dinner with Nancy providing a great salad.    Dinner led to drinks, with me going over my two-drink limit with three beers and a shot.  Luckily. I spread the dinks over enough time so no international incidents occurred.   Gary and Philippa live in the Trent Severns area and we hope to visit them again in a few weeks.  

On the 9^th we headed across the border as it were over to Dark Island to see the Singer Castle, clearing U.S. Customs by phone app.    Singer Castle was the summer home of president of the Singer Sewing machine company back in the Gilded Age.   A bit “Medieval” for our taste, but there you have it.

Singer Castle:

On the topic of summer homes on private islands, there are a lot of private islands in the TI with homes on them.   Rather than show picture after picture of beautiful homes on islands, here are two that made the most of it, maybe more of home on a rock but it officially counts as an island as long as it has a few trees:

 

 

Now this is more like it:

Our next stop on the same day was over to Heart Island to see Boldt Castle.   Kind of an amazing story.  George Boldt had three hundred workers building this massive place for his wife as a present, and when she died he was heart broken and immediately ceased all work on the project.   The property was eventually sold but remained largely unguarded and was used as party place for generations of teenagers.  (Two of the guides, in their 80’s, told us they used to party there back in the day, even lighting campfires on the marble floor).  It was eventually purchased and is gradually being restored, but this write-up and our pictures can’t do justice to the place, so best to follow this link for more information:

 https://www.boldtcastle.com/visitorinfo/

This is the power station building:

 


The children's play house:

The boat house is a mansion in itself:

 

 The mansion is so big, it was hard to get a good shot of the scale of it, but some pictures:

 

  

After a full day of castle sight-seeing we headed over to Clayton, NY to fuel up and park Hygge for a week while we are off to a Kanzler family reunion at my cousin Steven’s vineyard in Sebastopol, CA.   We did have two full days to “mooch” around Clayton but it was raining so no good town pictures.  The highlight of our Clayton visit (so far) was the phenomenal Antique Boat Museum:

Dave

Odometer: 4,972 n/m’s