We cross to the other side of the St. Lawrence River, visiting towns and anchoring at several islands in Thousand Islands National Park in Canada. We end up in Kingston on Lake Ontario, where we enjoy a week of city living.
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It’s official: we are in love with the Thousand Islands! If we were smitten with the American side, we fell head over heels with the Canadian.
While we had been making our way down the St. Lawrence on the New York bank, we decided on a last minute big itinerary change. We originally had planned to continue all the way to Montreal on the St. Lawrence, then head down to Lake Champlain and spend a month there. But when we discovered how exorbitant the marinas in Burlington VT were, we decided to spend the month instead between the Thousand Islands and the Rideau Canal. We did the Rideau two years ago from Ottawa to Kingston as part of our Loop and it was our favorite segment, so we figured we would take a very leisurely cruise from Kingston to Ottawa and then over to Montreal from there. It would be easier in lots of ways, and with the Parks Canada seasonal passes we could stay right at the locks each night and not have to worry about marinas. This also would allow us to spend more time in our Thousand Islands courtship. We would still go back to the States via Lake Champlain, but spend more of the summer in Canada – which also meant letting the hurricane season do its thing and thus less worries for us.
Brockville, Ontario CAN
July 14-17, 2024
Brockville was our first stop after crossing the border. Clearing Canadian Customs was a breeze with a simple phone call and a few questions, then we were ‘free to move about the country.’ It’s a nice sized town (population 22,000), with a large municipal marina along a well-used park. Being docked right along the wall meant great people-watching right from the boat, fielding inquiries about the boat, and chuckling at all the pictures and selfies in front of it. It was a very popular dog-walk route, and we chatted extensively with one couple that came by each morning with their pup.
Our ‘fun surprise’ in Brockville was the Railway Tunnel. Built at the height of the railroad in the mid-19th century to run under downtown as a link for the lumber industry to get its wares to the river for shipping, trains ran through it until the 1970s. It was then turned over to the city, and brilliantly rehabilitated into a ½ mile pedestrian walkway with a coordinated light and music show as you walk through the pleasantly cool tunnel, walls dripping from the moisture. We walked through it a couple times, and every 15 minutes or so the music stops and you hear the sound of a train coming through as a red light passes from one end of the tunnel to the other, reminding you of the its purpose for over 100 years. It was a great way to combine art and history into a unique tourist attraction.
Additionally, Brockville had the usual restaurants, shopping, and activities. We walked through the well-maintained downtown, admired the architecture, read about the history, found a bakery, and scootered through the neighborhoods. King St. in particular had some lovely homes with gardens in full bloom, and we went as far as the Fulford Mansion, named for the original owner who made his fortune with ‘Pink Pills for Pale People.” The people were incredibly friendly, quick to recommend a restaurant or tell us why they loved Brockville. Everyone seemed unhurried and relaxed.
Thousand Islands National Park
Grenadier July 18-19
Mulcaster July 20
McDonald & Beaurivage July 21-23
Between Brockville and Kingston is Thousand Islands National Park, with about 20 islands or parts of islands managed by Parks Canada. They do a phenomenal job keeping so much of these islands accessible, preserved, and instilling a respect for the environment and natural beauty of the area. All the sites are accessible by boat only, with docks (no electric or water hookups), campsites, and some limited facilities like. The docks are first-come-first-serve and very popular with Canadian boaters; as soon as someone left another boat swooped in to take the spot. We chose anchorages near these docks so we could easily get to shore for Roxy.
We spent six days at anchor, enjoying the peace and being blessed with great weather. Temps were mostly in the 70s or low 80s, and when you’re at anchor the boat points into the wind so we always had a nice breeze and no need for air conditioning. Sunsets were late, with the last vestiges of light and color hanging on until around 9 pm. It was full or near-full moon during this time, and several days we watched the fading sunset on one side and a giant moon rising directly opposite, with the distant call of loons and a gentle lap of water on the hull as background music. It was positively hypnotic – until the bugs penetrated our established ThermaCell mosquito repellant perimeter and we had to retreat inside.
Days were spent with a short transit to the next island or a leisurely breakfast and walk along on the island with Roxy in the morning. Afternoons were just hanging out on the boat and watching the other boat traffic, a dinghy ride, or maybe a swim off the boat. One day we dinghied into the nearby town of Gananoque to explore. Cell service was minimal, as we were so close to the border that our AT&T seemed to be struggling to decide if it should be using its US cell towers or its Canadian counterpart. It was a little frustrating when we needed to check weather or wanted to get the latest news, but we eventually just gave it up to better enjoy where we were.
Grenadier Island is popular with locals for its sandy swimming beach. We enjoyed watching the parade of boats and jet skis coming in for the day, with only a few boats in the larger bay with us overnight each of the two nights we were there. (The Parks Canada dock, however, was full.) When we departed, we learned exactly how well our anchor holds in grass as we pulled up enough on the chain and anchor that it took an extra 10 minutes with both Dave and I working to remove it as it came up. There was even a live crayfish and a clam in the giant grass ball.
Along the short 10 mile trip to Mulcaster, we marveled at all the small islands with a single cottage, wondering what it must be like to own your own island and thinking many had probably been in the family for a couple generations.
One settled at Mulcaster, we did a lovely and short shoreline hike around the island with Roxy, stopping for a picnic at a spot with a great view of kayakers and dinghies going by. We took the long route back to the boat with the dinghy to gawk at the variety of cottages and properties on nearby islands. One flew both an American and Canadian flag, along with a NY Yankees banner. Another had lined their dock with statues of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.
McDonald Island has an interesting history. It’s named for the previous owner who had the family farm there for years. Yes, Old McDonald had a farm. He donated a good chunk of it to Parks Canada, and the farmland has naturalized in with trees and native growth. One end of it is private, and Old McDonald still has a house there. The paddle-wheeler tour boats pass by his house on the channel, and the tradition is for them to give a long and two short blasts of their horn and he responds in kind. We had heard these horns and wondered what it was for, since the long-and-two-short doesn’t mean anything in the broader maritime world.
We stayed in this anchorage for three nights because it was a great spot to explore several of the other Admiralty Group Islands. One of our favorites was Beaurivage, which means ‘beautiful shore,’ and it was aptly named. Following the trail up and around the rocky island, there were some great views of the many large and small islands surrounding it.
There was also the famous Half Moon Bay on Bostwick Island, known as the Tallest Cathedral Ceiling for the Sunday church services in the summer. The open air services started in 1887, when vacationers would paddle their canoes and pack into the narrow inlet with high rock walls for church. Now the services rotate between various denominations, and people come by dinghy from their cottages, anchorages, or even the nearby town of Gananoque.
Gananoque (dinghy day trip)
July 22
We couldn’t get a spot in the marina at Gananoque, so the next best thing was to dinghy the mile from our anchorage at McDonald. It was a very charming small town of colorful gardens, street art, eclectic shops, old architecture, and nice parks. We met Jim, the Looper Harbor Host (liaison) for the area, who had been trying unsuccessfully to get us a spot in the marina, and chatted with him on his boat as we dinghied by. Turns out he owns Pistachio Café in town there, and it was our kind of place: nice outdoor patio, uniquely renovated old building, coffee and sandwich place in the day, beer in the evenings, live music daily, and gives back to the community.
Kingston, Ontario
July 23 - 29
Our time in the islands overlapped with the Quebec Construction Holiday, a two week period beginning the last weekend of July when the construction industry (and more) in the whole province takes a vacation. It seemed anyone with a boat took to the water. We knew this was coming and was part of the reason we decided to anchor out, knowing the docks would be busy and we didn’t want to compete for space. It was also why we decided to hold up for a week in the city of Kingston before starting the Rideau Canal, to let some of the potential surge in boaters dissipate a little.
While we loved our six days at anchor, it was nice to be back where we had electrical hookup and could refill our water tanks and do laundry. In fact, one of the beauties of cruising is that you can alternate between the two and have the best of both worlds. Kingston is a great city, with the very large and really nice city marina right in the heart of downtown. We were here two years ago, and looked forward to returning. Every day there was at least one free activity: concerts, outdoor movie, a large farmers market.
Behind their iconic City Hall is a large plaza, where they are constantly setting up and taking down stages, stalls, and whatever is needed for the day’s events. One evening they had a free swing music concert, and the hour before they had swing dancing lessons – how genius is that? Another evening it was the same with country line dancing. Crash Test Dummies – whose members are Canadian – gave a free concert another night; we decided they were kind of an acquired taste which we couldn’t acquire. We took in a military tattoo (a pipe and drums units performance, not the permanent ink type) at Historic Ft. Henry, caught our first movie in a long time at a cool independent theatre, scootered around the residential neighborhoods, and toured a restored Victorian era cruise ship that used to ply the waters of the Great Lakes. We dined at our favorite-ever pizza place, had gelato (twice, maybe three times), shared a hot dog from a cart, and of course found a bakery (might have done that two or three times also). We also spent a lot of time just sitting in the shade at Confederation Park, reading, watching all the people and dogs and geese go by. It was a great week, and we realized we could happily spend a month here, or even an entire summer and use it as a base of operations to explore the Thousand Islands even more.
Final Thoughts
The Canadian side of the St. Lawrence River has a decidedly different feel. It’s more a composite of a bunch of little observations rather than something specific I can pin down.
For starters, everyone seemed to spend more time outdoors on the Canadian side. In the towns, walkers, runners, and bikers were everywhere with designated wide shared paths. It seemed like everyone had a dog (anything-Doodles seemed to be the most popular), and thus dog walking was a regular sport. All the city provided ample big red Muskoka chairs and benches with lots of shady areas, with numerous free concerts and activities. The Parks Canada sites were well-used. In contrast, we only saw one NY State Park (Cedar Island), but it had a dock and amenities comparable to the Parks Canada site yet not a single camper and only one boat besides us was there on a beautiful weekend.
We also noticed the nice general appearance of the towns. Streets were clean, very little trash, fewer dilapidated homes in the residential neighborhoods when we got out of the tourist areas, not a lot of graffiti. We even realized while we were in Kingston that we had rarely heard a siren in any of the places we visited. But most marked was the abundance of flowers. Giant hanging baskets of colorful annuals hung from lampposts. Large containers with towering cannas and overflowing vines made up security barriers in front of governments buildings rather than plain cement Jersey barriers. The American towns also had blooms, but not as expansive.
The history buff part of us liked how the Canadian and American stories ran parallel, since both sides of the river developed during the same period. Many settlements in Canada were started by Loyalists to the Crown escaping across the St. Lawrence to the British side during and after the American Revolution. The railroad and industrialization had similar impacts, but with varying sequelae. Then there is the fun comparison of the subtle differences in how the history of the War of 1812 is told from the two perspectives (e.g. lots of references to how ‘disorganized’ the Americans were in the Canadian historical placards).
The Thousand Islands and Lake Ontario have been wonderful — the variety of towns, history, summer weather, clear water, the long days of sunlight. Fresh water cruising has a lot to offer. We love the small towns, the community feel. With the short season, it seems like everyone embraces the outdoors. As we continue to ponder life after full-time liveaboard cruising, we’ve talked a lot about ways we might combine time up here in the summer, exploring more of the islands and towns. Now if we could just figure out a way to get the bugs and spiders to leave us alone…
We look forward to our new itinerary with more time in Canada. It will all be familiar territory for us from here, but there’s still some new places to explore and things we previously missed at some of the familiar stops. And we will be doing it in the opposite direction, so perhaps some different views of the same things along the way. First up is the Rideau Canal, one of our favorite segments two years ago, with all its locks and history.
Pops’ Stats Corner*
- No of Days: 17
- Travel Days: 5
- Miles Traveled: 73.8 (64.1 nm)
- Days at anchor: 6
*Pops is the family’s affectionate name for Dave’s dad. He had a mind for sports statistics, earning him the nickname Numbers from the coaches of several Stillwater teams with whom he worked. This regular section of the blog is in his honor, because it’s the kind of thing he would love.
My parents stopped in Gananoque during their honeymoon trip to Niagara Falls and the Thousand Islands in September 1940. When I unearth their photo album, I’ll try to find some photos to transfer to my photo album on line and send to you. I wish the same long happy marriage to you two as my parents had (one month shy of 40 years when my father died).
Today’s Word of the Day: sequelae
Loved your prose as always!
Plus awesome photo of Roxy at Confederation Park