Parry Sound, Ontario

 Kerm here.
It's been awhile since blogging but we have had guests for the last 10 days and have not had wifi for awhile.  Chris will be catching up with her version for the last 2 or 3 weeks later today.
It was nice to have sister Mary and Cecil here for the last half of the Trent Severn Waterway and the first half of the Georgian Bay.  They were great guests / crew and we miss having them on the boat.

It's time to get back to the old routines.  We're thinking of taking a straight shot to Kilearny on the Georgian Bay in lieu of taking the inside passage.  I think we have seen at least half of the 30K islands on the first half of the Georgian Bay inside passage and are looking forward to the North Passage.  This is supposed to be one of the best cruising grounds in the world so we are anxious to get started.  The straight shot to Kilearny will probably be our longest single day passage but we will have one of the longest days of the year to do it in. 

Over the last 3 or 4 weeks we have slowed our daily average by about half.  This was partially due to all the locks but also have reduced our speed by a couple of MPH.  A side benefit has been that our oil and fuel consumption has improved.  The engine also sounds better but it may be my imagination. 

The black flakes in the fuel filter bowl seem to be getting smaller and perhaps fewer.  I added more anti algae stuff in the tanks along with more fuel a few days ago and this I hope is the reason for fewer flakes.  If it's not algae then it's probably a deteriorating fuel filler hose and there is no way I can replace that easily as they buried it.  I figure it would take at least a day to get to it with much surgery needed.  Putting it back together would take another day or two BUT if I'm going to dig this deep into the boat.  I'm sure that there would be other things I would like to take a look at and replace or improve.  So bottom line is that I will procrastinate until the boat is in a long term port or the problem gets worse.  

We have passed the 2600 statue mile mark.  Chris said that she felt bad that the loop trip was half over already.  Well, half over if we don't go up the Mississippi to visit the St. Croix.  NO, we still have not made up our minds if this is going to be part of the trip.  There is also the Keys and the blue water trip to the Bahamas to think about.  I refuse to look at this like it's Wednesday of a week long vacation.

I am a bit homesick for Minnesota.  Family, friends and the shop.  Perhaps it's because Mary and Cecil was here and are headed back.  We talked about taking a break around the 4th of July for the O'Donnell party but after checking transportation costs from these back woods and marina costs it probably is not in the cards.  Nuts.  Perhaps when we get closer to home...

We are looking forward to our next guests... son, Dan and Carrie in the next 3 or 4 weeks.  If Dan can't get off work Carrie may be coming alone.  Fearless, she is!  I can't wait to tell her Dan stories without him scowling over my shoulder.  Come to think of it,  Dan is also pretty brave to subject Carrie to me without him here to temper the situation.  Fearless, he is.