August 6: Belleville

Finally after 5 days in Trenton, it was time to go. The visit here was great - music festival and a quick trip back to Ohio.

Ready to move on after fueling up and pumping out the holding tank.

It was a gorgeous day - cool but light wind from the north. Sunny. Destination was only 10 miles away - 1 hour or so - to Belleville.

Traveling the Bay of Quinte was easy with nice weather but I think this bay can get quite nasty in E or W winds.

We arrived shortly after noon. Off came the bikes - it was time to find a place for lunch.

First though was an adjustment to Steve's bike seat. I don't know what we would do without these things as there is so much so see in each new town. Walking is ok but bikes are definitely the way to go.

Nice marina - quite large - we though Belleville was a small town but it's quite a bit larger than Trenton's 15,000.

Steve's choice for lunch was perfect: Chinese and Himalayan! So never having had Himalayan food before, Steve was into it :-) I stuck with Chinese .... but I guess Tibet is one more place we don't need to go to!

Fun place with yaks and posters from the "Top of the World".

The city hall was crazy! As I was taking pictures, I noticed strange look from the locals who walk past this building every day and maybe don't even notice how really fun it is.

It's basically the same since it was build in 1872.



Doesn't this totally look like a real store? It's along the main street through the old downtown section and seems to fit right in!

I told Steve he might want to pick up a new hat :-)

There is a really nice theater venue downtown with live shows. The show with Gordon Lightfoot in November is already sold out.

Wonder why they even bother with a poster???

We actually saw him a zillion years ago at Front Row Theater in Highland Hills (basically Cleveland). But sadly we missed seeing Anne Murray there because I thought the tickets were too much.

Regretted that decision ever since!

Anyway, a really nice downtown.

Another really fun building pretty close to downtown was St. Michael the Archangel Catholic Church. The architecture was AMAZING.

Inside was as expected. Lots of stained glass windows, wood ceilings, floor to ceiling pillars - very cathedral like. But in this relatively small town. Absolutely beautiful.

This parish was started in 1829 and this is the fourth church to be built on this site with the current church constructed in 1905. What a history ....

Steve had parked his bike outside the church - lucky for him that I saw the tow truck coming to take his bike away!

He rescued it just in time ....

Then we found the bike path along the river so our ride was extended - which was fine. It was good to be out and riding and the exercise is always good.

The path ran along the river (which of course feeds into Lake Ontario). Quite nice.

Towards the end was the grist mill originally built after the American Revolutionary war by Captain John Meyers - a British Loyalist who settled in this area after the Revolutionary war. Really old stuff around here :-)

Finally after playing away the afternoon, it was time for some work! We had picked up a 110 volt mini-fridge since we had a car for a couple of days for the trip to Ohio.

The idea was to increase our fridge space and do that using less energy than our current 25 year old 12 volt/110 fridge.

First cut the storage area down to accommodate the height of the new 3.2 cu in unit.

Once that was done and the trimming was completed, the new fridge could be put in place.

Of course one switch needed to be moved and some electrical wiring changes needed to be made but physically the fridge was in place.

Just hope I don't have to drive from down below very often! But since it has only happened once in the last 8 weeks, I don't think it will be an issue :-)

The difference in the amount of storage is crazy! And less energy to boot!!

Minor adjustments need to be made yet but basically we are good to go. The solar panel should run this fridge with energy to spare.

Which is a good thing since quite a few of the islands on the Canadian side of the 1000 Islands are generator free.

Right is the old fridge (now can, dry good storage). Only 2.2 cu ft. Doesn't seem like 1 cu ft could make much of a difference but it sure does!!

Off tomorrow - planning on anchoring out for the first time since we've been up here this year and should then be in the Thousand Islands area of the St. Lawrence by the following day.