Day 2: Leek Island to Sugar Island

By Bridget
Day 2 didn’t start out as early as Day 1, and we figured out that boating people on the St. Lawrence aren’t early risers. The wind had picked up during the night, but fortunately, we hadn’t moved anywhere. After breakfast and a little fishing, we headed toward Sugar Island, where Buzz had told us there were cliffs we could jump off. We got to Sugar Island with Dad, Grandpa, and Conor taking turns driving the boat, and we found the perfect anchor spot that Buzz had recommended.

The first thing we did was explore Sugar Island and another smaller island with the cliffs that Buzz had told us about. Immediately after Matty and Patrick stepped foot on the island, they declared it Match & Patch Island. Bridget, Molly, and Conor explored the island by raft and even found an old houseboat ladder. After checking out the cliffs on Match & Patch Island, we decided it was too dangerous to jump off because we didn’t know how deep the water was below the rocks. But that was before we saw some Americans from the American Canoe Association jump off the highest point of the cliff and not get hurt. And so after Mom, Dad, Bridget, and Conor swam a lap around Match & Patch Island, some of us decided to try jumping off the cliff. Now, the cliff doesn’t really look that high up when looking at it from the water, but once you get to the edge of the cliff and look down, it’s scary how high up you are. The cliff is actually really, really high, which means that it’s a really, really long way down to the water. In fact, it takes you so long to get to the water that there is time to ask yourself why you are doing this, then regret jumping off, and then brace yourself for impact.

Dad was the first one to jump off the cliff.  Then Conor, Patrick, and I jumped off twice.  Then we all had lunch and a few hours to do whatever we wanted. Some of us napped, some of us read, and some of us fished. Patrick even proved some of us wrong and finally caught a fish after two days of trying.  (Ok, it was only four inches long). A couple hours before sunset Mom and Dad ventured out on the raft with Dad manning the oars and took some pictures of the five kids and Granny and Grandpa on the houseboat. Then it was back to the cliff to jump off again, but this time we took the football. Our first strategy was that one person would jump off the rock and as they were falling to the water another person would throw the football to them. After that failed we tried a second strategy. This time the thrower would throw the football before the catcher jumped, and the catcher caught the football as they were falling. We made the first catch of the day using this strategy. I was the first person to catch the football jumping off the cliff, after a nice throw from Conor. Patrick was the only other person who caught the ball, which was thrown by Conor right after the first completion.

This is me about the catch the football.

The is the "six guns" pulling up the
achor in the morning.  We actually didn't
take any pictures during the adventure.

After a fun and exhausting day we all prepared to eat a yummy dinner cooked by Mom and to have a relaxing evening – or so we thought. While Grandpa, Matty, and Patrick were sitting down with their dinner on the front deck, they noticed that we were unusually close to the shore. They then realized that we were dragging the anchor and as they shouted this to the rest of the boat we all heard (and felt) the boat hit some rocks. The wind had picked up a lot and had dragged the anchor of the houseboat until the engine got hung up on rocks. While on the rocks, we realized that we were stuck because the anchor and the motor were keeping us on the rocks. Then Grandpa decided that the first thing to do was to deal with the anchor, so Patrick, Matty, and Grandpa (a group later called the “six guns”) pulled the anchor while Dad revved the motor.  The boat spun around, but we still couldn’t move because the motor was wedged on the rocks. We then tried to pull the motor up but couldn’t figure out how to because it had a lot of confusing buttons and such on it. After trying different efforts to get out of the rocks, Mom decided to call Houseboat Holidays for help. While Mom was on the phone, Grandpa suggested that we could get into the water and push the houseboat out. So the “six guns” (Patrick, Matty, and Grandpa) jumped out of the houseboat and used their muscles to push the off of the rocks. Fortunately for the “six guns,” they all managed to jump on the boat before Dad gunned the engine.

Once we were clear of the rocks we had to decide where to anchor, and Dad decided to go back to the anchor spot we were in before the whole adventure with the rocks. So we looped back to our original spot and dropped two anchors instead of one. Just then, the storm arrived and it started pouring.  Fortunately, the anchors held.  Then we finally enjoyed our delicious dinner and went to bed, hoping that we had already had our one adventure of the trip.

Day 1: Home to Gananoque to Leek Island

By Patrick

Our trip to the Thousand Islands region started off with an early wakeup call at 5:40 a.m.  We left Rugby Road around 6 o’clock with an ETA of 12:30 p.m.  Not wanting to waste any of the six-and-a-half-hour drive, the five kids started the first movie of The Lord of the Rings at around 6:30 a.m. We would end up watching a little more than half of the second movie until we came rolling through customs.  There, a serious Canadian guy with a bullet-proof vest questioned Mom.  Fortunately, he failed to notice that in the back, Conor had his sunglasses on upside-down and had a pillow on top of his head while sticking his tongue at the officer’s face.  When the border guy asked “Do you have any animals on board?,” it took some self control for Mom to say “no.”  We crossed the border smoothly and were soon on our way.

As we pulled into Houseboat Holidays in Gananoque, we were all eagerly searching for our boat, and found it, with Pop already sitting on the deck reading a newspaper and drinking a beer. After unpacking the car, packing the houseboat, blowing up the raft, getting fishing and boating licenses, and getting a run-down of the houseboat and the Thousand Islands region from our man Buzz (a Houseboat Holiday employee), we were ready to go with our bathing suits on and shirts off already. With Buzz piloting the boat, the boys pushed off the dock and we headed out into the river.  Soon Buzz was departing and we were out of the marina while cruising to our first destination.

Once we got into the St. Lawrence River we realized – there are a lot of islands.  So it took us a while to figure out the chart and the distances between islands (in other words, we were lost until Dad pulled out his iPhone and used the GPS to figure out where we were).  We eventually found our destination – Leek Island – and then found a suitable spot to drop anchor. Once we were anchored, it was time for Matty and me to break out the pirate flag, and time for Grandpa to break out the gimlets.

Although we weren’t completely sheltered from the wind, our spot was perfect.  We could swim to shore and we could see the sunset. So, we swam, we jumped off the roof to catch the football, we used the raft to go ashore, and we relaxed in the water before we ate a dinner of brats and macaroni salad. We then went for another swim and watched the beautiful sunset. As the sun went down, the moon rose and was very bright. With Conor and Grandpa settling down in their sleeping bags outside, the rest of us went to our own beds and turned in for the day. It was a great day full of fun and thankfully, no unwanted adventures, at least, for now.

Day 0: Packing

By Michael

It's been four years since the kids gathered around Molloy at the end of our cross-country 
RV trip ...

... and two years since we took the RV to the Southeast ...

... and we're hitting the road again.   

You'll notice that there's no RV in the background this time.  That's because our "RV" will be a houseboat on the St. Lawrence River.  We're heading to Canada tomorrow to pick up our "RV on pontoons" for a week of touring around the Thousand Islands.  It should be an adventure.