Keeping our time to the turn of the tide

We left our little anchorage east of Montreal and headed off once again. The river currents remain strong and the boat traffic, large, small and odd, is ever-present. We’re getting used to sharing seemingly narrow channels with all sorts of vessels:

 

 

 

As we approached the city of Sorel the traffic got increasingly large (in size and numbers), and increasingly annoying. Sorel boaters now hold the prize for some of the dickiest people on the water. People zipping every which way, with little regard for others, plus all the large freighter traffic made for some pretty stressful hours. (Later, we met a sailing couple from Sorel: Madeleine & Philippe. They were the sweetest people ever, so Sorel is redeemed!).

The fact that there was a tall ship event going on, plus it was the weekend, all added to the mayhem no doubt. But it was wonderful to finally find our anchorage and settle in for the night. We shared it with perhaps a 1/2 dozen other boats, but there was lots of space.

We settled in beside a reed bed that night and were treated to a chorus of bull frog croaking all night long. Ann was most amused…

From there the river widens to what they call Lac St. Pierre. It is large, but quite shallow off the dredged channel so we spent the whole day hopping from one buoy to another on our way to Trois Rivières. We once again arrived in the midst of Tall Ship revelries, which certainly added to the traffic and the excitement.

We found an anchorage up a branch of the Rivière St-Maurice which is one of the “trois” rivers. Our view included a public beach on one side, and a couple of fancy condos on the other. Lots of other boats were anchored and moored, although oddly none as close to shore as we. Hmmmm, I wonder why 😉 .

Trois Rivières is the place where tides first make themselves known. They started small — only a 1/2 foot here — but quickly built in range and water speed. In fact our next steps were to traverse the mighty Richelieu Rapids, which is a marked danger zone with currents reaching over 5 knots in normal times. We’ve consistently been seeing currents running at least a knot over normal, so we expected the worst. We decided to stay two nights so we could learn how to read tide and current tables.

Most boaters reach Quebec City from Trois Rivières in one day even though it is about 70 nm distance. We could have done this, but given the Tall Ship event, we’ve decided to have to bypass the City all together. So we made our plans to stop about 1/2 way along in a place called Portneuf. And glad we did b/c the trip down did not disappoint.

 

We did indeed hit over 5 knots of current. Here you can see our boat speed over water (right) at 3.6 knots and our speed over ground at 8.7 knots … and this was when we were trying to slow down! Here the tides average 10-12 feet. This drives very fast currents at times, which can either speed you on your way, or slow boats like ours to a stop. We arrived in Portneuf after a short and fast run down the river.

Portneuf is our first marina stop in 23 days. We decided to make this our re-provisioning stop, so we stayed three nights and filled our diesel and water tanks, dumped the garbage and recycling, cleaned up the head (emptied the compost), and made it to the local grocery store for a restock of essential additions: mostly coffee and wine 😉 .

The marina has a wonderful restaurant which we’ve been enjoying a bit too much. And the people of the marina and town are friendly and so very helpful to us poor Anglos. After learning the nearby grocery/booze store had recently burned down, leaving the only place many km away, we not only got a ride up there from a friendly marina member, but we also got a ride back from the store by a store employee. Incredible people!!

Tomorrow we make our run past Quebec City. The plan is to ride the ebb tide all the way past the city. Early start: 5 am!

 

… And so we did. Left Portneuf at 5:30 am about one hour ahead of high tide. We motored into a slackening, but quickly turning current, and rode the big wave all the way down. Zipping underneath the Quebec City bridge we hit a top speed of 12 knots, while showing 5 knots on the water. That’s 7 knots of current!! Our boat’s top speed is supposed to be 7 knots!!! That’s Trans-Warp Speed Scottie!!!!!

 

We bypassed Quebec City b/c the Tall Ship event, while pretty cool, also meant the city was a zoo. It would have been pretty impossible to find a berth for our boat at this late date, so waved and moved on.

  

We arrived at an anchorage some 15 nm further east from QC and dropped the hook. This would be our first major tidal anchoring with over 15 feet. To top it off, a major squall system rolled through the whole area, and lasted for hours. The squawking radio kept issuing WARNINGS, DANGEROUS SQUALL APPROACHING. Over 50 knots of wind was possible. Talk to you soon… I hope 😉 .