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www.oakvillebeaver.com · OAKVILLE BEAVER Thursday, August 5, 2010 · 4 ONCE IN A LIFETIME: From the photo album of the Brouse family, whose members took off last year for a sailing adventure of a lifetime. At left, top, the Brouse family (Kirk, Wesley, Claire and Elizabeth) on board Discovery, which is anchored in Port Elizabeth, Bequia (one of the family's favourite spots). Claire and Wesley help leatherback turtle hatchlings down the beach to the water's edge on the north coast of Trinidad. Above, Claire watches a monkey on her dad's head in Grand Etang, Grenada.At right,Wesley and Claire under Darkview Falls in St. Vincent. PHOTOS SUBMITTED BY THE BROUSE FAMILY Whales made St. Lawrence spectacular Continued from page 1 and driving the kids all over the neighbourhood to see their friends and have sleepovers and stuff like that," said Elizabeth. "This afternoon (July 20) was some grown-up time." The idea of a sailboat adventure for Elizabeth and Kirk can be traced back all the way to their first date in 1990, which Kirk proposed. As time went on afterwards, Kirk didn't grow out of the idea, so Elizabeth grew into it. After the kids were born, they decided to wait until they were old enough to begin the adventure. They bought their boat off eBay and once the kids turned 10, it was the perfect opportunity for the family to set sail in July 2009. "On July 1, we left Oakville on our sailboat with our two kids and husband of course. It took us a month to sail from Lake Ontario to Nova Scotia. We sailed up the St. Lawrence River, which was the highlight in terms of the marine life we saw, " said Elizabeth. "The St. Lawrence (River) was spectacular. It was a cold and rainy July but we saw humpback whales (and) pilot whales. "We went up the Saguenay River just to find the pods of beluga whales, the white whales that are endangered." According to Elizabeth, after sailing up the St. Lawrence River and through the Northumberland Strait between Prince Edward Island and the north shore of New Brunswick, they went through the Canso Causeway and down to Mahone Bay in Nova Scotia. They arrived in early August. "We spent about five weeks in Nova Scotia, because that's where my family has a cottage, so we were lucky enough to have the facilities to moor our boat right in from the cottage," said Elizabeth. "We spent five weeks there hanging out, getting ready and doing projects for the boat that needed to get done before we continued south." At the end of September, the family left Shelburne, Nova Scotia for a two-day nonstop sail to Cape Cod, where they then ran into the worst storm they've encountered so far on their journey. "Hopefully (it) will be the worst storm we ever experience again. We were about 300 miles off the coast of Maine, and we got hammered by what is called a `Beaufort 8' storm," said Elizabeth. "Beaufort is the scale they rank gales by in the Atlantic. We had about 35-foot waves, about 45 knots (83 km/h) of wind. It was pretty darn scary. "I had to inject my kids with Gravol and for about a day and a half, it was really bad conditions. We got blown off-course." Despite the rough conditions, the family and Discovery managed to escape unharmed and continued their way down south. By November, the Brouse family and company had sailed down past New York and New Jersey and made there way down to Norfolk, Virginia. "We look back (and) see what we later learned was a major volcanic event in which one-third of the dome of the volcano was blown off 33,000 feet in the air. If we had been an hour behind our schedule, we would have been caught in that." Elizabeth Brouse The farthest destination they've made it to so far has been Trinidad, where the boat is currently anchored. Since leaving Oakville, Discovery and the crew have covered about 5500 nautical miles. "We have friends in Trinidad, who are from Trinidad (and) we've been fortunate to spend some time with them the last few weeks when we came home," said Brouse. "One day we were out with them and we went to see the leatherback turtles which are the largest turtles in the world, they're between 800 and 1000 pound turtles." One of the major highlights on the trip for the family could have also been a disastrous one had the family been behind on their schedule, according to Elizabeth. As they were sailing past the island of Montserrat, southeast of Puerto Rico, last February, they happened to notice steam ris- ing up from the water near the volcano. There is a three-mile no sail zone off the western coast and they may have been a little close. "My son goes down below to check the charts and he says, `Dad you're too close. You need to get two miles off shore.' Kirk said nothing was happening (and) don't be silly," said Elizabeth. "Then you start to notice that along the shore, you can see the water steaming and the water is steaming because the volcanic ashes are coming up from under the water." It was a good thing Wesley had gone down below to check the charts and warned his father about being inside the no sail zone, because the volcano was starting to show signs of an impending eruption. "We saw a couple of little, minor eruptions rolling down the volcano. We thought jeez, maybe we should get off shore a little more, so we veer off shore a little more," said Elizabeth. They were able to get about an hour and a half past Montserrat or about seven nautical miles. When they looked back and they saw the full volcanic blast. The sight was unbelievable, says Elizabeth. "We look back (and) see what we later learned was a major volcanic event in which one-third of the dome of the volcano was blown off 33,000 feet in the air," said Elizabeth. "If we had been an hour and a half See Sailing page 5