We prepare to say farewell to Canada

When we returned to the boat (after having visited friends and family in Europe), we were on a mission to move south. This mission was both so we could get away from potentially freezing harbours, but most importantly so that we could be in the USA when family arrived to celebrate Christmas with us.

We didn’t feel too stressed out about this plan as we had more than 3 weeks to move the approximately 900 miles, so a 7 day sail if we didn’t stop! Our biggest problem (we thought) was being on the exposed Atlantic coast of Newfoundland in November. This coastline is frequented by strong winds from South that in combination with ocean currents create some particulary big swell and dangerous waves. Add to this the notorious fog created by the meeting of the warm waters of the gulf stream and cold waters of the Labrador current, and the start of the lobster fishing season. We knew there were some testing challenges ahead.

A wet and windy November in Newfoundland.

The first challenge was getting out of Conception Bay. There had been some big storms offshore so the first few days back were spent in the protected waters of the Royal Newfoundland Yacht Club waiting for a horrendous sea to calm down enough so we could get safely around Cape St. Francis. Rounding the capes can be problematic as it is often a place where the sea and wind comes from both sides of land and there can be a lot of turbulence in the water.

We found it very useful to see sea data from a bouy outside st. Johns harbour, so we could compare it with the data from PredictWind. One day they measured 12 meter waves! We were definitely not going to go into that sea.

So we hired a truck and took a drive up the coast and visited James Baird Gallery. It is one of the best galleries we have been to! The collection is huge and the artists displayed are very talented. Sarah now has several paintings on her wishlist.

There are also a very nice walk close to the yacht club called Manuels River Trails, where we finally saw a Newfoundland dog, which Steve has been waiting to see since arriving in NL as he had previously owned two of these huge majestic animals back in the UK.

We take a chance and head to St. John’s

We saw the chance to round Cape St. Francis and left motoring towards the corner. As soon as we rounded the corner however, we were met by much stronger head wind than predicted and a very uncomfortable, but predicted sea state. We regularly experience the wind being much stronger than forecast and always make allowances, but even so we do still get a few surprises.

As we arrived in 4M waves, pitching and rolling into the narrow entrance to St. John’s harbour, we could see several big ships outside the harbour waiting for pilot to be able to get on board – they had waited for days but the sea was too rough. As much as we love St. John’s this is not the place to be in big waves from the East as the entrance offers no protection from the waves and it can get so rough that even the big ships moored are in trouble (we learnt this from an experienced navigator from one of the oil rig supply ships).

And we also learnt from one of the harbour pilots we met (just as we were leaving) that several attempts had been made to get a pilot onboard the RRS Discovery before having to direct the British research ship to go to another port along the coast.

Quick stops at Bay Bulls and Port Kirwan

The next morning we saw another opportunity to move and got to the charming town Bay Bulls. All the fishing boats were on land, so there were lots of space to park the boat although there was a lot of swell in the harbour. This was the same harbour that the RSS Discovery had been directed too.

It is a charming place, where it is possible to walk a bit of the East Coast Trail, which we would have enjoyed if we had more time. We did however take a long walk to a restaurant in the next village, which resulted in us walking back in the dark along a busy road.

We decided on Port Kirwan as our next stop as it looked protected and a good distance from Cape Race, which was the next notorious cape we had to round at the right time. Port Kirwan is a lovely protected little harbour where we got a good nights sleep.

Rounding Cape Race and making friends in St. Lawrence

We got up before dawn and departed before sunrise so we could get to Cape Race at slack tide on what was now a windless day. As we rounded the cape we saw the sea completely calming.

From the last few weeks of planning we knew from monitoring Predictwind that the sea state would be much calmer once we rounded this cape, so we had looked forward to this moment – and it did not disappoint. With the flat sea we saw the opportunity to make good progress and motored all the way to St. Lawrence, which is a perfect place to cross to Nova Scotia.

In St. Lawerence we met the nicest people! First we were greeted by the president of the harbour, who we later learnt is a very good fisherman respected by all his peers. He gave us some of the best cod fillets to cook and eat later, and opened up the club house so we could use the showers and facilities. We normally shower on the boat, but as the water on the docks are turned off, we are saving the water more than usual.

St Lawrence, like many of the small harbours, has a history associated with the sea. This harbour had experienced a terrible tragedy in 1929 when it was hit by a Tsunami following an underwater earthquake on the Grand Banks 160 miles away.

Walking around the town we thought we saw a little pub at the harbour side because of a neon “open” sign in the window. So we had to investigate. We discovered it was an old private fishing shed owned by the nicest family, who had restored and converted it into a cozy meeting place for friends and family – so like a pub where no money changed hands:) They were the most welcoming people! Once a family 100% reliant of fishing but now master mariners working on commercial ships, hunters and fishermen who were really enjoying life. We spent a couple of evenings with them sharing stories and beers and they generously filled our freezer with moose meat and our drinks cabinet with some excellent bootleg rum.

Heading towards Nova Scotia

After experiencing the amazing hospitality in Newfoundland, we were a little unsure about what to expect in Nova Scotia.

We planned our crossing during some settled weather necessitating motoring most of the way across. Louisbourg on Cape Breton Island was our destination: this seemed like a good place to hide from some strong wind arriving soon after our crossing and an easy entrance for a nighttime arrival.

Louisbourg has a wealth of history, passing back and forth between the British and French several times and is well worth a visit. There are so many beautiful (but distressed) houses and a main street that looks like stepping into the 50’s. The town was hit by tropical storm Fiona in 2022 and we learnt that every property was damaged. Two houses were completely destroyed. It was clear that the town was still struggling to recover from some of this damage.

We arrived at night and was surprised by more navigation markers than on the chart and once again, we experienced a big difference between the chart and reality. Good we had a few days in harbour, so Steve could write the critical post about charts.

Christmas party at the Fortress of Louisbourg

We had a sunny but very windy day in harbour and decided to walk to the historical fortress. The walk from the harbour is very nice: first with the beautiful houses and then along the Old Town Trail that has several historical spots.

We hadn’t really read up on the fortress as weren’t sure if we had time to visit, but we were so glad we did. The fortress is a reconstruction of a real French fortress (that was 5 times as big as it is today) which was ruined by the French so it would not end up in the hands of the British again.

As it was off-season we were lucky that the guard at the gate noticed us walking, and arranged for us to get picked up, and get a ride back to town. The main entrance is closed (as the fortress is not full open during the winter) so we would have had to walk an extra 3 km if the guard hadn’t contacted his colleague who picked us up on the trail. This is how we got a quick historical recap and learned about the Christmas party the following day.

The fortress staff arranged for us to be picked up from the boat and returned later in the evening, so we could enjoy a lovely evening with live music from The sounds of Khozie featuring Kyra Foulds, Bradley Murphy, and Eric Angus White. And so we could avoid getting eaten by the wild coyotees, we learned lived in the area.

Enjoying city life in Halifax

As we were getting ready leave and head for Halifax, we saw our buddy boat Aegir posting about lobster pots. We had been very focused on lobster pots in Maine, but perhaps hadn’t realised how big this was in Nova Scotia. The season starts at the end of November with “Dumping Day” when an estimated 1400 lobster boats laden with up to 400 traps per boat head out to sea in areas 33 and 34 in Southern Nova Scotia. This is an area on our path to USA!

So now, in addition to wind, waves, tides, fog and currents we had the challenge of avoiding getting entangled in thousands of lobster traps. We discussed our routing with the coastguard at Lewisbourg who advised us that we shouldn’t see many before we reach halifax. But after Halifax the only way to be clear would be to head out 50 miles offshore (so we were outside the zones) or stick to daylight and keeping watch.

We always prefer to arrive at most harbours in daylight – it just makes everything easier especially with the inaccuracies in the charts. But as we weren’t sure how many pots would be in the water around Halifax, we definitely had to arrive to Halifax in the light. Unfortunately it was also very foggy and now it was getting cold as well.

We didn’t see any pots until we were a few miles from Halifax – then floats were everywhere. We thought that staying in the traffic separation lanes would keep us safe from the floats, but we discovered many placed in the traffic area, close to navigational markers and every time you think you can relax for a moment – they appear right in front of you.

We made it and after getting fantastic dock right on the waterfront in the centre, we enjoyed a few days of city life in the fantastic city of Halifax. We would have liked to spend more time here, but that will have to be when we return in the spring. We did get a chance to eat at the popular restaurant The Bicycle Thief, which was a great meal but the service seemed a little rushed.

The most amazing meal (Sarahs belated birthday treat having spent that day at sea on the way to Nova Scotia) was at restaurant Mystic right at the water front and next to where we had moored the boat. It was a tasting menu and everything was simply amazing and the wine parring was very interesting and unexpectedly many of the fine wines came from Nova Scotia!

Tips for sailing in lobster trap infested water

As already mentioned the local coast guard in Louisbourg had suggested that we’d sail off the coast approximately 50 miles and then stayed in deep water all the way to Portland. As he said: The fishermen have to use more fuel to get out further and have more rope to get the pots deep.

We did not like the thought of this as we spend an extra day sailing off the coast, and the weather routing we had would not give us sufficient time to reach a safe harbour in Maine before being in 50 knot winds. So we decided on only sailing in daylight except for the deep water (150 meter plus) part of the crossing between Nova Scotia and Maine.

Communicating about the floats

The day we sailed from Halifax we really started feeling the winter and when we got to Sandy Cove the sea was quite rough and there were a lot of lobster pots. We quickly learned that the best way of communicating about pots were: to say distance, placement and colour like this “Far away, 1 o’clock, red float”. If we started by saying “float” the other person would be immediately nervous about the distance from the boat.

Four eyes are definitely better than two.

After 8 hours in – 4C (without windchill factor) and constantly keeping watch and navigating is exhausting, so we went into Sambro harbour. It is a cosy little harbour but long lines are needed here as the harbour walls are very tall.

Keep a good distance in shallow water

We decided to head for Liverpool and had another start at daybreak, but the wind was much stronger than the forecast making it hard to spot the floats. Because of the windchill we experienced the boat freezing for the first time and after 2 hours we decided to go closer to shore and drop anchor for a while in a sheltered bay. It was demotivating and very cold. But after an hours rest we changed the route towards an anchorage close to Lunenburg and everything had calmed down quite a bit.

We could easily see the floats and kept a good distance, but suddenly we saw lines going under the boat. We learned that in the shallower water (normally below 25 m) the floats and traps can be joined by many meters of lines that will be floating in the surface, particularly at slack tides. So staying 30 m from the floats does not always keep you safe.

We also quickly learnt that our keel and rudder are very effective at running over these floating lines: the keel deflecting the line well below the prop and rudder. However we always immediately put the engine in neutral if we noticed lines in the water.

When sailing our prop folds so less of a concern.

We did snag one line with our Watt & Sea. This moved one of the brackets that attached it to our Hydrovane. Luckily no permanent damage was done. After the easy job to reposition and tighten the bracket we the modified the downhall by adding some strong shock cord rather than cleating off the line so it would release and spring back if it snagged another line. And we lifted it when we were motoring.

Less in deep water, often in a row and never the same

We saw the chance to move all the way to Lockeport and on this trip we got a bit of everything. When we got deeper than 70 m there were much fewer pots than when we were in 30 meters, but we also encountered them at 150 meters depth!

Often we saw several of the same floats placed in a long line, so whenever we saw a float we looked for a line of them.

It happened that we noticed an orange float far away and then suddenly noticed a white one close by, because we had focused on orange colours in the water. The floats come in all shape and sizes, so it is important to look for everything in the water and then sometimes you realise you have been avoiding a seagull or a seal.

We anchored outside Lockeporte and as the nights are getting very cold night we woke up to a thin layer of ice on the water around us. A reminder that winter is fast approaching

If you can avoid Cape Sable, Nova Scotia in lobster fishing season – do it!

We had a calm day to go around Cape Sable and like all the other capes this one should be navigated at the right time due to strong currents, tides and turbulent water. For us it was a sunny day with little wind and we timed our arrival perfectly for slack water. But we encountered an enormous number of lobster pots and suddenly we were surrounded by lines floating in the water and it felt like we were caught in a maze of floats.

This is where we experienced that in shallow slack water that the lines will float to the top. If you end up in an area surrounded by these, a lobsterman told us that the best trick it to wait for the tide. This is not so easy to do when you need to be in harbour before dark!

We just slowly navigated through it and tried to make sense of what would be fastened to what and looked for the clearer paths through the maze of floats, and suddenly we were at a less dense area again.

The good thing about sailing in lobster season

After rounding the cape we had a few choices of harbour. In fact all along the coast we had planned several contingencies for shelter. Windy weather was once again on its way so we decided that Dennis Point Wharf at Lower West Pubnico would give us the best shelter. We were a little unsure about how welcome we would be as this is the busiest fishing harbour in Nova Scotia. Over 100 boats operates from the harbour, but the gamble payed off and we had a very unique and authentic experience.

When we arrived we motored slowly along the outside of the three harbour entrances looking for someone to speak too. We were then suddenly greeted by Floyd, the super friendly harbour manager, who told us to moor on a navigation buoy outside the harbour until all the lobster boats were in. Then he would find us a spot inside.

Watching all the 50 foot long, 30 foot wide lobster boats coming in and out of harbour is a fascinating sight! At 11pm we were guided to a floating pontoon used for unloading and storing lobsters. The fishermen were so friendly and chatty and we heard many interesting story’s. Sarah learned that the lobster cannot cut off the finger, but the main claw can be very painful. In this area around 1000 people are supported by the fishing industry that is mainly lobster, and the annual catch is said to be worth around $100,000,000.00.

This area of Nova Scotia is French Acadian where most can speak both fluent French and English. As well as a distinctive culture they also have a distinctive local language that is interesting mixture of French and English that native speakers of either would for the most part be able to follow.

Floyd took us on a tour of the area where we learnt that he wore many hats in the community. During the summer months he had painted many of the beautiful houses in the area and even built a few. We also had a lovely meal at Dennis Point Café, where we met more friendly fishermen and locals (It was quite windy so they were not fishing).

Just as we were about to depart the following day Floyd came to say goodbye and sent us on our way with 4 fresh lobsters to enjoy!

We were very happy to have visited this harbour.

We set off to Yarmouth, our final destination in Canada before departing for the USA. This was a short 5 hours sail away and half way there we were suddenly followed and approached by a big high speed lobster boat. A little confused we were unsure what to do but we held our course and suddenly it was right next to Snow Bear and 3 happy lobster men threw a couple of fresh lobsters on board. It was the funniest thing ever and it absolutely made our day. We called a restaurant in Yarmouth and arranged for them to cook the now six lobsters for us as we do not have a big enough pan to do it.

Yarmouth is another picturesque town with a few shops, restaurants and bars. Being winter it was very quiet but we had a nice meal at Rudders restaurant (who had kindly cooked our lobsters) and got chatting to some interesting locals at a sports bar.

Signing out of Canada at the CBSA office was very easy. The officer was expecting us and had spotted us walking up the road. We guess that his life is pretty quiet during the winter months.

We were now ready to say farewell to Canada and head for Chrismas in Maine USA!