July 5 - Big Chute

One of many narrow passages on our way to the Big Chute

Swift Rapids Lock ("going down" - 47 feet and fast)

House on the rocks

Big Chute Marine Railway (lock)

Tomorrow it is our turn to get on board

Someone we met earlier in the trip told sister Pat that the area beyond Orillia would be some of the loveliest we would see on the Trent-Severn, and this certainly seemed so today. Beautiful small lakes, rocky islands, quaint cottages, and enormous homes with boat-houses abound in this area. We have also seen the largest amount of boats of the entire trip past the Hudson River. One of the two locks we went through today dropped us 47 feet very rapidly, but we managed everything very well even though it was just the two of us working the fenders and lines. By mid afternoon we pulled up to the public dock at Big Chute where planned to spend the night. Cameras in hand, we walked over to the Visitor's Center and observation deck where we could closely observe the workings of this marine railway lift which will carry our boat down 57 feet tomorrow. It is an amazing operation, and we watched numerous boats, as many as five at a time, enter this enormous apparatus that looked like something out of "Star Wars", and be transported over a road from one body of water to another. They looked like they were going up and down on a slow-motion roller coaster! George had a chance to talk to one of the operators, advised him of some of the nuances of our boat, and was assured that they would take good care of us on Monday morning.