 We left Riviere au Renard about 6:30am—destination today: the actual peninsula at Gaspe and Percé rock. Once we reached the rock we would alter our course and head on to Chandler, Quebec which was about another 2 hours beyond. |
 This part of the Gaspe Peninsula is very dramatic, with cliffs rising steeply from the water to the land hundreds of feet above. Percé rock is massive. It stands on its own out at the end of the peninsula and it has no trees on it. |
 It got its name from the predominate hole at the base of the rock (“percé” translated from French means “pierced”). This hole is huge, larger enough to take a small boat through it at high tide but there was no way we would try to take Ananda through it! |
 We all took turns banging off lots of photos of the rock (ya gotta love digital cameras) and took our time passing it so we could enjoy the view for as long as possible. I was very grateful for having been able to come so far (from Goderich) without a lot of stress—and of course there is still lots more to come. |
 My TIKI navigation system had a lot to do with this safe arrival so, in a moment of inspiration, I took a shot of Percé Rock with my iPhone and emailed it along with a short note to Fred Jenssen, the creator of TIKI Navigation, in Norway. Thanks Fred, TIKI is awesome and I have been singing its praises to other sailors all along the way. FYI – Fred is awesome too! |
 When I was first shopping for navigation software, many of my contacts in the Nauticat Owner’s Association strongly recommended TIKI. I contacted Fred by email and asked him lots of questions about it. He very patiently answered every question and I downloaded the software. |
 When I was installing it on my new computer it had some difficulty finding the GPS antenna because of some compatibility issues between Windows XP and Windows 7 operating systems. I emailed Fred about this and he quickly replied back with a solution to my problem. However, I missed one important step so I had to apply certain settings every time I started up the computer. |
 I emailed Fred about this and he said he would help me—and help me he did! At 10:00am on Boxing Day morning (December 26th) Catherine and I were sitting in our pajamas in the kitchen having a quiet coffee together. The phone rang, Catherine answered it and then passed me the phone, saying “its for you”. I was greeted by a voice saying, “hello Wally, this is Fred from TIKI calling from Norway, have you solved your problem and what can I do to help you?”. Now how’s that for customer service! I was blown away. Fred talked me through my problem and we exchanged season’s greetings. I think you can all understand now why I am such a big fan of TIKI Navigation and Fred Jenssen. |
 Anyway, back to our journey. Our passage to Percé was a bit rough, the winds were on our stern and we were getting bounced around a bit. We could see Perce for over an hour as we approached it. After we rounded the rock it disappeared from sight in about 15 minutes! |
 It took a minute to figure out that our perspective had changed with our course and the rock was now “behind” the end of the peninsula. We would have liked to have stayed longer at the rock but we still had a lot of miles to go, so on to Chandler we went. |
 We chose Chandler because this marina has a fuel dock and we were approaching the ½ full mark on our tank—with a long distance to cover the next day and no gas stations along the way. |
 Chandler is a very nice community with a great little marina. We were warmly greeted by staff who helped us tie up to our dock and show us around the marina. Annie, one of the staff members spoke excellent English and Spanish too. I told her that I had a couple of Spanish speakers aboard (Chris & Joan) and that she should pop by the boat to say “hola” to them. |
 We were just settling in for our afternoon libation and Annie appeared. She joined us for a bit, gammed with Chris and Joan in Spanish, and then told us more about the community of Chandler and about herself. We really enjoy meeting the local people when we are in a port. You learn so much more about where you are and what the community is really all about. |
 The entrance to Chandler harbour has a small reef just in front of it. Over the years this reef has claimed a few unfortunate victims and the marina has an interpretive display about the notable shipwrecks. The display’s prominent feature is the masthead from a shipwreck in the 1980’s. Thankfully no one died in that shipwreck. |
 |
We left Riviere au Renard about 6:30am—destination today: the actual peninsula at Gaspe and Percé rock. Once we reached the rock we would alter our course and head on to Chandler, Quebec which was about another 2 hours beyond. 
This part of the Gaspe Peninsula is very dramatic, with cliffs rising steeply from the water to the land hundreds of feet above. Percé rock is massive. It stands on its own out at the end of the peninsula and it has no trees on it. 
It got its name from the predominate hole at the base of the rock (“percé” translated from French means “pierced”). This hole is huge, larger enough to take a small boat through it at high tide but there was no way we would try to take Ananda through it!
We all took turns banging off lots of photos of the rock (ya gotta love digital cameras) and took our time passing it so we could enjoy the view for as long as possible. I was very grateful for having been able to come so far (from Goderich) without a lot of stress—and of course there is still lots more to come.
My TIKI navigation system had a lot to do with this safe arrival so, in a moment of inspiration, I took a shot of Percé Rock with my iPhone and emailed it along with a short note to Fred Jenssen, the creator of TIKI Navigation, in Norway. Thanks Fred, TIKI is awesome and I have been singing its praises to other sailors all along the way. FYI – Fred is awesome too! 
When I was first shopping for navigation software, many of my contacts in the Nauticat Owner’s Association strongly recommended TIKI. I contacted Fred by email and asked him lots of questions about it. He very patiently answered every question and I downloaded the software. 
When I was installing it on my new computer it had some difficulty finding the GPS antenna because of some compatibility issues between Windows XP and Windows 7 operating systems. I emailed Fred about this and he quickly replied back with a solution to my problem. However, I missed one important step so I had to apply certain settings every time I started up the computer. 
I emailed Fred about this and he said he would help me—and help me he did! At 10:00am on Boxing Day morning (December 26th) Catherine and I were sitting in our pajamas in the kitchen having a quiet coffee together. The phone rang, Catherine answered it and then passed me the phone, saying “its for you”. I was greeted by a voice saying, “hello Wally, this is Fred from TIKI calling from Norway, have you solved your problem and what can I do to help you?”. Now how’s that for customer service! I was blown away. Fred talked me through my problem and we exchanged season’s greetings. I think you can all understand now why I am such a big fan of TIKI Navigation and Fred Jenssen.
Anyway, back to our journey. Our passage to Percé was a bit rough, the winds were on our stern and we were getting bounced around a bit. We could see Perce for over an hour as we approached it. After we rounded the rock it disappeared from sight in about 15 minutes!
It took a minute to figure out that our perspective had changed with our course and the rock was now “behind” the end of the peninsula. We would have liked to have stayed longer at the rock but we still had a lot of miles to go, so on to Chandler we went.
We chose Chandler because this marina has a fuel dock and we were approaching the ½ full mark on our tank—with a long distance to cover the next day and no gas stations along the way.
Chandler is a very nice community with a great little marina. We were warmly greeted by staff who helped us tie up to our dock and show us around the marina. Annie, one of the staff members spoke excellent English and Spanish too. I told her that I had a couple of Spanish speakers aboard (Chris & Joan) and that she should pop by the boat to say “hola” to them.
We were just settling in for our afternoon libation and Annie appeared. She joined us for a bit, gammed with Chris and Joan in Spanish, and then told us more about the community of Chandler and about herself. We really enjoy meeting the local people when we are in a port. You learn so much more about where you are and what the community is really all about.
The entrance to Chandler harbour has a small reef just in front of it. Over the years this reef has claimed a few unfortunate victims and the marina has an interpretive display about the notable shipwrecks. The display’s prominent feature is the masthead from a shipwreck in the 1980’s. Thankfully no one died in that shipwreck.