Buying A Boat in the United Sates - Importing a Vessel Into Canada

 A few years back, we purchased our current boat in the US and brought it home to Canada. Before we actually went ahead with the purchase (when we were still internet shopping for our dream boat), we did some preliminary research as to what we might need to do to make things go smoothly with the 'import' process. Good thing, because there is a lot to learn.



  Getting the boat into Canada was actually very simple. The correct term is 'Importing A Vessel Into Canada'. But please, don't take my word for it - you REALLY should call Canada Customs to get their story. But don't be surprised to get more than one interpretation of what is required - we got three different ones. If you are considering having your boat trucked into the country, the firm you use should be able to handle the border crossing directly, if they are a licensed broker. Check with any potential companies to see what services they offer. The only part you would be handling in that scenario is any Custom Brokerage fees, and the HST on the boat. If you have a trucking firm in mind already, check with them to see how they approach that issue.

 Our boat was purchased in Harrison Township, Michigan, which is located on Lake St. Clair, just north of Detroit. Our journey home took us through Lake St. Clair, up the St. Clair River to Sarnia, Ontario (where we 'Imported' the vessel). Onward from there, we traveled north on Lake Huron, through Georgian Bay and down the Trent Severn Waterway to our home port.

Heading up the St Clair River (Canada to the right, US to the left)

 

 Whatever way the boat comes into the country, it is subject to Canada Custom's scrutiny. As we entered by water, we were obliged by law to report the boat being in Canada upon making landfall. At Sarnia, I gave Canada Custom's a phone call as soon as the boat was secured, letting them know that both my wife and I had re-entered the country as well as the fact that I wanted to import the vessel (we were given a 9 digit number when clearing our passports. More on that later. . . ). To do the necessary paperwork, they told me to report to the border crossing, which was the Bluewater Bridge crossing from Sarnia to Port Huron, Michigan.

  In most cases, a Canadian Custom's officer would come to the boat, do a quick look around and perform the paperwork there, but apparently they were too busy that night to spare anyone and that's why we had to walk over to them . .

 All I had to show the Custom's folks was the bill of sale, the 'Deletion From Documentation' (of the vessel) from the previous owner and pay the HST on the sales price. As it was, the only thing questioned by the woman in charge was how I got the boat so cheap! Quick note; have available any web listings, emails or whatever else to back up the purchase price. We bought the boat through a local yacht broker, so that made things look better & more 'legit' to the Customs folks.

 One other thing to make note of is how much you are going to have to pay at Custom's. Under the terms of NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement), any boats built in either Canada, the US or Mexico during the past number of years is only subject to the HST (in Ontario), and free from duties.

A cautious captain keeps a close eye on all systems on his new ship.

 

  Now, here's where a HUGE, double caveat comes into play. One should make sure that the boat they are bringing into the country was, indeed built in North America. We know of a boater who was unexpectedly hit at the border with a big duty because that particular model was built in England. Even though it was an 'American' company (Viking Yachts), that particular model came from England (Princess Yachts). Oh ya, and the 13% sales tax on top of it all. The other kicker is that Custom's won't take a cheque for amounts greater than $200, so make sure your Visa card is in good standing. Again, if you are simply having your boat trucked back, a custom's agent should be able to give you the rundown on all of your obligations.

Approaching the Bluewater Bridge @ Sarnia, Ontario.

 

  One final note on the sales tax. The boat will be assessed the tax amount on the day it crosses the border - not the day you bought it. What I mean by that is that from the time we took possession of our boat (paid for it in the U.S.) and the time it entered Canada about three weeks later, the Canadian dollar actually rose in value against the US buck, so we ended up having to pay less HST than I had initially anticipated. Plus, since we were out of the country for a few days getting the boat, I could claim the exemption entitled to me for the time out of the country and apply it to the boat purchase price! After all, we didn't bring any cheap booze back with us ;-) All in all, that part worked out way better than I even thought it could!

 Ok, back to the part about 'Deletion From Documentation' I mentioned.  Boats in the United States can be considered a second home, complete with a mortgage and all the financial repercussions/benefits that go along with that. So, many boats are 'Documented' with the U.S. Coast Guard, as an official status as to who owns - or is 'Titled' to - the boat, including creditors that may appear on the Title. Think of it like a Deed to your home. Same idea.

 How does one do that, you ask? Simple. Pay someone to do it for you. I found a firm online that takes care of all that stuff for a very reasonable fee of only $250 (USD). Do a Google search for those services to find an appropriate representative. And don't worry where they are physically located - our guy was in California and it all worked out fine. Thank you InterWebs :-)

 Would I do it again? In a heartbeat!!!The only reason we were able to get the boat that we did was because of the dramatic savings (40% less!) over buying a similar model here in Canada. Yes, it was initially stressful, with all the running around and setting things up to make it actually happen - compounded by the fact that we had to drive a boat home, through mostly foreign waters which would be brand new to us and a complete change from the type/size/style of boat we had been driving previously.

 One final note about driving a US registered boat into Canada. If you don't have a chance to get your Ontario registration numbers for the boat right away, be prepared to be boarded by Canada Customs officers at any Ontario port you may visit. We were approached both at Kincardine (our first stop after leaving Sarnia) and then again at Parry Sound.  They (Canada Customs officers) travel around to all ports of entry to make sure everything is copacetic with both Canadians AND Americans visiting these ports, checking mostly to see if they have cleared their passports. This is where that 9 digit number comes in to play, as they WILL ask you for it.

 All that said, it was an adventure to remember for the rest of our lives and immense inspiration to one day soon travel further and farther! I'd say that if you had an opportunity to do the same - and save a few bucks - then go for it. Well worth the running around, by far.

More Georgian Bay by Boat

Here's a few (dozen) more pictures & videos from our 2011 Georgian Bay jaunt. Fear not, these are almost the last ones from that there period of Boogaboo's history. That said, there is some new destinations coming up from up on The Bay that I'm sure most of you haven't seen or been to, so it's all good.

 If you recall the last post of our 2011 summer holidays selection, you will remember that the Boogaboo crew was just pulling away from the docks at Killbear Marina.
 As you can see, we were greeted by a very pleasant, sunny morning with nice conditions for doing some traveling;

I thought it would be nice to head a bit farther north, as we had never been this far & my wanderlust drew Boogaboo upward. And, like I said, it was a loverly day for cruising;

Look at that, yet more rocks and trees ;-)
 I'm only funin' with ya. I love the scenery up here and wanted to share lots of photos of same;

Looking off to the starboard side of the boat, this set of buoys marks to west side of  'Canoe Channel'.  Although narrow, it looks like we might have been able to pass through safely but the chart has an advisory for this spot that vessels over 40' shouldn't attempt it.
 Probably just as well that we didn't attempt it. As you'll see in an upcoming video that we had a narrow enough passage a couple of days after this was taken;

Looking north again towards 'Regatta Bay' and the Snug Harbour lighthouse;

A look back over the shoulder to see our trailing path.
 Please remember to click on ANY of the photos to get a full sized view for ALL the photos;

The Snug Harbour lighthouse comes more into view. Check out the jagged, rocky ledges. Beautiful;

Take note of the black stripe painted on the 'front' side of the building. This is done purposely as the entire building acts as a range marker for vessels heading in from the big part of The Bay;

Here's a video from our passing of the lighthouse;


 This was a pretty common site - a cormorant sunning itself, wings spread on the rocks. It's a shame that these goofy animals seem to be taking over Georgian Bay just as they have Lake Simcoe;

We spotted this sign, all by itself on a rock at the top end of Franklin Island. I'm sure some guy would love to have that old Shell sign for his garage. Or Ebay;

Again we are witness to one of my appendages, indicating some sort of milestone on our boating travels. This time it signifies not only the turnaround point of our adventure, but the farthest north we have so far ventured on Georgian Bay;

I had to capture the spot on my chart plotter. This will continue to act as inspiration for me to go past this point ;-)

On our way back south, we encountered this little curiosity - a dear swimming across the Small Craft channel between the mainland & Franklin Island;

Here she is coming ashore on one of the tiny channel islands;

A quick jaunt across & she was back in the water, heading towards Franklin Island in the background;

 And wouldn't you know it - I caught this neat little event on video;

One of the mini lighthouses on the bay. This one is no longer in service, but still makes for a good day beacon and a nice pic;

Crossing Parry Sound (the body of water), I filmed the captain being really serious as Boogaboo IV blasted across the waves;


Back in Parry Sound, we spotted this vessel coming into port & I thought it was a great  lakes fishing boat It was similar in style to what we encountered the summer before in Lake Huron when we brought Boogaboo IV home from the US of A.
 Turns out it is a scientific research vessel. Better that than having to worry about more errant fishing nets on the open water;

I was playing around with the camera and grabbed a couple of cool shots of one of the float planes coming in for a landing behind our slip at Big Sound Marina;

There is always lots of float plane activity at Parry Sound, as it is a good spot for the locals to pop in for fuel, food & whatever else they may need - just like us boaters;

Yea, it was a classic, hot summer evening when I took this shot. The view of the A/C water coming out of the side reminds me of how warm it was outside & how comfortable it was inside the boat;

A nice shot of the sun glittering off the side of the boat;

I wasn't sure what view looked better (sideways or topways), so I'm sharing both.
 SWEET SUMMERTIME;

Anchor Girl relaxing and taking in a beautiful summer evening;

Check out the sharp angle of this guy coming in for a landing;

Yep, more video. This time it's the planes coming & going;

Ahhhh - Summertime :-)

Ice cold beer on a hot summer evening on the boat. It don't get any better, my friends;

Yes it is;

Morning comes & it's time to head out. The very lovely Anchor Girl tends to the lines & fenders as we leave the gas docks for a pump out.
 On our way back south and back to Henry's;

As it was such a beautiful and calm day, I decided to take the long way around, through Parry Sound (yes, the body of water), around Parry Island and through this gorgeous slice of heaven known as 'Long Sault' (pronounced Long Soo);

The water is incredibly clear through here. Not sure if that's a good thing though, as you can see ALL the rocks and some of them look like they aren't as deep as the charts would suggest;

 

 Yes, it was this tight;

After clearing Long Sault, we pass to the south west of Parry Island and continue southbound on the main small craft route;

We enjoyed a wonderful sunset evening, secured at Henrys for a few nights.

One last look at the 2011 Georgian Bay adventure coming up. . . .

Summer Boating on Georgian Bay #1

Back on The Bay

Ya, ya, ya - more Georgian Bay stuff . . .

 Can't help it, I love boating on The Bay :-)  Nothing like dreaming, planning and looking forward to getting away for our summer boating holidays - and The Bay has been the place to dream about for the past number of years.
 That said, I'm really looking forward to going back to there this summer, but work commitments might not allow for our regular three week hiatus.  We might have to break things up a bit to two or more shorter holidays, including a possible run eastward on the Trent . So, the lovey Anchor Girl & I are talking about, in addition to a shorter trip to Georgian Bay, maybe doing a week or so eastward, toward Peterborough. We'll have to let time & tide decide . . .

 Speaking of holidays and time off, we've been fortunate enough to spend some time down south in Florida this past year and we are already planning for spending even more time down there. Ya, like retirement - but that's a ways away. Believe it or not, but I got one or two pictures I'm going to be sharing here, along with some video of our time in Fort Lauderdale. But that's for another day.

 Back to today's post. Due to the large number of pics that I'm compelled to share, I'm going to break this up to a couple or more posts & will break those up with some stuff from our new home at Lagoon City - including the long winded story of why/how we came to find ourselves there. Apparently, some of you hadn't heard the whole story. Or something like that.

 The Bay. Let's go - - -

 Pulling out of the Pefferlaw River. This would be one of the last times leaving here :-(

We had a BIG little stowaway while crossing Sparrow Lake;

Arriving at the top side of Swift Rapids Lock (#43);

It was nearly 5:00 by the time we got through the lock, so we decided to spend the night here;

Here's some video from this HOT day one of our holidays;


Notice that there's hardly any water flowing over the water control dam. It had been pretty dry out for the previous week or so and the runoff was minimal, resulting in little current through the system. We wouldn't have the same conditions on our return, making for a fun time at Lock #45, as we'll see later on;

 End of Day 1 brought our first pretty sunset of many on this trip;

Next morning we continue on westward;

Next stop - well, more like slow to a crawl - was the Big Chute Marine Railway;

In case you missed it earlier, here's another video review of the ride over (down) the marine railway;


Leaving the bottom of Port Severn Lock where the Trent-Severn meets Georgian Bay. This was the calmest conditions we have ever seen going through here. I'll be including some video from here a bit later on, showing how dramatically things changed by the time we came back home;

All thumbs up as we are officially back on The Bay for another season's worth of memories!

When we got on to Georgian Bay, our first stop was going to be a few nights at anchor at Beausoleil Island. Well, as we keep discovering, boating plans tend to change rapidly when traveling. This time it was our anchor windlass malfunctioning. When we attempted to launch the anchor, the windlass rapidly let out all 100' of chain + rode - and then would not respond to controls any more. Fortunately, I was able to use the built in manual winch to retrieve the anchor, but we didn't want to spend a night on the hook without having the ability to get up and go quickly if need be during the night, so we went to Midland Harbour to tie up and fix the windlass.
 Good thing, too, as that night we had a strong storm blow through with lots of rain and strong winds. So much so, that the rain was blowing through our transom door with such force that it blew the carpet back & soaked it. Lucky? More like protected :-)

The next day I got in touch with the windlass manufacturer & the fellow I talked to suggested the source of the problem & how to remedy it. Fortunately, it was a simple matter of disemboweling the foot controls and cleaning the contacts for the solenoid switches & voila! All operating more better, according to the professional Anchor Girl.
 Listen to the sound of my voice discussing our time at Midland;








 Just north of Honey Harbour the landscape & water becomes much more rough & rocky. This is approaching Monument Channel;

Gotta stay on top of them charts to stay on course in the 30,000 Islands area;

Although this spot looks wide open, there's only a narrow channel marked to get through. No problem, but we wound up catching up to these folks just at the bottom entrance to it and they weren't moving too fast at all. Just after we got behind this boat, Anchor Girl went into the cabin to make me a sandwich. When she returned to the bridge a few minutes later, we hadn't moved very far & she thought they had hit bottom & were stuck!

O'Donnell Point marker;

Sure is pretty boating up here;

Passing through the narrows at Starvation Bay means we are only a short distance to Henrys Restaurant;

See, I told ya ;-)  Taking the 'Inside' passage & doing a slow cruise, this leg of the trip took us 3-1/2 hours from Midland;

Some cool looking rock formations we saw on our dingy trip over to Wreck Island;

The view from our dock at Henrys. Those islands and rock formations in the distance mark the main entrances to the anchorages of the Massasauga Provincial Park & the Moon River basin - an adventure all to itself;

Here's a group of three photos I stitched together to form a panoramic shot;

I took many pics form this vantage point out the back of the boat, attempting to capture the beauty & essence of this spot;

Anchor Gilr walks back to the boat with a bag of ice, as we are moving on to the next spot;

 A quick parting shot of the docks. You can see they can accommodate a number of boats in a row, with the policy being that if you are at the front (closest to shore) by around 3:00, you are spending the night. There's room for up to 50 boats here. Generally, they pack 'em in for lunch & dinner, but overnight usually sees roughly 20 boats staying;

Here we are, pulling in to LeBlanc's Marina - which is right around the corner & on the same island. We needed a pump out & I learned the hard way a few years back that if there's a facility nearby that can do it, take advantage of it;

They also have a small variety store with highly inflated prices. They are also an agency LCBO outlet;

Speaking of highly inflated prices, gas here was $1.90 per litre. That works out to $8.64/gallon. Oh well, ya gotta remember that this place is on an island, many miles from where it has to be delivered from by water, and the the next closest place to get gas is at least an hour away. . . . Nobody said boating was a poor man's hobby. It only makes poor men out of us.
 No, we didn't get here - this time ;-)

Next stop was Parry Sound. Good municipal marina & complete shopping facilities available, as the local Sobey's supermarket offers a free shuttle service to their store for the boaters. And there's a Canadian Tire right beside it, along with the usual assortment of stores in these bog box pods.
 This is looking out from the back of the boat;

 . .  . And a look forward from the flybridge;

We were only here a day or two, to catch up on groceries and do some laundry, hit the beer store, etc.. We'll be returning after our next adventure.
 I just wanted to share this pic of us leaving, as the big express boat to the left in this shot (a Canadian built Neptunus yacht) was equipped with a wireless remote docking apparatus. We saw the captain pulling that thing into the gas dock in town - with him maneuvering it standing on the bow. A neat show & when I yelled over to him that I considered that cheating he laughed & called it a marriage saver ;-)

Next stop was Killbear Marina;

This was our first time visiting here;

Did I promise nice sunsets or what?

Killbear has alot of bigger slips, all with 2x30 amp shorepower;

Our 2nd big bug visitor of the holidays;

Of course, Anchor Girl saw that & immediately zipped up & snapped in all the canvas. She already had one big bug on board & didn't want any more getting on;

A look out on to The Bay from the southern dock;

This is looking back from the office/chandlery store;

They have a restaurant (upstairs) and small grocery store (down) in this building. The restaurant food was quite good - they served both regular Canadian fare, as well as specialty German dishes;

Killbear Marina is in a very well protected cove, surrounded by land on three sides;

This photo shows how far out of the water the fixed docks are, a testament to how much the water level has dropped in the past 20 years;

A brave soul heads out on a windy day;

Enjoying the sunset as I prepare an evening snack for the first mate;

Mmmmmmmm, garlic bread;

 Next time, we're heading north. And then south.
 Stay tuned to see our encounter with a swimming dear, a very tight passage and video tours of a bunch of anchoring bays of the Moon River Basin. Heck, I might even throw in some more spectacular sunsets :-)

:-)