Day 13, July 10: When is over 'over'?

I spent the rest of the day on the 9^th wrestling with my decision to stop the row as well as luxuriating, I must admit, in the shower and soft bed at the B&B. I knew that the safe and logical thing to do was to call it quits here at Baie St. Paul: 425 miles was not a totally shameful effort, and escalating conditions ahead beyond those that had so challenged me over the last two days all pointed towards this logical conclusion. And the news from Jane’s family was more than the capper; it was indeed time to go home.

Yet as I put the boat and my gear in storage by the barn across the road from the pier, I kept looking out at the river. Alternatingly calm and inviting, roiling and white-capped, the variability I was witnessing virtually hour-by-hour from the security of land represented the real danger. Just two or three days of concentrated effort would get me to the Saguenay river if normal conditions prevailed, but the “normalcy” of this region was volatility.

A Pretty Spot for a Boat to Wait.....

I was so close…yet so far.

Packing to catch the bus home that afternoon, I felt disappointment on a bunch of levels. I’d come up short on my stated destination for the first time in five long rows and over 2,000 miles. At any moment I could get back in the boat and try again, but I’d elected not to. In trying again, I would no doubt have another exciting adventure, right? Why not go? Was I losing spirit? Was 62 (now 63!) making itself felt? I again missed Matt’s company and counsel. I don’t know whether his capable presence and companionship would have spurred us both on or whether he would have said, “Pop, it’s beyond us; it’s time to fold ‘em.” I do know that I would have listened, and I missed his voice.

And then there was Alec, my Sage of Baie St Paul, who wandered down later in the afternoon to say hello and to applaud me for my good judgment. His respect for the St Lawrence was driven by a lifetime of observation far beyond my own single week of experience, and I’d like to think that his experience and candor enriched my “good judgment” at this moment.

So the packing continued and Nicole, Daniel, and Christian, my collegial hosts at Auberge Le Cormoran & Le Domaine Belle PLage, agreed to watch over my stuff while I was gone. Alec then guided me to the bus station along the most delightful path to any bus station, anywhere.

Gentle Reader, earlier in this blog I’ve already recounted most that has happened since: the overnight in Montreal’s bus station, Jane’s passing, Peg’s generosity and spirit in accompanying me back to Quebec, Timmy’s role in getting us through Customs and such. But as I gaze at this photo of the path to the bus station, the obvious closing metaphor forces its way to the page….

Sublime can supplant stupendous. Gentle closure, be it a walk down a grassy path to a bus station or a loving family gathered around a bedside, can trump the dramatic. Just trying hard can indeed rival clear accomplishment if one’s head is on right. And as Alec escorted me down this path, I wondered whether relying on the best natures of others, giving yourself over to the possibility of acceptance and hospitality and to rejection as well, teaches us more about ourselves than about anything else. On this short trip I’d met Peter, Phil and Helen, Denise and Gerald, Nancy and Nancy and Daniel, Nicole and Daniele and Christian, Michael and of course Alec…..and many others whose names I’d neglected to record but whose kindnesses will be paid forward.

At a moment when CNN, the background noise to this writing, conveys global challenges of every shape and form, my own insignificant sojourn suggests that countless unseen acts of compassion and unconditional kindness are the most important stories of all.

Thanks for having joined me.

Love, and be kind,

Al

Day 12, July 8: Finishing on Foot

Day 11 became Day 12 at first light, a kind of faint shadowbox that allowed me to discern sea from shore if only for a few hundred feet. I had been sitting stationary in the boat for the better part of two hours, waiting for contrast that would allow me to proceed and at one moment, after asking myself “Now?...Now?” a hundred times, I figured it was time to go. The tide that had pushed me off the beach was now beginning to run out, and I knew that what would otherwise have been a helpful additional current would now only mean the re-emergence of the boulder fields this morning. Without Chart #2, I was not certain how far I’d have row to reach Baie St. Paul, yesterday’s intended destination, and the only humor of this dark morning was the faint possibility that it had been waiting for me right around the next bend all night long.

It wasn’t.

But it felt good to be rowing again, getting the legs and arms moving and the blood coursing and some warmth developing under my rain gear. A heavy overcast remained and the light came slowly but evenly.

I hit my first unseen boulder within the hour. Then another, and then came the dreaded “hang up” which suspended the boat, twisted it in the current, and exposed me to a broadside dump. I’d had enough of this broken-field rowing routine last night and freeing the boat by using my tender cherry oar as a pole, I resolved to head out to deeper water immediately.

The grey water and sky offshore blended without a horizon but perhaps half a mile offshore, after a few more unavoidable bumps and grinds, I cleared the emerging boulders which were beginning to pop through the surface like seal heads. The relatively calm water was a relief, but I was not pleased to have to be so far out from unfamiliar shoreline in such poor visibility. Perhaps it would improve at sunrise?

I’d never been in thick fog on the water before, but I’d read about it. I’d read that it can come on you fast, that it can create a kind of vertigo when it’s close and there’s no contrast, and that relying on sound – the impact of waves on shore, the cresting of waves over obstacles- can be useful and perhaps one’s only navigational tool. What I read is true. The tradeoff for getting clear of the Kevlar-eating granite seals was flirting with the dense fog offshore. I started to row with the current, thinking that it was a reliable directional cue, and I tried to keep the sound of waves hitting the shore at a consistent decibel level as well, hoping that doing so would represent running a line parallel to shore. If only the shore ran in a straight line.

I ran into a few boulders as the shore curved towards me before I could react, and more than a few times I paused as the sound of waves on the shore became too faint for comfort. Above all, I realized that in this kind of visibility, I could pass Baie St Paul without ever seeing it, and the next stop, Malbaie, would be a bridge too far in my current state. I had to slow down, get in close, and hope for a change in the visibility.

At last, perhaps because of a rising sun that I couldn’t yet see, the fog began to thin and a breathtaking view of the base of the mountains of Charlevoix slowly emerged. I could see shore and even though I saw no sign of civilization, at least I could navigate safely.

This is a beautiful morning.....

About three more hours finally brought me to Baie St Paul, the town that was to have been my “easy reach” destination of yesterday. It was now late morning, I was famished and utterly spent, but a last treat awaited me before landfall: the low tide completely drains the harbor of Baie St Paul. If I wanted to make landfall, I would be obliged to get out of the boat and sledge it in through the mud. I estimated maybe half a mile, more or less, from the beginning of the mud to the pier. I also could just wait it out, but my meager stores and appetite to reach dry land compelled me to try it now, so out I jumped. Every boat in BSP was resting in the mud. Mine would, too.

That's my boat on the far right; you want sprinkles on that chocolate?

Gentle Reader, how do I describe the sensation of plodding through fine, viscous mud up to one’s thighs, on the one hand counting each yard as a step to recovery while, on the other hand, knowing that the gathering crowd on the pier was now pointing at me, not at the ocean? Fortunately, my heavily laden boat slid well through the ooze while I, pulling on the line strung over my shoulder, kept losing my balance or footing and took more than a few plunges into the chocolate. If I could have charged admission, I’d have made a few Canada-Bucks. As it was, exhausted, I reached the dock to a smattering of applause, crawled up on it like the survivor I was and remained motionless, catching my breath and savoring the security of terra firma.

This.......

...leads to this.

An onlooker let me know that the B&B across the road was offering a breakfast buffet until noon, news that galvanized me immediately. The proprietor was not entirely pleased with my attire or all-natural droppings on his rug in the foyer, but he accepted my reservation for a room that night and a friendship ensued….even after I attacked his buffet table.

That afternoon, after I pulled the boat from the mud and began to reclaim and clean my belongings, Alec sat down to ask me what I was up to. I explained my journey and, in particular, my last 24 hours. He said, “You’ve had a fine trip and have come a long way. Stop now, my friend. What you are now doing -and where you are going now, especially- is very dangerous. It gets much harder from here. Stop now.”

He knew the water well, and he knew what lay ahead. After what I’d experienced of late, I knew he was right. This should not be “Do or die,” should it?

I’d also been thinking a lot about my friend Jane Messenger who had just entered Hospice as I turned onto the St. Lawrence. Below I’ll re-post an excerpt of my earlier reflection simply to keep this blog “in order,” but my thoughts had been with her, my mom’s best friend, and with her family. Maybe it was time to go home and tend to the business of living, loving, and to witness real courage:

The “why” of my return involves Jane, the mother of my best friend (other than Brian) and my own mother’s best friend, who has entered hospice in Albany.  Early this week, when I learned of this turn of events and the urgency of her state, the present unconditional joy and freedom of this adventure pretty much evaporated; Jane has been “the other mom” in my life, a lady for whom the idea of “just being there” could have been coined, and rowing on in blissful exploration was just not in the cards. Jane, her wonderful family, and my own mom seemed too far away at a time when, as powerless as I am to effect events, I nonetheless felt like I needed to “be there” for someone else…. all of this (rowing) is trivia in the context of Jane’s present hospice travail, of course, and I’d ask you only to take a pause right now, close your eyes, and in recalling and embracing a wonderful, warm, spirited, selfless and generous lady in your own life, you’ll be embracing her.

On July 13th, Jane passed away peacefully in the presence of her loving family. I’d made many boneheaded decisions and wrong choices over the last 12 days, but catching a bus home in time to be with them was not one of them.   

 

Day 11, July 7: The New Longest Day, Part II…and, All Hail, Stephanie Kwolek!

…and with Gerald and Denise waving from the dock and 3/5 of my maps in hand, I pushed off at a too-late hour into the main stream above downtown Quebec City. It was overcast and had been drizzling during breakfast, a main morning meal I was no longer accustomed to. I’d have three or so hours of plugging against the tide, then slack, and then, downstream away from the things of man, the flush would start…and the bottom would fall out.

But for now I looked forward to seeing Quebec City from the water. I knew that the tidal effects here compelled the city to put its “Old Town” waterfront behind a lock, but I would not have the time to linger and wait for that lock to open at slack tide. Nonetheless, as I rowed past the city, I was surprised at how little public access there seemed to be to the St Lawrence itself. Industrial docks, bulk loading facilities, and ferry and tug piers dominated the entire shoreline; I couldn’t see a “promenade” enabling the public to see the water. I know that in not lingering to get “inside” the city’s lock, I missed what I’m certain is a charming river presence. Yet the main body of the St Lawrence is essentially walled off from the Quebecois for much of its passage through the city. Curious.

Maybe it should have struck me at that moment: in three days of rowing on the St Lawrence, I had not seen a single kayak, rowboat, or similar man-powered craft on the water. Not one. Cruising sailboats and such, yes, but no one was paddling or rowing. Rather than wondering “Why?” I simply considered myself lucky.

By mid-afternoon I’d made 15 miles or so, leaving the city behind as the extraordinary mountains of the Charlevoix region rose into the clouds on the northeast horizon. The current began to run faster, the tide began to run out, and I was booking along at 6 to 7 with easy strokes, in relatively calm water, my confidence rising even as I rowed off of my first chart and into the missing second. Gerald had touted Baie St Paul as an first excellent stop, alleging that it was just off of chart #1, and my plan was to stop there even if I had daylight ahead. It would be a good jumping-off point for Day 2 after Quebec City, and he and Denise had recently spent a week there enjoying the arts scene and restaurants. I could already taste dinner….

The ceiling lowered as the mountains encroached on the east (north) shore, my only avenue to the Saguenay. It was getting dark, I had now rowed off of Chart #1, but the sky still provided enough contrast with the shore and mountains so that I could still keep oriented along the coast. As I would learn later, I was still more than thirty miles from Baie St Paul…and there was nothing but rock walls and boulders between me and it as darkness fell. But I rowed on in blissful optimism, looking for the glow of a seaside village around then next bend.

It was around this time that I first thanked Stephanie Kwolek, the feted DuPont chemist credited with the invention of Kevlar. She had passed away on June 18^th at 90, and my Kevlar boat was a vestige of her genius. I struck a rock, hard, a rock that I could not see. Then, another. I was stunned; I could see no obstructions ahead, my oars were in what seemed to be deep water, and Wham!, then another. Oh, Stephanie! Hung up on a submerged rock, I was pulled sideways in the current as the boat tilted perilously upstream. The hull ground its way off the obstruction (Thanks, Stephanie!), and I was clear...at least for a few minutes. These rocks were emerging all around me as the tide went down, and I realized that I had unwittingly rowed into an endless field of boulders rising from the bottom, invisible at the surface and randomly spaced, extending farther out from the shore than I wanted to go at night.

My primary safety strategy has been to be close enough to shore so that a safe bailout could be effected before all is lost but I’d now rowed into terrain, at night, affording me no such alternative; the shore was piled high with rocks and vertical rock faces with no place to put out. I realized that I’d have to go offshore to get out of a rock field that would inevitably hole my boat. The Kevlar was getting me through for now but the hard grinding impacts, my boat literally bending and dimpling at times, would eventually find the limit of Stephanie’s stress calculations. Staying among the rocks was not an option; I headed out.

Old Paint just got older...and less painted. Thanks, Stephanie!!

Fortunately, the water and dark sky presented enough of a contrast that I could spot the boulders that were now emerging out of the receding tide; I could see and avoid but could only avoid what I could see, and rocks remaining just under the surface or masquerading as waves in the current hammered Old Paint many times. I eventually got clear of the rocks but the tradeoff was in now being uncomfortably far out in the river in a strong current with standing, rolling waves of frigidly cold water. And, of course, it started to rain. The visibility I desperately needed to stay in touch with a pitch-black shore began to deteriorate. It was now after 10:00 at night. A stupid time to be where I was. If Matt had been with me, we wouldn't have been there. I'd have had a reasonable adult with whom to confer and debate. I think we would have been elsewhere.  

Gentle Reader, when I tell you that in thousands of miles of rowing I have never been in a situation when I simply wished I was out of the boat and on shore, I speak truth. But this night, I wanted out. I had pushed on when I should have pulled up and now I was in trouble. Moving to Survival Mode from Rowing, I put all of my focus into staying upright while keeping shore in sight. I cared not a whit anymore about “making progress” except that which would get me past the next breaking wave rushing out of the night or off of the next rock looming off the bow. Staying upright until morning was everything.

Sometime later I spotted a single light over my right shoulder, the first sign of human presence I’d seen since dark. Reaching that light became my new goal, and I was resolved to get off the water at that point at whatever cost since it seemed that the light was quite close to the water. I let the current take me as I simply stabilized the boat as best I could, stabbing the water with my oars to take a wave at a better angle or to find a line around a rock. At one blessed moment the light and my sightline aligned in such a way that I could actually see the contour of the shore at the base of the light’s pole: piles of rock on either side…and a sliver of black beach in the middle. I made for it with all of my waning might, counting on Stephanie’s genius to absorb the inevitable bumps and grinds I’d endure in getting from here to there.

Thirteen hours and 48 miles into the day, Old Paint ground ashore and her hapless pilot tumbled out of the boat onto the coarse sand. Blessed sand. Land at last. I pulled the boat up as far as I could, tied its line around my ankle, fished my tent’s rain trap out of its sleeve, wrapped myself in it, fell in the sand, and slept. Before I closed my eyes, I looked at the light again; it illuminated the base of a ski area’s chair lift. Oh, Canada.

In the middle of the night- who knows what time?- Old Paint nudged me awake; the incoming tide was lifting her and driving her up and inwards, and it was time to reposition. I got up. The rain had stopped, I recall, but I was in a bit of a stupor and was famished. After pulling the boat further up the black sand, I dug into my stores for my can of Dinty Moore Beef Stew (the best emergency ration imaginable), popped the top, drank it in one draught, flung the can back in the boat, and fell back on the beach wrapped in my tarp like a sea otter in kelp. Picture Popeye gulping his spinach…and then falling asleep?

I will never throw this can away. Never, ever.

Later, in the middle of the night- who knows what time?- Old Paint nudged me awake again; the tide was still rising and driving her up and inwards and in repositioning a second time, I realized that I would run out of room on this beach before the tide had finished its work. The beach backed into a vertical wall that was cluttered with the detritus of the sea, clearly a demarcation line for high tide, and there’d be no room for us at the Inn when that line was reached sometime later tonight. I’d be back in the boat soon. This respite would soon be over.

I was now simply counting the hours and minutes until daylight, so I repositioned uphill one last time to wait it out as long as I could. I had called Peg earlier in the night to allay her concerns about my whereabouts and safety and wanted to call her again now, but what would I say? That I’d been an idiot? That I was in some trouble and did not know exactly where I was or what might happen between now and morning? That it was two in the morning and I was soon climbing back into the boat? That I loved her? That the can of Dinty Moore Beef Stew that everyone made fun of had just saved the day?

At a little before four AM it was time to get off of the disappearing beach.The sea would soon be at the wall and I wanted to plan my exit using the beach while I had it. Covered with sand and seaweed, I piled into the boat and rowed out to the edge of the stream inside the standing waves but now, with the rising tide, Old Paint was far enough over the boulders to be safe from impact. Daylight was ninety minutes or so away. Wrapped in my tent, dripping and shivering and cowed by circumstance, I decided that I’d simply sit tight until I could see. I used the oars only to maintain my position in a sweet spot between the cliffs and boulders of the shore and the unpleasantness outside.

Ninety minutes until tomorrow. Then I could row again.            

Day 11, July 7: The New Longest Day, Part I

As I was setting up my tent in a drizzle last night, an envoy from a group dining inside appeared and asked if I might be interested in sleeping in the gazebo on the side yard. “Better for the rain, yes?” she questioned in lilting English. “Ah, yes,” I replied gratefully, wondering why I could not shake my own lilting English French accent. Apparently they’d followed my arrival from across the river through the rain, and the amusement provided by my Snoopy-like wrestling match with my tent had earned me a much-improved set-up for the night. (Note to file: the hard plank floor of a dry gazebo at Levy at the invitation of friendly diners is far preferable to bootless groveling at the Quebec Yacht Club.)

Room with a View: Quebec City from the window of my gazebo.

 

As I quaffed a pre-bedtime libation in the restaurant- something carrying tonic, for resisting the bugs, of course- I met Gerald and Denise. They lived aboard a sailboat here at the marina, and I asked them if they knew where I might purchase charts for the waters to Saguenay. I had run off my map as I arrived in Quebec City, and I knew I’d be heading into large stretches of unpopulated shoreline ahead. My day had also taught me that the water was changing rapidly; this was no longer a charming river delivering me gently to my destination. Gerald said, “Meet me here at 9:30 tomorrow; I have charts for you.” How easy! 9:30 was on the late side for me, but I immediately recalled the scene in Casablanca when the young lovers, desperate to escape, arrange a meeting with Captain Renault to receive their coveted visa.

The young man declares, “We’ll be at your office at 7, Captain.”

“Fine,” replies Renault. “I’ll be there at 10.”

So I was there this morning at 9:30 and Claude was right on time, carrying a bundle of charts under his arm along with something of an appetite for breakfast. His lovely wife Denise accompanied him, and we talked of things Canadian, global, and personal. A musician, Gerald had also spent his career as a principle figure representing artists in labor negotiations in the US, Canada, and abroad. Between liberal forkfuls of hash browns and rye toast, I offered that he should be teaching labor relations and exploring issues of equity with the next generation before so much of his incredible experience is lost. Gerald's stories evoked what recalled reading and even experiencing in my own career….Sinclair Lewis, Walter Reuther, Saul Alinsky, Studs Terkel…all somehow rolled up in my compelling, passionate, principled breakfast companion. Incredible perspectives…a delightful couple....

Gerald and Denise bid me a Bon Voyage before The Mal Voyage.

 And..zoot alours! The Charts!

Gerald’s chart collection represented a collection of maps of waters from Quebec City to Saguenay…from which two middle maps were missing. My first mistake of the day was to elect to push off that morning with an incomplete set, putting me in the dark (literally, as I would find out that night…..) for over forty miles of coastline. In retrospect, this was an incomprehensibly bad call. After all, I’d had my confidence badly shaken yesterday, I had done a pretty realistic job of assessing the mistakes in judgment I had made…and yet here I was at almost noon, pushing off from Quebec City with incomplete charts into fifty miles of essentially uninhabited coastline of increasingly oceanic conditions with 40% of my path- and tonight’s probable landfall- “off the charts” in my possession.

Armchair Analysis: On August 22nd, 2006, I faced what I thought of as “The Longest Day” in an epic struggle to exit the Delaware River for the Chesapeake as I rowed from Troy, NY, to Baltimore. That day and night I covered 62 miles in 17 hours in bad conditions and, at the end, against a building tide, arrived in a heap on a dock at one in the morning. In Quebec I found myself comparing this kind of previous experience to my current situation, finding confidence that “I could do it” because I’d faced tough sledding before. I knew the tides were much, much stronger here in Canada, as was the flow of the St Lawrence. I knew that the water temperature of the Delaware was as that of a bathtub compared to the quick hypothermia underneath me now. And I knew that I had a rocky, unapproachable, and largely uninhabited coastline ahead as opposed to the refuge of marshes and glades of the Delaware. I knew all of this because I’d experienced it in Technicolor®, Surround-Sound®, and Reality® just yesterday…and yet I allowed an incomparable earlier experience cloud my judgment and fuel my boyish enthusiasm on this July departure.

It perhaps also bears noting that I was soon to be 63 years old this morning, not newly 55. When you’re 63, details like this matter.

So I pushed off - too late in the day, underequipped, and overconfident- for the final leg of my journey. I’d soon have a new standard of comparison for a “Longest Day,” one which I’d be grateful to have lived…and passed.     

 

Day 10, July 6 : First Signs….

 

Leaving Portneuf felt a bit like leaving home yet again: delightful people, convenient amenities, a protected harbor, hot water…but with a bit of a push I’d make Quebec City today, and the push had to start early. I’d texted Phil and Helen to see if they were behind me in their newly re-masted Beneteau, but they had yet to depart Sorel; getting the mast up and secured is one thing, but accurately rigging the umpteen miles of lines and cords that hang from it all is yet another. I let them know that Portneuf was a great port even without a storm and that they should make a point of stopping. Maybe Phil could talk some sense into the Screen family.

I felt like a cork coming out of a bottle as I hit the main stream from the marina basin; a standing wave ripped across the river where the turbulent main course hit the relatively still water of the harbor. Before traversing it to the main channel I pulled up to take it all in. It was daunting but seemed manageable. Nevertheless, I slipped into my lifejacket….and I would remain in it all day for the first time in over 2,000 miles of rowing. 

“Daunting but seems manageable” became my rubric for the next three days on the water, but like grade inflation, my standards began to creep as I made progress through increasing risk and found success in tamping down the “daunt”. This creep in judgment vs. reality would bring my rowing to an end in two more days.

If yesterday was a sleigh ride, today’s ride was a roller coaster as the winds continued to build and the current picked up in a narrowing river. Every mile closer to the Atlantic was delivering a stronger tidal effect and on this morning, my Machmeter indicated a groundspeed of better than 7 mph through the swells. I was estimating only a bit more than forty miles to Quebec City and at this pace I’d be there for a late lunch. Yeeehaaa!!...right?

Gentle Reader, no doubt you’ve heard expressions like “less is more” or “scarcity breeds demand”? How about “go slow to go fast”? “Slow and steady wins the race”? “Haste makes waste”? “Don’t run with scissors in your hands”? Well, maybe the scissors thing doesn’t really fit but the idea here, the irony, I guess, is that this morning I’d been given a trifecta of natural phenomenon that any rower would welcome: a following current, an outgoing tide, and strong tailwind. On still water, each would be a blessing. In combination on a river rapidly morphing into ocean, they became unusable at best…and opponents at worst.

As the waves built and soon became as confused and randomly directed as the 113^th Congress, I pulled down my diminutive “pusher sail” (good for tailwinds, bad for gales), dropped out of my sliding seat (good for power and efficiency, bad for center of gravity and stability), and settled into my fixed wicker seat. For long stretches I had to stop rowing altogether simply to maintain a safe heading relative to the large waves that were building and breaking around me. At times I even turned around, facing forward, stabbing at the water with directional, not propulsive, strokes in order to be able to see and take a path through the most threatening stuff.

As I read what I have just written, I wonder why I did not simply pull for shore to wait it out. In fact, my handwritten journal at the end of the day carries this closing sentence: “Took too many chances today in open water, pushing for speed and line. Took sail down twice after scaring myself…a dump (in the water) would have ended it all. Gotta’ slow down/ take time out!”

Did I really need to be ashore, safe and dry in my sleeping bag, to have this epiphany? The fact is that on the water, in the middle of it all, concentrating on staying upright and keeping the worst of the water out of the boat, knowing that you are making progress even if more at the whim of the river than your own heavy labor, the impulse is to stay at it, keep going, plug away, press on. Perhaps because I have spent a lot of time on many trips rowing against headwinds, currents, and waves, when the cards were with me this day- even if they were one quick draw away from overpowering me- my unthinking impulse was to keep going, to make progress, to take advantage of any serendipity regardless of seemingly manageable risk. As a former pilot I’m reminded of the malady of “get-home-itis” that plagues aviators who hazard flights through conditions beyond their experience or ability. You read the accident reports of crashes based on this “probable cause” and you say, “What poor judgment. Why didn’t he just wait it out? What could have been so important to have risked it all?”

These questions are rarely answered. They hang there, hoping to be used as lessons for the rest of us. 

So “daunting but manageable” got me to Quebec City late in the day, but the trifecta had compelled me to slow down, to limp into port in a cold downpour. I’d eaten only Nature Valley granola bars and water all day and, famished and freezing, I pulled into the Quebec City Yacht Club wondering if the 1% might be feeling generous this day. I noted that there was not another boat like mine in their inventory. A taciturn bureaucrat would not grant me permission to pitch a tent on their property but was perfectly happy to sell me an early dinner, and I was too tired to be righteously indignant. Sitting alone in their capacious dining room, dripping an expanding puddle on the flagstone floor and making periodic forays to the Men’s Room to warm myself with the hand dryer, I feasted.

I asked the Yacht Club Manager where I might find success pitching a tent for the night (hoping that he might relent at the last minute seeing as how I was obviously harmless, had just dropped a fortune on an early dinner at his empty establishment, and would leave no footprint of my presence the following morning). He said that downstream, a few miles past the city, a municipal beach on the east side was sometimes “used by those kayakers for such purposes.” I asked him about the small marina that was directly across the river from us in a clearly industrial-looking area, and he frowned and waved his hand dismissively. “Oh, no. No, don’t go there.” 

Back in the boat in the cold rain of a grey evening, facing the river again just north of Quebec City, I rowed directly to Levy.

Today I’d picked up the first signs of the ocean ahead…a first taste of salt, a first taste of ceding control to the water….a first taste of doubt.

But tonight, I would sleep well at Levy.    

Day 7, July 3: Cause for a Pause

Today, Day 7, is for rejuvenating , re-provisioning, and re-orienting. Courtney is on her way north from Saratoga to retrieve Matt; she’ll arrive in his truck looking as fresh as if she’d just bopped down to the corner store for the paper instead of having traveled 250 miles and through Customs before breakfast.

In the meantime, Matt and I have work to do.

Up off the dock after a night on the boards, Matt cleans his boat and packages his stuff for the trip home while I decide what to send back from my own too-heavy stores. I’ve been freighting around clothes I will not use, gear I will not get to, and gadgets I don’t even know how to deploy, and it’s time to shed a few pounds from the boat. After an hour of intense decision-making, two sea bags and the detritus of a week on the water are culled from my boat for the trip south in the truck; my boat is now lighter and marginally faster; less is more!

Clean up that room!

This morning I also covet the newer mechanicals in Matt’s boat; after all, the building St Lawrence is no place for equipment failure, right? Our boats are identical, but Matt's borrowed boat is very-low mileage while mine is showing some worrisome wear and tear. We wonder whether Bob Ashton will object to some temporary swapping-out of parts from his boat and while we debate his response, we swap out the parts: new floorboards, the rails for the sliding seat, and the sliding seat itself are purloined and installed in Old Paint while Bob’s boat takes on the old gear.   

Later that day I call Bob to ask permission. Whew. Knew he would. This is the stuff of friendship.

Courtney arrives right on schedule at 0930 and Telemachus morphs back into McGuyver, master rigger, as Matt secures Bob’s boat to the truck. Straps, ratchets, and lines knit it all together and within ten minutes they are good to go. (I make this point now only because later on it will take me, the alleged tree for this acorn, the better part of two hours to tie my boat (badly) onto my Mini. I have no such intuition about straps, ratchets, lines, and such.)

Courtney cheerfully jumps into the passenger seat for the rest of her 500 mile-day (Unsung Heroine Award #2!), Matt gives me the big bear-hug and as they pull away from the marina, I find myself welling up for a minute. Great kids, a wonderful week, the blessing of sharing….Al is a lucky man for a host of reasons that have nothing to do with rowing.

Time to get back to work; this may be a day off the water, but there are things to do.

We have rowed off the charts and I head off to find a map of the St Lawrence. Sure, I could have procured charts at any freaking time during the four freaking months that have passed since I hatched this freaking plan, but why would I do that when I could struggle at the very last minute? After walking around for a bit I find a map that covers the next leg to Quebec City but nothing for the waters beyond to the Saguenay. Quebec City is a big place, I reason. Surely I will find my next necessary charts there, right? Sounds reasonable, yes? This is the way I operate, Gentle Reader: superficially reasonable logic meeting uncooperative reality.

Anyway, when I return to the marina from my MapQuest, I spot Phil and his 42’ Beneteau at a public dock about half a mile away, a massive crane on the pier holding his 50’mast high in the air while he crouches on the deck trying to guide it all into place. His wife, sitting on a bench back at the marina, calmly suggests that I might consider joining this tableau. I note her furrowed brow.

Never having raised a mast so consequently not feeling very much like the cavalry coming to the rescue, I nevertheless quickly clamber down the steel rungs of the pier in time to “help” Phil with the placement of the foot of the mast into an impossibly tight fitting on deck. Even a child could see that there is no tolerance for error in this procedure. “I’ve never done this before, Phil,” I confess, “but I’ll do what you need me to do.” Phil advises me that this is a first for him as well…quite an admission as fifty feet of aluminum seeking a home bobs over our heads with each passing wave and wake. “But I’ve seen it done before.” Last night over cocktails on this very boat I learned of Phil’s engineering and design background, and it is the recent memory of this conversation that sustains my hope.

High above us, out of earshot but responding to our hastily contrived hand signals, the crane operator moves the mast in small increments as we try to guide this huge spear to the target. Since the boat is in the water and the deck is moving, the target is in perpetual motion. Holding this mast in place by hand is impossible; its mass is too great. All we can do is use the motion of the boat to “guide” it to a metal fitting on the cabin roof, and it takes many tries to finally get a hit. But it’s the spaghetti mix of stainless steel shrouds and stays that actually holds a mast in a vertical position, so while the crane guy holds the new line on the mast, we quickly scramble to affix the hardware. Excitement builds for me when, for some reason or other, I look over my shoulder and notice a huge freighter heading our way. It’s generating a very large cresting wake that will reach us in probably five minutes or so and if the mast is not standing independently and secure by then, who knows? The crane operator sees this unfolding drama as well and, after a surprising eye roll, smiles and shrugs. (I say “surprising” only because an eye roll is not what I‘d expect from a crane operator at a poignant moment such as this.) Phil, to his credit, misses this silent exchange and has his head down, doing the necessary work, totally focused, taking it step-by step, calmly giving me my next task which can best complement his task.

Gotta love an unflappable, sequentially-thinking engineer. I bet he has all of his charts, too.

And...hey, where is McGuyver? This is his bread and butter!

Depiction of the relative mechanical skills of McGuyver and his father 

Anyway, hours later, as we toast the apparently successful completion of this task back at the marina in the cockpit of the Beneteau, the mast towering straight and true above us, I secretly both wish and lament the fact that I’ll not be on this boat when the sail is next raised and real tension and torque is applied to this assembly.

The proof will be in the pudding, as they say….but I’ll be sitting at a different table. I hope it all works out.

Sunset in Sorel

 

Tomorrow will come early. Spaghetti in Sorel, then early to bed.     

  

        

Intermission, Part Deux

I know, I know, you want to get back on the row, and so do I, but these next few strokes are simply to document our (Peg, Timmy, and me) present (7/27) return from Quebec with Old Paint on board.

Mini with a Mohawk

 We collected the boat and my gear at Baie St Paul this week and then spent four days gooning around the Charlevoix/Saguenay area, and what a beautiful part of the world it is! While a mid-January visit might assault our opinions of “habitability,” the grandeur of this area as a summer destination is breathtaking. We dipped our toes in the frigid waters, climbed into a Zodiac for a whale watch at the mouth of the Saguenay River, and enjoyed the cuisine and hospitality of the area; I saw my first Beluga and Humpback whales (way cool), ate my first Canadian Chinese food (at a pizza shack…not as rewarding as seeing the whales), and of course asked myself each day if I could have/should have continued from Baie St Paul to Saguenay. The short of it is that I think I made the right call.

 So….this travelogue of our return will now give way to the resumption of the row, but not without the encouragement to any and all of you to visit our Neighbors to the North. Quebec is not far away but if you are pressed for time or money, a visit there can act as a reasonable surrogate for a trip across the Big Pond, I think, with the added benefit that French Canadians are still engaged with disco in ways that Americans (or the French) are not. For a child of the 60’s, the car radio in Quebec is a jukebox.

Now…back to the row!

There we were, pushing off for our second day on the Richelieu, yet another early south wind building behind us….

Intermission for a Mission

From a writer’s perspective, a blog can present time-management issues. It is presently Wednesday, 7/23, and by my established routine I would normally be writing about Day Six of the row (7/2) except that yesterday, 7/22, Peg and I headed out on a mission. 7/2 will have to wait until 7/24, when I get back on track.   

Yesterday (7/22) Peg and I refurbished our travel bags, fluffed up the sock drawer, and embarked on yet another journey to Quebec in order to retrieve the Guideboat. We covered 482 miles in an already-stuffed Mini that will have to perform the miracle of also accommodating the gear I left behind at Baie St Paul. The drive up I-91 to the border was a breeze. We stopped in St Johnsbury and enjoyed lunch at the old post office (now a dog-friendly bistro), and Timmy scored a plate of turkey and a tummy-scratch from the waitress.

Does that come with freis?

Against Timmy’s protestations we pressed on, the lovely rolling countryside of northern Vermont soon giving way to the expansive plains of Quebec. At the border, Customs was more interested in Timmy’ status in our company than in any motive we had for visiting Canada....but only marginally so. Unlike the Customs crossing at Rouses Point in New York, Magog seems very uncommercial and much more oriented towards processing tourists and locals…so the heat was light and even cheerful.

We hit Quebec City at rush hour and pulled into Baie St Paul at around six, only to find that our reservation did not include permission for “le chien.” Timmy was out and with no good alternative at the Inn, we took the advice of “Robert” at our old inn and chanced to find a terrific spot right in town. Michael, the amiable owner of La Maison Otis, is not only a dog nut but also a Mini devotee who owns one of only two specially-hopped-up John Cooker Works Super-Minis in North America. He calls her “Alice” (ah, but of course) and has only danced with her (him, actually) for 8000 kilometers since 2009. The Mini, the dog-friendliness, the room with a view…it was all a package deal sealed with pasta on a deck and a nice walk through town.

Alice Cooper with Michael

 I’ll get back to the row tomorrow, Gentle Reader, I promise. But the poignancy of being back in Baie St Paul to get the boat after a couple of weeks has been cause for pause. Driving east from Quebec on such a beautiful afternoon, through spectacular mountains bathed in golden light, a gentle whisper of air-conditioning on my legs and the best of company by my side seemed a stark contrast to my last transit of this shore: in the rain, strong winds, building waves, and approaching darkness along an inaccessible shore.

But more of that tomorrow.

BlogTeam One

Day 5, July 1. Locking Down to Mayhem

 Waking up on a wet dock in St Jean sur Richelieu did nothing to inhibit our typical get-going-itis, but this morning our start would be reliant upon the opening of the first lock at 8 AM. We packed the boats, tidied up in the marina’s men’s room, and prowled into town for breakfast. This town sleeps well after a street festival, and it took some time and the obvious gesticulating with an amiable street sweeper to locate a breakfast nook.

Some Fast Facts about St Jean while we wait for the lock to open?

·       5,750 of its inhabitants commute to Montreal , while only 745 Montrealers work in St Jean. None seemed in evidence this morning. If you like St Jean sur Richelieu and hate traffic, live in Montreal.

·       Hockey legend Bernard (Boom Boom) Geoffrion and 1993 World Champion figure skater Isabelle Brasseur both call it home. We walked past an impressive gymnastics training center but saw no ice until our water arrived in the diner. The locks and canal, as it turns out, are popular skating venues in the winter.

·       The Chambly Canal’s ten swing bridges and nine locks (all “down” as we head north) are designated as a National Historical Site of Canada and many of them, including all of the locks, are hand-operated.

·       If I were a college kid or an aging teacher, operating a lock would be just about the coolest summer job ever. The lockkeepers wear these great uniforms with cute little beavers on the pockets.

Breakfast done, I arrived at the first lock on foot because we had to purchase passes for the system ahead. The lockkeeper had no extra uniforms (hey, no harm in asking, right?) but did say that after we passed his lock, he’d be the first of eight lockkeepers to call ahead to his colleagues after we’d passed; we could expect an easy, delay-free passage today. Cool.

The locking-through process is a snap. After the lock doors open and a green light is issued, you power into the concrete and stone chamber to either wall and grab a rope. The doors close, you remain along the wall by hanging on to the rope, and the still water of the lock gently descends to the next level as the valves behind you are opened. The doors at the other end then open and- voila!- out you go, rowing out onto the canal and the next lock.

 

The eight-mile transit of the Chambly Canal is advertised as taking from three to five hours, but the very light traffic and total attentiveness of the lockkeepers enabled us to proceed more quickly even though we didn’t want to rush this pleasant row. Flanked by charming houses, a bike path, and lovely fields, the canal’s narrow width also provides a rower with a sense of speed. As the day grew hot, the tree-lined shores provided some shade but no breeze, a stark contrast from the wide waters of Lake Champlain.  

Heading north, the canal terminates in Chambly at a flight of three locks in succession in a dramatic descent to the Chambly Basin. We paused for lunch at the top of the flight, leaving the boats at a park and enjoying an expansive view of the Basin below. We commented on the strong building wind and the density of the boat traffic. Then I was distracted by a plate of spaghetti. Just for the carbs. Need the carbs.

Back in the boats after lunch, we entered the “flight” and immediately began to chat it up with the gathering crowd. We were “it” on a busy day, Canada Day, and our journey seemed to fascinate the gathered vacationers. One very kind family offered their house for our next overnight (“we’re about 20 kilometers miles upstream…two red chairs on the lawn...you can’t miss it…”).

We pushed out of the third and final lock at about two o’clock, rowing into Chambly Basin, a circle of aquatic mayhem or, more precisely, 

The Evacuation of Dunkirk as Reenacted at Skippy’s Water Park during Hurricane Andrew on Canada Day, When There Are No Rules…and No Limits.

The Chambly Basin, a small lake of perhaps two miles in diameter, feeds the narrow band of river to the north where we were headed. The winds had piped up very dramatically, creating stiff, nasty cresting waves which competed for dominance against the confusion of the boat wakes…and there were boats, scores and scores of boats, all being driven either at that particular speed before planning which guarantees the largest possible wake…. or at 70 miles per hour. Nothing in between. Add to this mayhem the whine of jet-skis (some carrying riders), windsurfers and kite-surfers riding and sometimes flying the breeze at easily 30 knots, and even a figure along the shore wearing a jet pack which enabled him to rise above it all on two marbled pillars of water. Biblical, really.
The strong wind, confused and dangerous waves, and cacophony of internal combustion precluded any conversation; eye contact and frantic gestures confirmed that we simply had to row for our lives through it all, which we somehow did, arriving at the narrow continuation of the Richelieu River in relief, amazement…and in hysterics. The Canadians put a lot of livin’ into Canada Day even if living to the next day takes some concentration and effort.

The rest of the day seemed almost anti-climactic; we again enjoyed the current north and a tailwind, enabling Matt to move to SailPlan Revision 3.0 and for us to make great time along waters that bedeviled me three years ago. I recalled a particular point during Row, Canada! that presented Brian and me a particular “all-or-nothing” challenge in the dead of night…a narrow channel under a railroad bridge that required us to row at maximum effort until we could pass, and my memory of the painfully glacial progress we made against the current until we could reach shore prompted me to glance at the Mach Meter as we passed under: 8.1 mph. Give 5 to Matt and me and the rest to the river. Brian, today was a good day to go downstream.

At dusk we pulled into a campground on the eastern shore….two red chairs faced us from the yard across the river, but we saw no sign of anyone….and were given the OK to pitch our tents anywhere and use the facilities just as the mosquitoes began stir for the evening. Two tuna pouches and some Starbucks Mochas saw us to bed on a verdant lawn with the boats bobbing gently in front and threats of “tornado” issuing from the radio.

After the Chambly Basin, we laughed. “Tornado.” What fun.

A View from a Tent......

 

                    

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?