Day 4, June 30: Oh, Canada at Last!

While Matt and I slumber at Mooney Bay on the morning of June 30^th, might we nip to now and examine this writer’s present moment…just for a moment?

It’s just before seven as I sit at Brian’s dining room table at Lake George. It’s perfectly calm, the quiet broken only by birds and the gentle murmurs of Mr. Coffee in the next room. As the sun crests Pilot’s Knob, 32 miles of pristine water cradled in the Adirondacks glisten outside, water ultimately and inevitably destined for a ride over La Chute, a trip up Champlain, a course along the Richelieu, and an eventual procession through the St Laurence, past the Saguenay River to the sea.

In a cup at Pitch Pine Point or bordered by the Adirondacks, tumbling over La Chute or scaring the crap out of an oarsman forty-two miles east of Quebec City, was this water once all of one? Water, like people, is labeled for its boundaries and borders, identified not for what it is but for where it lives or for what holds, controls, or shapes it. Water can be seen in a molecule or a drop but takes on its identity in a cup, a lake, a river, or an ocean. Has that happy droplet lapping the gently sloping shore of Brian’s bay right now once rubbed elbows with the droplets contributing to my extreme discomfort off of Baie St Paul? What’s the history of this water in my cup? Where is confluence in the Ukraine, and when did the individual who launched that missile last tuck a child into bed?

Were my boat here and not in Quebec I’d be rowing, not writing. And if I had the next Great American Novel in me, here is where I’d write it. But for now I’ll let this Kosmic Moment pass, perhaps take one more cup out to the point, and get back to writing about the row. After all, Matt and I have a border to cross and a loathed river to revisit!

Better get back to writing....

Back in the boats for our third day on Lake Champlain, Matt and I were pretty sure that we’d make the Canadian border but less certain about our state upon arrival; dark cumulus clouds more typical of a late summer afternoon storm were already well developed by seven in the morning, and soon out of Mooney Bay we were wrapped in heavy, penetrating rain. The wind came up from the south again so we were able to deploy our running gear, but keeping a sightline on shore was not so easy as visibility began to deteriorate. Think “buckets” of rain…the kind of leaden rain that makes water dance and hat brims thunder…and you’ll have it.

Happily, and perhaps in no small measure due to the controlling beneficence of our present Administration, the rain abated as we approached the Canadian border at Rouses Point. Matt and I used the Customs Dock and the advice of a most pleasant officer to walk into town for a late breakfast at The Squirrel’s Nest. Wouldn’t you? A plate of eggs, another cup ‘o joe, and a spot ‘o corned beef hash later, the sun met us for our walk back to the boat and an easy crossing to Canada.   

The delightfully casual Canadian countenance that greeted Brian and me three years ago on our way home from Ontario has been beefed up considerably. Two stern, armed, Kevlar-jacketed gentlemen asked for our IDs and our intentions, might have cocked an eyebrow or two behind the aviator glasses in hearing “Saguenay,” but then passed us on to the suction of the upper Richelieu.

I carry a small GPS unit in the boat not so much for navigation purposes as for monitoring boat speed and, in doing so, in trying to assess the current. On flat water at cruising speed, Matt and I sustain about 4.5 to 4.7 mph. Up to now the wind had been the only variable on this progress, mostly for the better. With a tailwind and maybe a bit of sail to augment our rowing, I’d seen episodic registers of “5.5” or even “6.0” on the Mach meter and, of course, numbers as low as “2.8” or “3.2” when nature pushed back. But now, in water flowing north from Champlain into the Richelieu River at an increasing rate, the very current that bedeviled Brian and me back in 2011 again exerted her grip (see “Row, Canada!”…ibid, Brian, “goddamned Richelieu!” and “I’ll be glad never to see this place again.”). Our flat-water pace now generated 5.0, 5.1…5.2 as the lake narrowed and we entered the top of the river. When the south winds built later in the day, the new standard would be six. Oh, what a difference a compass heading makes!

Almost forty miles into the day brought us to St. Jean sur Richelieu and the top of the first lock of the Chambly Canal, a great place to stop if not to camp. Peter, allegedly the marina owner, allowed us to pitch our tents on the dock next to the boats…not the most comfortable ground, but convenient. Peter’s restaurant roasted a steer for me and we hit the hay amid the festivities of a pre-Canada Day festival. Late at night it began to rain and since my rain tarp was now a part of Matt’s sailing kit, he graciously allowed me entrance to his capacious tent during the downpour. This prince of mine….he’d been living like a king, I learned. But I sure appreciated his hospitality.

Objects on the plate may appear closer than they are...but not larger.

Today we crossed the border, remained thoroughly soaked for much of the day, felt the embrace of favorable currents, and ate well.

Tomorrow we’ll hit our first locks… and then barely survive Skippy’s Charnel House of Aquatic Mayhem, eh?