Our Voyage

The weather has been remarkably cool.  Here it is mid Sept and we haven’t seen high temps above 85deg!  Most nights drop into the high 50s with daytime highs of 70 something.   Leaving when we did and heading north, we were chasing Spring.  The Hudson River valley was still in early bloom with the bright green leaves of new growth.  It’s part of the amazing journey that the loop is, perfectly aligned to avoid hurricane season too.  Up north during the season and south for a mild winter.  Lovin the loop; they should probably rename it “Chasing 70!” Update – Mid Illinois, we started seeing temperatures in the 90s!  We’re not dealing well with these high temperature days and the humidity.  Surprised how late in the season these temperatures are occurring, we’re getting a taste of what many have been experiencing back home since we left.  In the picture above the 17.4 is the temp in our freezer, the 95.5 is the temp in the galley an...

It’s complicated but it really lets you pack them in.  Having done it now 3 times now, I hope I’m done with it.  For us it’s complicated by the tender hanging off the stern and our stern anchor rode being 300 ft long in the bottom of a lazarette under a pile of other items.  All the rode has to come out into the cockpit for attaching to a tree on the shore.   It makes for a messy operation.  Let’s see if I can explain. To anchor med style, you have to be able to backup well, which being a sailboat puts us at a distinct disadvantage (can you hear me saying powerboat would be better here too, but I won’t say it).  You also ignore the winds as you will back into a parking spot between other boats anchoring the same way.  You “simply” pick a spot, throw out the bow anchor in front of it, back into the slot and tie a rope to something substantial on the shore, and put out bumpers for your neighbors.  That’s all you have to do.  So we pick...

The burdened vessel in all these waterways are the big boys; ocean going freighters are almost as common as “lakers”.  Lakers are the same sized freighter with the bridge on the bow to look around corners better, not a place for a bridge that heads into the oceans.  But to the point, I don’t know how they do navigate these waters at all, especially with the precsion required to avoid ostructions.  Between the wind, current, turns and night operations it seems no one could navigate these waters safely but here they are 24/7 (expect winter).  What could they possibly do to avoid hitting any of us?  Nothing.  Their timing must be impecible and my being in there way is not part of the equation.  It’s like a mouse dancing with elephants.  I wouldn’t recommend doing a cha-cha unless you have lots of power (I’m not going to say it again, but powerboats have far better odds here the sailboats).   Being spitting distance to these big boys is i...

I admit the picture doesn’t show much, but this was 5.5kts underneath Peace Bridge near Port Huron.  We were doing 1/2kt against the current.  People on the shore were walking faster than us.  It was impressive.  I’m glad to be on Lake Huron where there are no currents.  The lake does slosh around with wind but I can handle that, I really don’t want to fight 5.5kts of current again, it was taking the boat and tossing it all around like a cork.  I was working the tiller harder than in a following sea.  You can see a bit of an eddy in the lower right but you’ll have to trust me on this one.  The dramatized blurry picture below shows the turbulence and terror of the experience.  It also captures the Loch Huron monster in the middle left – it’s unexplained what that silver hump is.  Yikes!

The Great Lakes are mislabeled, they are really inland seas.  They are so big that one end can have very different weather than the other end or even the middle.  Waves however don’t really care where they come from and can travel hundreds of miles, reflecting off hard coastlines.  Shallow waters amplify the waves by making for a shorter period; this can create little waves that brings the boat to a complete stop as it goes up and down pounding against a wall of water.  Similarly, one end of the lake may be experiencing 20+kts of wind and the other end could be in a dead calm with waves that originated from the other end.  Makes it tough to know what the conditions are for your journey, so when its good take advantage of it, it will likely change.

We’re in a different place!  The waters of Lake Huron are a Caribbean turquoise, so much so that had you told me I was there I would have believed you.

To all those who insist on paper charts as a backup to electronics, “what good are they in fog?”  What was a surprise to us was the frequency of fog on the lakes, it wasn’t anticipated by us, seemed like a New England issue not a lake issue.  But the water is cold (60s in the big water) and the air is warm which is perfect for dense fog.  We learned at the shipwreck museum that a large percentage of ship wrecks on the Great Lakes are ships driving into other ships, mostly in dense fog.  Radar, GPS, electronics charts and AIS should mostly preclude this cause of shipwrecks.  We expected the number one cause for shipwrecks to be bad weather (think Edmond Fitgerald) but bad weather only accounted for ¼ of so of great lakes shipwrecks.  With far better forecasting today, this too shouldn’t be an issue like it used to be.  But back to our story, without radar, we played our fog horn, set a watch on the bow, watched the AIS for ships (we could see them ...

Grilled hamburgers, chips and drink.  The goof ball on the left just ate his second burger and was guilty.  No fireworks, on the 4th but we did the 2nd for Canada day – does that count?  And we got a bagpipe serenade from atop a bluff overlooking the harbor while we watched the sunset over Lake Huron.  It was like magic. 

See, we are still little kids, even if our toys do cost a bit more. And Brian is a teenager.

These houses look awfully close to being houseboats to me.  The Great Lakes are very full, about 4ft above chart depths.  Great for us, we could go anywhere we wanted.  But not so good for these guys who probably panic with every high speed motor boat that passes by.  After seeing all the water going over Niagara Falls and down the St. Clair River (we fought a 5.5kt current for about 1mi at the top).  it’s hard to believe there is any water in the lakes to flood with.  I wonder if flood insurance covers their loss?

As a high schooler, I used to pile in the car with friends on a Friday night and cruise 4th street in San Rafael and look for other kids we knew, jumping cars and going out to eat at Jack In The Box.  Michiganian’s continue this fine tradition today using their boats.  We anchored in this tiny cove carved out of St. Clair Lake shoreline by Edsall Ford for his yacht and all day long there was a parade of boats.  Some would stop for a while, some might raft up, others just drove the circuit.  It was a hoot, the comings and goings but none stayed the night, we had it all to ourselves.  We continued to observe this behavior throughout Michigan– it’s in the blood to cruise.  Freedom baby.  But I note it is almost exclusively motorboats, after all it is motor city.

Lucy was so smitten; she almost swam over to join them as they tootled around our anchorage.  We didn’t know where they came from but every hour or so one or two would come by always with women.  Their seaworthiness was certainly questionable and the bartender did all his own navigation which came across as a secondary function to the guest enjoyment.  But why not guys?  I only have a theory, but I note there isn’t a restroom.

These towers house corporate headquarters, the largest structures in Detroit.  With that much corporate management it’s a miracle they ever produce a thing let alone cars American’s would want to buy.  This may be a little dramatized as I think there are a few other tenants in this behemoth complex but it makes for a great story so it must be true.

Why can’t industry spend a few bucks to make it look pretty?  It always looks like it’s in a state of disrepair or they’re squeezing every last nickel out of it.  Why don’t they throw away the trash and rake the yard so it’s at least tidy?  The Detroit River has many of these places, most look abandoned but some not, like the ones above.  It makes for a very entertaining passage imagining what goes on in these places and the people who had the vision and ambition to build them.  How did they sell the concept for such vast expenditures in capital?  It’s really a marvel it ever worked but it would all the better if they looked a bit more tidy.

The waterway from Lake Erie to Lake Huron is a bit confusing.  The Detroit River is more like a fast-moving delta region with “the river” breaking up into 3 channels at one point with multiple islands.  The USA/Canadian border winds its way around these waters and it is very difficult to keep track of what country you are in at any one time.  Lake St. Clair is straight forward enough, but the St. Clair River which is the outflow from Huron to St. Clair is similar the Detroit River, more a flooded delta region that makes it difficult again to know what country you are in. The basic rule is you can transit each other’s waters as long as you don’t anchor, transfer people or cargo to another boat, or touch each other’s shore or facilities.  If any of the three occur you must report to customs within 24 hrs.  The Canadian’s make this relatively easy with a phone call, the American’s not so much, they require a face-to-face in one of their “conveniently” located ...

It doesn’t fit the “Don’t Give Up the Ship” history or its dangerous anchorage but it is clearly the place where Ohioans go to cut loose.  The town’s main street is one bar next to another.  Flyers were advertising pub crawls, festivals, dancing, all the festivities you’d expect for a party happening place.  At night it was “free” music for us on the water, I guess it was setting the beat for the revelry ashore.  And the ferries shuttle hordes to and from the mainland all day long, even into the first hours of the night.  For those with a boat it is an easy ride from Sandusky, a great weekend “get away.”  We were there on a Thursday and you felt the preparations for the coming throng.  They even limit the use of automobiles; tourist can’t rent or bring one.  Golf carts are for the tourist to get around the island.  It’s all set up to cut loose. We took this picture atop the Perry monument.  The bay is completely open to the east, a...

It seems an odd spot for so much investment, but at the western end of Lake Erie is the ultimate amusement park for those who love roller coasters, “Cedar Point Amusement Park.”  Its investors can only get a return during the summer months.  But somehow it works and it is world renowned as the place to go for roller coasters.  It’s that old school Americana thing you don’t find a lot of anymore and fits hand-in-glove with Sara’s just up the road.  This place will stretch your comfort zone. This monster, “Top Thrill Dragster” accelerates to 120mph in 3.8 seconds and shoots straight up 400ft before spiraling you back down to earth all in under 13 seconds.  It is literally over the top and Brian loved it.  Brian said it all happened so fast you didn’t have time to be scared.  I was too much a chicken to find out. On a tamer note, was this massive wood structure for a more traditional ride.  I think it was 400 ft vertical drop with a top speed...

It’s refreshing that every establishment hasn’t been franchised.  I love the pricing, write it down and tape it up.  None of that McDonald’s electronic monitors that change so rapidly I can’t remember what I wanted.  We searched these places out.  Not always the best, they’re each a memory.  It’s the things that don’t go to plan that we remember best.  The nacho’s were kind of nasty but the dog was great! The place below sold a dog with chili, onions, and a squirt (you know, that all American invention of cheese in a CAN) for a buck.  I downed the one in my excitement that I could buy anything for a buck before I had the discipline to shoot a picture – sorry for the messy plate (don’t you love the Formica counter top?).

What a beautiful working replica of this historic ship.  It is used today as a training ship and offers 10day expeditions for youth to learn the ways of sailing a Brigg.  It is about as exact as you can expect.  I loved their use manila rope, linseed oil, and other items that gives it the smell of an old ship – I don’t know what it is but it’s very familiar.  Below decks were tight, it only had a 5ft ceiling in the galley area – how anyone could operate in that space long term was beyond me but the professional crew does. Galley stove and 5ft ceiling - how do they do it? Watching it sail was like stepping back it time.  It passed us on the breakwater silently, tall, and majestic.  It was easy to imagine the awe seeing this come into an isolated harbor like Presque Island 200 years ago.  Something so big and complicated carrying so many men and cannon would change the balance of power with its arrival.  It would intimidate the st...

Most the shore of Lake Erie is a long straight beach.  But jutting out is a very large peninsula that loops back on itself creating a bay.  They say it’s formed by glaciers but this isn’t obvious to the casual observer.  For starters, I don’t see how a glacier can flow if it doesn’t have a mountain to slide down and there is nothing to the North I’d call a mountain worthy of the lake depth gouge.  Call me a geo skeptic, but some of the stories they tell sound more like conjecture than science. Behind the beach is a steep hill that drops to a valley and then a significant mountain behind it so it generally looks like it was formed by a really big dozier.  So why this odd shaped bay jutting out into the lake?  And the bay it creates is very deep and the channel small, what glacier movement did this?  No matter how it was formed, the place is important to American history and is very beautiful and home to a great hot dog stand, “Sara’s.” Lake E...

Yup, bugs in the middle of the lake.  Why the not the shoreline?  How do the bugs get to the middle of the lake?  Did they fly out here and if so for what, to find a boat?  Or do they breed out there and if so, why don’t the fish eat the larvae or the insects themselves?  It’s one of those questions in life that probably has an answer but it’s just to fun to be outraged over the unexpected. It all made me laugh at the “Breaking Bad” episode on “the fly” where he destroyed the lab for one fly.  We didn’t destroy the boat, but then we had more than one as are documented in the photos above.  We found out after the fact that the FAA had radar blips for the billions of mayflies that hatched while we were on lake.  I believe it.  I’d never seen anything like it.  So thick we had to wash the deck of the dead and their green goo.  It had a nauseating stench with it too.  But it was just the beginning.  We were inundated o...

Its not so much about anything else other than long distances between ports and not wanting to be on the water at night.  As a result, if the winds aren’t just right its motor city for this sailboat.  For example, Lake Erie was dead calm and we needed to go 72mi the first day, so no sailing.  The next day we had to do 35mi into a 5-10kt head wind so no sailing.  The following day was dead calm with nasty winds predicted for the following couple days so it was a long 107mi day to the far end of the lake completing our Lake Erie adventure and missing some strong headwinds.  Bypassing some treasures, like Cleveland to avoid weather is a hard pill to swallow but then it was more important to do Cedar Point amusement park than the rock’n roll hall of fame. But back on point, this trip is not conducive to sailing.  Maybe in the Bahamas, or if we sail in the Atlantic up the East Coast, but all this inland waterway stuff we won’t.  When we “sail” its norma...

Each evening I make plans for the next day, yet every morning I have some apprehension that raises its head about leaving what we know and heading out into the unknown, especially on dark cloudy windy days.  It’s not like Star Trek, we have charts, maps, guidebooks, satellite imagery, and a host of other knowledge at our finger tips but there is something to never having been there.  Am I noticing the map scale properly, will the anchorage already be full, which way will the wind be blowing, is there a current we’ll be fighting, will the forecast be wrong, will there be a mechanical failure, and on and on.  Yet everyday we’ve made it to our next destination, maybe not the one we planned at the start of the day but a destination that has been interesting in its own right and the next morning I have that same anxiety of the unknown.  We have a wall hanging in the main salon that we picked up years ago.  But even being reminded of it constantly doesn’t remove...