Days 30 & 31 – Capricious Mother Nature

On day 30, we left at the break of dawn and had a phenomenal 90 nm sail and motor from St. Anne Des Monts to Riviere au Renard. The wind, current, and waves were all in our favor. To put icing on the cake, we ended the day by anchoring at the picturesque fishing village of Rivière au Renard. There we met a group of residents who were as hospitable and kind as the village is beautiful. We spent about an hour sharing our travel experiences with each other.

After multiple long days of motoring and sailing, our planned trip from Riviere au Renard to Gaspe should have been easy. It was a relatively short distance of about 34 nm with the weather, wind and waves predicted to be in our favor. In addition, with over 700 nm under or keel, our confidence level that we would be there in a few hours, well before happy hour, was high.

This was not the case. Shortly after we left Rivier au Renard, we encounted water in the bilge (never a good sign) and electrical problems with our speaker. That meant, that while Sandy helmed the boat, Dan was sentenced below deck, pulling the boat including the bedding, mattresses and floor boards to apart to isolate the leak. Fortunately, a couple hours later, we breathed a sigh of relief as the source of the leak was identified as the hot water tank, and fixed. The speaker issue, which turned out to be a loose connection, was also fixed just as we were turning around the Gaspe Peninsula.

After we high fived each other and had some lunch, we began a lovely sail down into the Gaspe Marina . However, as we were approaching the marina all hell broke loose. The sky turned black, the wind picked up to about 30 knots, white caps began to roll in and thick, soupy fog dropped down on us like an opaque shower curtin. The skies then opened up and it poured and poured and poured. We knew the marina was spitting distance, but all we could do was bring in the sail, stop the motor, put on the fog horn and wait and wait what seemed like hours. Finally, the sky cleared up long enough for us to dock the boat.

This incident reminded us that Mother Nature is clearly in charge, and that we have the privledge to experience her power both blessings and provocations.