When I finished my last blog we were anchored in Port Saunders and Dave was getting ready to go for a swim. He put on his shorty wetsuit and went in the 12 deg C water to move the line cutter and two hours, a cuddle under the duvet, and soup and grilled cheese later he was still shivering! He finally warmed up and we started the engine, but we still had a noise coming from the shaft. So after having another look around in the engine room, Dave figured out that the coupling had shifted. He got it adjusted and tightened up again and we started the engine and actually pulled up the anchor and set off, but there was more noise, so we turned around and dropped the hook again. Dave had to go in the water again (it had warmed up to 14.5 deg C) and move the line cutter back to where it was. This time he wasn't in the water as long, and he was able to warm up in a bit of sun breaking through the clouds, so that was good. By then it was after 4 p.m. and we decided we weren't going anywhere that day, so we rowed over to shore and went for a walk along the rocks just to stretch our legs after almost a day and a half on board.
Thursday morning we got up and headed off for Port au Choix. It was only 14 Nm so we anticipated an easy trip, but after a couple of miles we got into a thick fog. Visibility was less than 0.1 Nm and although we were heading along the coast we couldn't see it. It is quite an unnerving feeling, and you lose all sense of scale. A couple of times I saw a gannet on the water and thought it was a boat. We saw a few dories out fishing, and it was comforting to see some signs of life. As we turned into the harbour at Port au Choix the fog cleared and we could see our way in. Some fishermen showed us where we could tie up to the sturdiest floating wharf we have ever seen and by 10:30 we were all settled in.
I had heard we could get laundry and showers at the Fisheries and Oceans building on the wharf, so we went to check it out. We had a nice chat with the young man working there as a summer student and found out there was indeed laundry and showers. I got a couple of loads in. At $1 per wash and $1 per dry it's the best deal I have seen on laundry in years - our tax dollars at work! We went to get groceries, had lunch, got water (Dave lugged 10 gallons and then a couple of friendly fishermen drove the next 10 down in their truck), and filled up with diesel. There is no diesel on the wharves on this coast - you just have to 'call the truck' and they come down and fill you up.
By 3 p.m. we had all of our 'chores' done, so we decided to walk up to the Port au Choix National Historic Site, which we had heard about. When I inquired for directions at the post office she said it wasn't far, but she assumed we had a car (because what tourist wouldn't). In fact we walked a couple of km up a long straight road that seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. We found out later we were on the limestone barrens, a very specific ecosystem that has three or four endangered species of plants living in it. Who knew? It just looked like a big gravel pit to us. We finally got to the Visitor's Centre an hour before closing time, which was just enough time for us to watch the film they had and see the exhibits, all about the four waves of people that lived here over the last 6000 years - including PaleoEskimos, Doreset people, ancestors of the Beothuk (who tragically died out in Newfoundland) and the French and English, who seemed to co-exist fairly peacefully along this coast. It was quite interesting, and they had a lot of artifacts from archaeological digs in the area. We decided to walk back along the trail across the point, which was another 5 km. By the time we got back to the boat we were pretty tired out, but after a drink and a bit of a rest for our feet we headed up to get a shower.
I have to say this was one of the most interesting shower experiences I have ever had. The shower room, obviously designed for all male crews on fishing boats, had kind of a foyer with a bench and a hand drier mounted above head height (presumably to dry your hair) and then another area with 4 showers on each side. Each 'stall' had a curtain on it. The place was deserted, so Dave and I figured I would be safe if he kept an eye out. Luckily we hung our bags and towels on the hooks provided, because as soon as I turned the shower on, the water shot out and under the shower curtain about half way across the floor! I tried a different shower, but it did the same thing. The shower water ran for about 30 seconds at a time and then you had to punch the handle in again and, as Dave and I had our showers, the water level on the floor started to rise. Either the drains were very undersized or something was plugged or not working properly. We tried to keep the showers as short as possible and waded out to the foyer to get dried off and changed.
We had decided to go out for supper, and at the recommendation of the diesel truck driver we walked over to The Anchor, where we had a delicious meal. Dave ordered the local shrimp, which is tiny but sweet and super delicious, and I had halibut. We waddled back to the boat, very satisfied with our visit to Port au Choix on all fronts. That night we enjoyed the sensation of being freshly showered and sleeping in freshly laundered sheets - heaven!
Although we liked Port au Choix, we had decided that we were going to do a circumnavigation of the Gulf of St. Lawrence rather than go back down the west coast of Newfoundland, so we felt we should push on. Our plan is to head west along the Quebec coast until we are just west of Anticosti Island and then cross the St. Lawrence River to the Gaspe peninsula before heading south along the New Brunswick coast and into our home waters of the Northumberland Strait.
Friday morning we set off for New Ferolle Cove, about 25 Nm north up the coast. It was a beautiful sunny day when we left and we even got to sail for a while until the wind died but by early afternoon we were tying up to a 65 foot fishing boat at the wharf in New Ferolle Cove. Unfortunately the wind had picked up just before we docked and it was a bit tricky getting alongside, and in the process we knocked off one of our navigation lights on one of the fishing boat's big fenders.
Luckily the water was clear and although we were in 13 feet we could see the light, so we decided to try fishing for it. We had just got the fishing rod out when a local came over for a chat. As Dave tried fishing for the light, we chatted to Ray, a fisherman from two communities up the coast (Reef Harbour). We had no luck with the fishing rod, so I suggested trying a bucket. Ray figured it had to be metal, so he went and got a fire bucket from the fishing boat. After about 20 minutes of trying to pick up the light with the bucket, with Ray and I moving the dinghy back and forth while Dave used the looky bucket to see what he was doing, Dave finally decided he should just go in the water and dive for the light. The water was a balmy 16.5 deg C so he didn't even put his wetsuit on. One dive and he had the light! The adventure never stops!
We went for a walk around the point, to the lighthouse, which ended up being a little longer than we had bargained for (again - there seems to be a theme here?), and that night I cooked some cod which a fellow had given to us in Port au Choix. I cannot say enough about how kind and friendly the people of Newfoundland are. It is such a pleasure visiting this island and meeting them, and we were sad to be leaving.
Saturday morning we got up at 5:30 and left, ready to cross over from Newfoundland to area of Quebec called 'the North Shore' or 'La Cote du Nord', as it is the northern shore of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Our destination was St. Augustine, just under 60 miles away. Rather than crossing to the closest point on the Quebec side, we wanted to move a bit west as well. The day before we had seen the coast of Quebec to the north about 30 miles, but now it was a drizzly morning and we couldn't see far.
It was a bit of a hard trip. Again the wind was behind us but very light, so we couldn't keep a sail up, but the seas were very rolly. We bounced around for 40 miles feeling grim. I managed to make a sandwich for Dave and heat up some beans for me for lunch, but other than that we survived on snacks. It was drizzling most of the day and then it got foggy. And then it got foggier! We found the fairway buoy on radar, and heard it groaning, but never saw it, and it was only 0.1 Nm away! By 2:30 we got in the lee of some islands and the swell dropped a bunch. This helped us feel better, but we still had about 15 miles to navigate through a bunch of islands in the fog.
Using radar and the plotter we picked our way in, finally tying up to a barge docked at the end of the big government wharf at 4 p.m. We were worn out, but happy to be there. The place was deserted. We went for a walk up the dirt road to explore a bit. It is beautiful - red granite rocks, trees and bog - but the bugs were plentiful and fierce. As we walked along the road, an osprey flew down really close to us - the closest I have ever seen one - adding to our sense of really being away from it all.
Back at the boat we looked at the Road Atlas (ironic since there are no roads here) and figured out we were on AST, so we adjusted our watches by half an hour. Dave braved the bugs and barbequed hamburgers for supper, but we couldn't stay up in the cockpit to eat. It was a super still, calm, quiet night and we didn't see a soul. There's no cellphone coverage on this part of the coast, so we are out of touch for a while and back to trying to get the marine weather forecast on the VHF (like 'in the olden days').
The next morning it was raining, so we spent most of the morning doing chores around the boat. Just after noon (or so we thought) we heard the sound of an outboard. Dave went up to say hi and we ended up having quite a chat with Neil, who works at the wharf for the ferry service. He told us that the road we had walked on goes 11 km to 'the Reserve' but the community of St. Augustine is on the other side of the river, so they have to take a small ferry to get across to the road. St. Augustine has roads, but Neil said you can drive from one side of town to the other in 10 minutes. He told us "the water is our highway 130". And in the winter, when the bays freeze over, they go everywhere on snowmobiles.
On this section of coast there are no roads between communities, but there is a ferry service that runs along the coast, stopping at the communities once or twice a week. From what I understand, it's not as much a car ferry, as a people and goods ferry. It goes as far east as Blanc Sablon, then turns around and comes back. Neil told us the ferry was coming in at 10 p.m. that night and that the barge would be leaving to take cargo from the ferry up to the town around 9 a.m. Monday morning. He also told us that they were actually on EST here, so we adjusted our watches back another hour.
Knowing we were okay to stay tied to the barge for the day, we decided to take the dinghy up to see St. Augustine. It was a 20 minute ride (on plane), so about 5 Nm, and Neil had told us to follow the buoys to stay away from the sandbars, especially at low tide. when we got to town and went for a walk we had to contend with the bugs again, but soon the fog lifted, so at least we could see the bay. We stopped in at the local store and bought some hummus and a couple of plums (I was pretty excited to see the hummus). There are some very nice homes in St. Augustine and every household seems to own a boat, a four wheeler and a snowmobile, while some have trucks or cars. Neil told us that most people go away to work and that the community is getting older as many of the young people go away and don't come back - a sad and too familiar story here in the Maritimes.
When we got back to Romana I tried to set up a bug net around the cockpit. We had brought some bits and pieces to try to make this work, so it was a test version. I played around with it a bit and got the idea right, but there is still some tweaking to do. As I finished up, a truck arrived at the wharf and soon we were chatting with a family from Pakuashipi (the reserve at the end of the road, across from St. Augustine). They are Innu, and the grandmother, Christianne, was very chatty, and spoke Montaigne (the native language), French and English. Her daughter Anna and 3 of her children, aged 11, 9 and 9 months were with her. We learned a bit more about life on this shore, and that they use the ferry to get around and often leave vehicles at either end of the ferry route. They can also get in and out of the community via plane.
Although St. Augustine is an English community, as quite a few of the places along this shore are (many were settled by people from Newfoundland), the children in Pakuashipi speak French, as well as their native language. The accent of the English speaking people here is similar to a Newfoundland accent, but with a bit of a French twist. Neil, who said he didn't speak French at all, pronounced the names of french areas nearby with what sounded like perfect pronounciation to us. Even more interesting is that when people who speak French are speaking English to us, they translate the names of places into English! It took me a while to figure out that when Christianne was referring to Seven Islands, she was talking about Sept-Isles.
The time change had us all mixed up so that night we went to bed just before 9, anticipating getting woken up by the ferry. Sure enough, it arrived at 10:40 but we didn't get up to have a look as it was raining. The next morning I was awoken to the sound of fork trucks backing up just before 5 a.m. and soon they were loading things onto the barge. We had breakfast and left at 7 a.m.
The fog had lifted and we planned to have a short day going through the Petit Rigolet passage, about 15 miles of water sheltered by a couple of big islands to the south. It was a beautiful trip and soon we had just enough wind to sail slowly along the passage looking at the rocks and islands all around us. We could hear a loon call, and water rushing from streams off the rocks. Parts of the passage were quite narrow, but the water is very deep, so it isn't too difficult to navigate. As we reached the western end of the passage and headed into Baie du Portage du Canot, where we planned to anchor for the night, we figured out that the datum on the chart plotter wasn't right, so we had to ignore our position shown and go back to using some of our old navigational skills to head up the bay.
We had some difficulty getting our anchor to set, but got it on the second try. The bugs had been following us all the way down the Petit Rigolet and were even more plentiful once we stopped moving. After lunch (below) we donned our bug hats and long sleeves and boots and went to shore to go for a walk. We had read that there was a trail over to Baie de Ha! Ha! and we found a snowmobile trail, complete with a Quebec DOT warming hut and various 'road' signs for the trail. We only got as far as a pond just before the bay when we gave up. The terrain was very squelchy and the bugs were ridiculous. Even with the bug hats they were almost unbearable.
Back at the dinghy we motored around the cove and found that a bit of wind had come up and the bugs weren't too bad there. We walked on some rocks on the shore before heading back to the boat. We were able to sit in the cockpit while the wind blew, but as soon as it dropped off the bugs came back and drove us down below. I really need to perfect that bug screen for the rest of our trip down this shore!
So far we have encountered four different types of bugs, or 'flies', as the locals call them. There are the tiny blackflies whose bites you don't feel until after they are gone, and then they swell up and/or bleed and itch like crazy. Then there are the standard mosquitoes, as evidenced by a different kind of swelling and itch. Third are the deer flies, who can take a chunk right out of you when they bite. So far we have been lucky and neither of us has been bitten by any of them. Finally Dave saw some tiny house fly like critters - we are not sure if they bite or not. Even though the weather has warmed up in the last week so we have shed a layer or two, we are still wearing long pants and long sleeves. Despite that, the 'flies' have managed to find all of our exposed skin and made a meal of it. One of my ears is red and ridiculously itchy and this morning I woke up and my top lip was swollen up with a bite. We haven't resorted to taking Benadryl yet, but that day may come still.
Yesterday morning we left for a fairly long day (52 Nm) to Harrington Harbour. We got up at 5 to fog, but decided to leave anyway and picked our way out of the bay and then south to the very narrow Passage Germain which was a bit of a nail biter to get through. Luckily conditions were calm and the fog had lifted a bit so even though you felt like the rocks were only a boat length away we made it through with no problems. By 7:30 the fog had cleared out where we were and it was a beautiful sunny day. I saw another sailboat, off in the distance, heading in the opposite direction from us. This was notable, as it is only the fourth sailboat we have seen since we left Bay of Islands a couple of weeks ago. Sometimes it feels pretty lonely out here, so we were happy to overhear a long conversation on the VHF between two local fishermen catching up on the news and the woes of the ferry. Knowing they are out here too helps. We were able to sail for about an hour and a half, but then the winds dropped again and we motored the rest of the way, arriving at the public wharf in Harrington Harbour mid afternoon.
At first I was underwhelmed, as the wharf is a busy place with a fisherman's co-op, forklifts buzzing around and the hum of refrigeration trucks and generators all around us. A couple of locals came down on their 4 wheelers to chat and we decided to go for a walk. As soon as we stepped off the wharf I realized how absolutely charming this community of 280 people is. Located on an island, their 'roads' are boardwalks, interrupted from time to time by rock and their 'cars' are 4 wheelers. It started to rain, so we took refuge in one of the two grocery/hardware/everything else stores in town, and then checked out the other one. I wanted to go to the post office to mail a letter, so we walked up the boardwalk to find it. It started pouring rain again, so we went to huddle under an entryway at the community hall and ended up having a good chat with the fellow there doing some painting and maintenance work. It looks like a very well kept and useful facility. Further up the boardwalk, and over 'the ravine' we found the post office, a tiny little building beside a house where the postmistress lives. We had another good chat with her, and learned that before the boardwalks and 4 wheelers, everyone just walked around the community.
Further along we found a construction crew who were working on building a new wharf facility in a more protected cove. The project includes bringing rocks for a breakwater from the mainland and putting in floating docks, which will have to be fairly substantial to support the fishing boats here. We had heard that we could get fresh lobster at the co-op, so on the way back to the boat we bought a couple for supper. They were delicious!
It rained on and off all evening, but I was able to get up to the stores to get a few fresh things when they re-opened after supper. They had a bit of a run on their produce this week, as a problem with the normal ferry boat has thrown everything off schedule and they had to wait a bit longer than normal to stock up, but I got enough to keep us going for a while. Speaking to the woman at the store I solved the mystery of the time change - they ARE on AST here, but they don't change their clocks to daylight savings time, so in the winter they are on AST and in the summer they are on EST.
About an hour after we went to bed last night we were awoken by the crash of thunder and a deluge of rain. Lightning was all around and the thunder kept rolling on. Dave went out in a downpour to adjust our dock lines and then waited for the rain to let up a bit before going out to remove the drain plug on the dinghy (which is up on the davits) so that it wouldn't fill up with water. It was not a quiet night and the thunderstorms rolled through until early morning when the rain finally stopped. I saw the sun in the sky for about two minutes this morning before... the fog rolled in.
And so it goes. I am sure this is not the last we will see of the fog or the flies, but to be able to visit this place is worth it. We are probably going to stay in Harrington one more day before we push on along the coast and I am not sure when I will be able to post this blog, but eventually we will find either internet access or cellphone coverage.
Thursday morning we got up and headed off for Port au Choix. It was only 14 Nm so we anticipated an easy trip, but after a couple of miles we got into a thick fog. Visibility was less than 0.1 Nm and although we were heading along the coast we couldn't see it. It is quite an unnerving feeling, and you lose all sense of scale. A couple of times I saw a gannet on the water and thought it was a boat. We saw a few dories out fishing, and it was comforting to see some signs of life. As we turned into the harbour at Port au Choix the fog cleared and we could see our way in. Some fishermen showed us where we could tie up to the sturdiest floating wharf we have ever seen and by 10:30 we were all settled in.
I had heard we could get laundry and showers at the Fisheries and Oceans building on the wharf, so we went to check it out. We had a nice chat with the young man working there as a summer student and found out there was indeed laundry and showers. I got a couple of loads in. At $1 per wash and $1 per dry it's the best deal I have seen on laundry in years - our tax dollars at work! We went to get groceries, had lunch, got water (Dave lugged 10 gallons and then a couple of friendly fishermen drove the next 10 down in their truck), and filled up with diesel. There is no diesel on the wharves on this coast - you just have to 'call the truck' and they come down and fill you up.
By 3 p.m. we had all of our 'chores' done, so we decided to walk up to the Port au Choix National Historic Site, which we had heard about. When I inquired for directions at the post office she said it wasn't far, but she assumed we had a car (because what tourist wouldn't). In fact we walked a couple of km up a long straight road that seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. We found out later we were on the limestone barrens, a very specific ecosystem that has three or four endangered species of plants living in it. Who knew? It just looked like a big gravel pit to us. We finally got to the Visitor's Centre an hour before closing time, which was just enough time for us to watch the film they had and see the exhibits, all about the four waves of people that lived here over the last 6000 years - including PaleoEskimos, Doreset people, ancestors of the Beothuk (who tragically died out in Newfoundland) and the French and English, who seemed to co-exist fairly peacefully along this coast. It was quite interesting, and they had a lot of artifacts from archaeological digs in the area. We decided to walk back along the trail across the point, which was another 5 km. By the time we got back to the boat we were pretty tired out, but after a drink and a bit of a rest for our feet we headed up to get a shower.
I have to say this was one of the most interesting shower experiences I have ever had. The shower room, obviously designed for all male crews on fishing boats, had kind of a foyer with a bench and a hand drier mounted above head height (presumably to dry your hair) and then another area with 4 showers on each side. Each 'stall' had a curtain on it. The place was deserted, so Dave and I figured I would be safe if he kept an eye out. Luckily we hung our bags and towels on the hooks provided, because as soon as I turned the shower on, the water shot out and under the shower curtain about half way across the floor! I tried a different shower, but it did the same thing. The shower water ran for about 30 seconds at a time and then you had to punch the handle in again and, as Dave and I had our showers, the water level on the floor started to rise. Either the drains were very undersized or something was plugged or not working properly. We tried to keep the showers as short as possible and waded out to the foyer to get dried off and changed.
We had decided to go out for supper, and at the recommendation of the diesel truck driver we walked over to The Anchor, where we had a delicious meal. Dave ordered the local shrimp, which is tiny but sweet and super delicious, and I had halibut. We waddled back to the boat, very satisfied with our visit to Port au Choix on all fronts. That night we enjoyed the sensation of being freshly showered and sleeping in freshly laundered sheets - heaven!
Although we liked Port au Choix, we had decided that we were going to do a circumnavigation of the Gulf of St. Lawrence rather than go back down the west coast of Newfoundland, so we felt we should push on. Our plan is to head west along the Quebec coast until we are just west of Anticosti Island and then cross the St. Lawrence River to the Gaspe peninsula before heading south along the New Brunswick coast and into our home waters of the Northumberland Strait.
Friday morning we set off for New Ferolle Cove, about 25 Nm north up the coast. It was a beautiful sunny day when we left and we even got to sail for a while until the wind died but by early afternoon we were tying up to a 65 foot fishing boat at the wharf in New Ferolle Cove. Unfortunately the wind had picked up just before we docked and it was a bit tricky getting alongside, and in the process we knocked off one of our navigation lights on one of the fishing boat's big fenders.
Luckily the water was clear and although we were in 13 feet we could see the light, so we decided to try fishing for it. We had just got the fishing rod out when a local came over for a chat. As Dave tried fishing for the light, we chatted to Ray, a fisherman from two communities up the coast (Reef Harbour). We had no luck with the fishing rod, so I suggested trying a bucket. Ray figured it had to be metal, so he went and got a fire bucket from the fishing boat. After about 20 minutes of trying to pick up the light with the bucket, with Ray and I moving the dinghy back and forth while Dave used the looky bucket to see what he was doing, Dave finally decided he should just go in the water and dive for the light. The water was a balmy 16.5 deg C so he didn't even put his wetsuit on. One dive and he had the light! The adventure never stops!
We went for a walk around the point, to the lighthouse, which ended up being a little longer than we had bargained for (again - there seems to be a theme here?), and that night I cooked some cod which a fellow had given to us in Port au Choix. I cannot say enough about how kind and friendly the people of Newfoundland are. It is such a pleasure visiting this island and meeting them, and we were sad to be leaving.
Saturday morning we got up at 5:30 and left, ready to cross over from Newfoundland to area of Quebec called 'the North Shore' or 'La Cote du Nord', as it is the northern shore of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Our destination was St. Augustine, just under 60 miles away. Rather than crossing to the closest point on the Quebec side, we wanted to move a bit west as well. The day before we had seen the coast of Quebec to the north about 30 miles, but now it was a drizzly morning and we couldn't see far.
It was a bit of a hard trip. Again the wind was behind us but very light, so we couldn't keep a sail up, but the seas were very rolly. We bounced around for 40 miles feeling grim. I managed to make a sandwich for Dave and heat up some beans for me for lunch, but other than that we survived on snacks. It was drizzling most of the day and then it got foggy. And then it got foggier! We found the fairway buoy on radar, and heard it groaning, but never saw it, and it was only 0.1 Nm away! By 2:30 we got in the lee of some islands and the swell dropped a bunch. This helped us feel better, but we still had about 15 miles to navigate through a bunch of islands in the fog.
Using radar and the plotter we picked our way in, finally tying up to a barge docked at the end of the big government wharf at 4 p.m. We were worn out, but happy to be there. The place was deserted. We went for a walk up the dirt road to explore a bit. It is beautiful - red granite rocks, trees and bog - but the bugs were plentiful and fierce. As we walked along the road, an osprey flew down really close to us - the closest I have ever seen one - adding to our sense of really being away from it all.
Back at the boat we looked at the Road Atlas (ironic since there are no roads here) and figured out we were on AST, so we adjusted our watches by half an hour. Dave braved the bugs and barbequed hamburgers for supper, but we couldn't stay up in the cockpit to eat. It was a super still, calm, quiet night and we didn't see a soul. There's no cellphone coverage on this part of the coast, so we are out of touch for a while and back to trying to get the marine weather forecast on the VHF (like 'in the olden days').
The next morning it was raining, so we spent most of the morning doing chores around the boat. Just after noon (or so we thought) we heard the sound of an outboard. Dave went up to say hi and we ended up having quite a chat with Neil, who works at the wharf for the ferry service. He told us that the road we had walked on goes 11 km to 'the Reserve' but the community of St. Augustine is on the other side of the river, so they have to take a small ferry to get across to the road. St. Augustine has roads, but Neil said you can drive from one side of town to the other in 10 minutes. He told us "the water is our highway 130". And in the winter, when the bays freeze over, they go everywhere on snowmobiles.
On this section of coast there are no roads between communities, but there is a ferry service that runs along the coast, stopping at the communities once or twice a week. From what I understand, it's not as much a car ferry, as a people and goods ferry. It goes as far east as Blanc Sablon, then turns around and comes back. Neil told us the ferry was coming in at 10 p.m. that night and that the barge would be leaving to take cargo from the ferry up to the town around 9 a.m. Monday morning. He also told us that they were actually on EST here, so we adjusted our watches back another hour.
Knowing we were okay to stay tied to the barge for the day, we decided to take the dinghy up to see St. Augustine. It was a 20 minute ride (on plane), so about 5 Nm, and Neil had told us to follow the buoys to stay away from the sandbars, especially at low tide. when we got to town and went for a walk we had to contend with the bugs again, but soon the fog lifted, so at least we could see the bay. We stopped in at the local store and bought some hummus and a couple of plums (I was pretty excited to see the hummus). There are some very nice homes in St. Augustine and every household seems to own a boat, a four wheeler and a snowmobile, while some have trucks or cars. Neil told us that most people go away to work and that the community is getting older as many of the young people go away and don't come back - a sad and too familiar story here in the Maritimes.
When we got back to Romana I tried to set up a bug net around the cockpit. We had brought some bits and pieces to try to make this work, so it was a test version. I played around with it a bit and got the idea right, but there is still some tweaking to do. As I finished up, a truck arrived at the wharf and soon we were chatting with a family from Pakuashipi (the reserve at the end of the road, across from St. Augustine). They are Innu, and the grandmother, Christianne, was very chatty, and spoke Montaigne (the native language), French and English. Her daughter Anna and 3 of her children, aged 11, 9 and 9 months were with her. We learned a bit more about life on this shore, and that they use the ferry to get around and often leave vehicles at either end of the ferry route. They can also get in and out of the community via plane.
Although St. Augustine is an English community, as quite a few of the places along this shore are (many were settled by people from Newfoundland), the children in Pakuashipi speak French, as well as their native language. The accent of the English speaking people here is similar to a Newfoundland accent, but with a bit of a French twist. Neil, who said he didn't speak French at all, pronounced the names of french areas nearby with what sounded like perfect pronounciation to us. Even more interesting is that when people who speak French are speaking English to us, they translate the names of places into English! It took me a while to figure out that when Christianne was referring to Seven Islands, she was talking about Sept-Isles.
The time change had us all mixed up so that night we went to bed just before 9, anticipating getting woken up by the ferry. Sure enough, it arrived at 10:40 but we didn't get up to have a look as it was raining. The next morning I was awoken to the sound of fork trucks backing up just before 5 a.m. and soon they were loading things onto the barge. We had breakfast and left at 7 a.m.
The fog had lifted and we planned to have a short day going through the Petit Rigolet passage, about 15 miles of water sheltered by a couple of big islands to the south. It was a beautiful trip and soon we had just enough wind to sail slowly along the passage looking at the rocks and islands all around us. We could hear a loon call, and water rushing from streams off the rocks. Parts of the passage were quite narrow, but the water is very deep, so it isn't too difficult to navigate. As we reached the western end of the passage and headed into Baie du Portage du Canot, where we planned to anchor for the night, we figured out that the datum on the chart plotter wasn't right, so we had to ignore our position shown and go back to using some of our old navigational skills to head up the bay.
We had some difficulty getting our anchor to set, but got it on the second try. The bugs had been following us all the way down the Petit Rigolet and were even more plentiful once we stopped moving. After lunch (below) we donned our bug hats and long sleeves and boots and went to shore to go for a walk. We had read that there was a trail over to Baie de Ha! Ha! and we found a snowmobile trail, complete with a Quebec DOT warming hut and various 'road' signs for the trail. We only got as far as a pond just before the bay when we gave up. The terrain was very squelchy and the bugs were ridiculous. Even with the bug hats they were almost unbearable.
Back at the dinghy we motored around the cove and found that a bit of wind had come up and the bugs weren't too bad there. We walked on some rocks on the shore before heading back to the boat. We were able to sit in the cockpit while the wind blew, but as soon as it dropped off the bugs came back and drove us down below. I really need to perfect that bug screen for the rest of our trip down this shore!
So far we have encountered four different types of bugs, or 'flies', as the locals call them. There are the tiny blackflies whose bites you don't feel until after they are gone, and then they swell up and/or bleed and itch like crazy. Then there are the standard mosquitoes, as evidenced by a different kind of swelling and itch. Third are the deer flies, who can take a chunk right out of you when they bite. So far we have been lucky and neither of us has been bitten by any of them. Finally Dave saw some tiny house fly like critters - we are not sure if they bite or not. Even though the weather has warmed up in the last week so we have shed a layer or two, we are still wearing long pants and long sleeves. Despite that, the 'flies' have managed to find all of our exposed skin and made a meal of it. One of my ears is red and ridiculously itchy and this morning I woke up and my top lip was swollen up with a bite. We haven't resorted to taking Benadryl yet, but that day may come still.
Yesterday morning we left for a fairly long day (52 Nm) to Harrington Harbour. We got up at 5 to fog, but decided to leave anyway and picked our way out of the bay and then south to the very narrow Passage Germain which was a bit of a nail biter to get through. Luckily conditions were calm and the fog had lifted a bit so even though you felt like the rocks were only a boat length away we made it through with no problems. By 7:30 the fog had cleared out where we were and it was a beautiful sunny day. I saw another sailboat, off in the distance, heading in the opposite direction from us. This was notable, as it is only the fourth sailboat we have seen since we left Bay of Islands a couple of weeks ago. Sometimes it feels pretty lonely out here, so we were happy to overhear a long conversation on the VHF between two local fishermen catching up on the news and the woes of the ferry. Knowing they are out here too helps. We were able to sail for about an hour and a half, but then the winds dropped again and we motored the rest of the way, arriving at the public wharf in Harrington Harbour mid afternoon.
At first I was underwhelmed, as the wharf is a busy place with a fisherman's co-op, forklifts buzzing around and the hum of refrigeration trucks and generators all around us. A couple of locals came down on their 4 wheelers to chat and we decided to go for a walk. As soon as we stepped off the wharf I realized how absolutely charming this community of 280 people is. Located on an island, their 'roads' are boardwalks, interrupted from time to time by rock and their 'cars' are 4 wheelers. It started to rain, so we took refuge in one of the two grocery/hardware/everything else stores in town, and then checked out the other one. I wanted to go to the post office to mail a letter, so we walked up the boardwalk to find it. It started pouring rain again, so we went to huddle under an entryway at the community hall and ended up having a good chat with the fellow there doing some painting and maintenance work. It looks like a very well kept and useful facility. Further up the boardwalk, and over 'the ravine' we found the post office, a tiny little building beside a house where the postmistress lives. We had another good chat with her, and learned that before the boardwalks and 4 wheelers, everyone just walked around the community.
Further along we found a construction crew who were working on building a new wharf facility in a more protected cove. The project includes bringing rocks for a breakwater from the mainland and putting in floating docks, which will have to be fairly substantial to support the fishing boats here. We had heard that we could get fresh lobster at the co-op, so on the way back to the boat we bought a couple for supper. They were delicious!
It rained on and off all evening, but I was able to get up to the stores to get a few fresh things when they re-opened after supper. They had a bit of a run on their produce this week, as a problem with the normal ferry boat has thrown everything off schedule and they had to wait a bit longer than normal to stock up, but I got enough to keep us going for a while. Speaking to the woman at the store I solved the mystery of the time change - they ARE on AST here, but they don't change their clocks to daylight savings time, so in the winter they are on AST and in the summer they are on EST.
About an hour after we went to bed last night we were awoken by the crash of thunder and a deluge of rain. Lightning was all around and the thunder kept rolling on. Dave went out in a downpour to adjust our dock lines and then waited for the rain to let up a bit before going out to remove the drain plug on the dinghy (which is up on the davits) so that it wouldn't fill up with water. It was not a quiet night and the thunderstorms rolled through until early morning when the rain finally stopped. I saw the sun in the sky for about two minutes this morning before... the fog rolled in.
And so it goes. I am sure this is not the last we will see of the fog or the flies, but to be able to visit this place is worth it. We are probably going to stay in Harrington one more day before we push on along the coast and I am not sure when I will be able to post this blog, but eventually we will find either internet access or cellphone coverage.