The view from the marina is beautiful which makes up for the showers which are not beautiful. Oh well, this promises to be a great place for the winter layup and we’ve certainly showered in worse places. 
Ron sailed solo again and had an exciting start to the day. The winds were blowing 20knots from the SW straight into the channel into Wellington. Having got past the 4’ section there were breaking waves at the channel entrance. Quinita handled it fine though, although it was a bit lumpy and noisy. Out in the lake there were 6-8’ waves with the wind almost dead ahead, so Ron got soaked a few times bringing in the fenders and lines – I miss my crew! Motored the first 6nm while the wind was on the bow and then bore away, raised the main with 1 reef and ¾ genoa. Then the sailing improved – following seas and 8-9 knots boat speed. 
Ron sailed solo in light winds and motor-sailed the whole day so that he wouldn’t keep the girls waiting too long for their accommodation to arrive. The entrance to Wellington was interesting – it’s not on any charts and we were told that it had 4’ depths in places. It was pretty easy though – there was a narrow channel with the docks at the end, and my 2 dockhands were on the dock waiting to take my lines. 
We found ourselves with one boat, one car and three bikes. So Teresa and Mary took the car and three bikes to Cobourg. They then biked back to Port Darlington, 43° 53’.31N 78° 39’.87W, where they met Ron who sailed solo to that very port. What a coincidence! Docked at Wiggers Custom Yachts, owned by a Dutchman. The Waterway Guide listed it with the marinas and it did in fact offer transient dockage but was not a marina, but a shipyard. We tied up to a “dock” in the middle of the channel into the Port Darlington Yacht Club. The depths on one side of the relatively narrow channel were less than two feet – see photo of fisherman in the channel.
Teresa and Mary went for a bike ride around the Toronto Islands. Ron did some route planning for the next few days, went back to the boat where Keith had just finished his work and then started boat cleanup. Tom (from Tomcat boats) arrived in the afternoon and installed our mainsail stackpack and screecher (large, light airs headsail). 
We were planning to have some work done on the boat by the builders who are based close to Toronto. The work was not to start until next week, so Keith, one of the boat builders who Ron worked with last year, arranged a mooring for us at his sailing club – the Aquatic Park Sailing Club. It’s not shown on the charts and we had verbal directions on how to get there. We entered the bay and asked a passing tri-maran to confirm where it was. He sent us off in a different direction, we found the dock and 2 guys waved us in and took our lines. Keith sails a Tomcat 6.2, the club we were in was almost entirely multihulls and the 2 guys were very friendly, so we figured we must be in the right place and Keith was delayed. It turns out though that we were in the wrong sailing club! They knew Keith however and sent us off to the correct club where we found Keith. We docked for the night, had a few beers and burgers with Keith, Hazel (his wife), Lynn (her sister) and several other members. 
We’re heading for Lake Ontario today which connects to Lake Erie via the Niagara River and Falls. My plan was to hoist a spinnaker, go over the falls backwards and float down gently with the spinnaker acting as a parachute. We found an alternate however – the Welland Canal – and decided to go this way instead. The canal has 10 opening bridges and 8 locks and the canal operators time one’s passage through to minimize bridge opening times and disruption to commercial traffic. The locks were huge – big enough for large ocean going ships and most had a drop of 46 feet – 1 foot more that our mast height! The hype makes the transit sound daunting, but we passed through without any issues and docked at St. Catharines marina in Port Weller, 43° 13’.89N 79° 12’.72W. 
Today’s log: 21.7 nm, season total: 1237.5
Can’t believe it’s almost September! Yesterday we noticed that the BBC was in town – the British Baking Company. A sign on the door said “Closed Mondays, see you Tuesday. So this morning at 8am, Ron went there picked up a blueberry scone and brought it back to the boat where we shared it. It was scrummy – so scrummy in fact that Teresa went back to the shop for some more at 8:30am. Trouble was, by the time Teresa got there the shop was closed with a sign on the door saying “Closed until 2pm to bake fresh goods”. So we had oatmeal for breakfast. 
We had tailwinds on the way out, were making slow progress over the bushwhacking sections and were anticipating headwinds for the return trip so we turned back about 2/3 way along the canal and returned to Port Colborne after cycling 40 miles. Somewhere along the canal, we noticed some strange devices in the canal (see photo). They’re “fire pods”. Later that week, a concert is being held on a floating stage, and the pods will all be filled with wood and lit. It promises to be a really nice evening – pity we won’t be here to enjoy it. 