August 2 - Lake Champlain

A week ago we got back on the boat.  Joan and Steve Butler drove over for a cruise and cook out.  Joan brought a salad and vegetables fresh from her garden.  It turned out to be a great evening, and it was their first time traveling under the Crown Point Bridge rather than driving over it.

Patti and I then set out to "bounce around Lake Champlain".  No agenda, just enjoy the good weather and empty lake.  There are very few boats just bouncing around the lake.  A number of small fishing boats, but not many cruisers.  I think we mentioned on an earlier post that the lake is closed at both the north and south ends.  The biggest impact is that Canadians can't come down to use their boats that they keep on the Lake.

We spent two nights in Burlington, Vermont, which was very refreshing!

Burlington is the sunset capital of the east.


We try to anchor out when possible to swim and just float around.  We went to Valcour Island on a perfect Friday night.  We got there early, but then about a dozen other boats came out to join us.  The most activity we have seen so far.  Some of them were ready to party.

Coronavirus update:  
Vermont is reportedly the safest state in the US.  Many people outside are maskless, as are restaurant customers seated outside.  However we did notice some differences.  

One store that we did not enter, had a greeter ask you where you were from and to show him on a map where that is, and what color your county is (only green counties were allowed in his store).  If your county was red, he asked you to leave (in a nice way).  Our county in Virginia (Lancaster County) was green when we left it, but is now red because it now has had a total of 25 cases in a population of about 10,000.  It had 13 cases when we left.  Any county with over 2 cases in 100,000 people is red.  The numbers don't exactly work, but we follow the logic.  Then it gets a little more complicated.  You are allowed to enter Vermont without quarantining if you have quarantined in a green county outside of Vermont immediately before entering.  We have stayed healthy and more or less quarantined in green New York State counties.

After explaining all that we were allowed to enter the store, but we went on.

We had a number of people ask us about the "Patti Ann" (everyone thinks the Patti Ann is cute) and how we got here from Virginia.  We're not sure if they were curious how a boat gets to Lake Champlain from Virginia, or if we should be here in the first place.

And if you are riding your bike, without a mask, people get out of your way (like Richard Pryor said when you're on fire).  Actually most bike riders and joggers/walkers don't wear masks, but are giving each other wide berth.

We are careful and feel pretty safe.  Eating in restaurants inside is out.  We also avoid busy outdoor restaurants.  Our impression is that there are a lot of people, especially young people, who have pent up demand to be social and active.  I just hope we can all hold out until that is possible.




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