Friday, August 31, 2012

Coda


With Carrie Rose carefully tucked away it was time to return home. But home is some 350 miles from Mackinaw City, MI. What to do? Well after checking trains, planes and automobiles we decided to ask Marion and Jim if their offer to pick us up was still on. They spent many decades cruising from the Detroit area and then from Chicago to the North Channel in several sailboats, the last being a very fast Beneteau 38. It was unlike any boat I had ever sailed and it was hard for me to give up the wheel when given the chance to sail her.

They agreed and then the logistical nightmare began. The main conundrum being how much stuff could we pack into the trunk of a Subaru Impreza. I was not sure how big the trunk is but I knew it was smaller than our Outback. We tried to plan accordingly as we chose what to take home.

Cruising is an activity that demands practicality and logic, and is not forgiving if either is ignored. Thus over our last two seasons on Carrie Rose not only have our waistlines shrunk, but so has our need for most of the paraphernalia we have lugged around since 2003. When we wear two t-shirts and the same pair of shorts for the entire summer why do we need drawers full of them. When I have not used a book, chart, or electronic gadget why is it on the boat. This train of thought can be applied to anchors, pots and pans, dishes and glass wear, cleaning supplies, and every type of attachment attached to the outside of the boat.

Bag after bag came off the boat. Some to the dumpster and some into the back of a vehicle lent to us after two other cruising friends heard the volume of gear we needed to move to the motel. They took pity on us and gave us the keys to their car. To make matters worse we kept forgetting Charlotte's rock collection! We anxiously awaited the arrival of our friends. Would it all fit?

Truer friends it would be hard to find. With alacrity they came with one small bag between them. Thank goodness they did so because it all just fit. We piled into the car, which was now very low in the aft and headed for the wine country known as Lake Michigan Shore in the southern Michigan.

A few carefully negotiated speed bumps and over 800 miles later we arrived home. That is after visiting a farmer’s market, several vineyards, a wine tasting and having a wonderful dinner at Tabor Hill Winery.

It was good to be home. We were both surprised how noisy it was; how congested it was; how the air was not so sweet and the sky not so blue. And it took us a few days to realize we did not have Carrie Rose to escape to—so we left. But that is another story . . .

Thursday, August 16, 2012

Fini

Carrie Rose is on the hard and we are in a Best Western. I already feel claustrophobic!

We should be home Saturday night, so now I have to figure out what to do with the rest of the Summer and Fall.

I have so many pictures I want to share with you all, but first a statistical haiku.

Fuel: 211.7 gallons,
Hours on the engine: 130.1,
Gallons per hour: 1.63,
Average speed: # 7.5 knots,
Water: # 400 gallons,
Bottles of wine: heaven only knows.


Crossing the Straits of Mackinaw


It is all about the light up North


On the way to DeTour Village


DeTour Passage Lighthouse with a little weather moving off


Birds love hidden rocks


Cleaning House


Coast Guard visits a training vessel in St. Ignace


Gotta love these spiders


Sunset Rainbow


Still looking good


Say Goodbye







Tuesday, August 14, 2012

From St. Ignace, MI

We've come full circle, at least if we consider the Nordic Tug Rendezvous our starting point, which of course it was not since we came from Can 16 in Montrose Harbor, but as we are not returning there St. Ignace will work. (I think that was a run on sentence.) This AM we woke up to fog; always something interesting happening on the water.


Here is the plan . . . we will leave Carrie Rose in Mackinaw City. She will be missed in Chi-Town but the thought of racing 300-plus miles south just to race 300-plus miles north again in the spring ceases to make sense. So, Carrie Rose will be a hobo next year, wandering the Great Lakes and its tributaries.

This season we visited twenty-nine different harbors, anchorages and towns, some more than once. We could have seen more but the constant vigilance finally got to us, and we needed to sit still and recuperate. And that is what we have been doing in St. Ignace. Took the ferry to Mackinac Island, rented a car and drove to the Wooden Boat Show in Hessel, MI in the Le Cheneaux Islands, cooked dinner to use up our stores, changed the oil, made a few engine repairs and road our bikes to Straits State Park to view the bridge at a scenic outlook. The comings and goings about the harbor also provide much entertainment. St. Ignace’s fireworks were surprisingly good making me wonder why Chicago canceled theirs.




This summer Charlotte read books about assassins and I managed to finish an obscure book about post war Japan written by an Italian who spent the war with his young family in a Japanese interment camp. Maybe that explains the fitful nights of sleep. No TV, very little radio, some music from the iTouch, but mainly blessed quiet. I have become very fond of silence. I am not sure why. The silence in more then a few of the anchorages was on par with turning the lights out in Mammoth Cave, an overwhelming sensory experience.

We left Thessalon, ON and crossed the North Channel to Drummond Island in Michigan. Drummond Island probably should have been a part of Canada but through the fickle finger of faith, and a drunken British negotiator, it was ceded to the USA after the War of 1812. The harbor on Drummond Island is called Drummond Island Yacht Haven. A private marina that is located on the south end of Potagannissing Bay and on the northern end of the island, it is the only place to clear customs.


We tried to circumvent this necessity by applying for a new program called the Small Vessel Reporting System (SVRS) but were thwarted at every turn. It required a lot of legwork including personal interviews by custom agents. I only wish one of them would have admitted ignorance instead of doing it all wrong.

So, we wound our way through the small islands that protect the harbor and tied up to the wall to await customs. We had decided not to mention the SVRS, the less complications the better. I know it is common to feel guilty of some unknown infraction while going through customs and that day was no different. We had just approached the wall and the customs agent was there before I had even secured the boat. He caught me off guard.

So far the agents have been polite serious young men as I suppose they should be considering the amount of armament they carry. I pulled out my folder with passports, boat registration, etc. and forgot that our SVRS paperwork was sitting there for all to see and see it he did. His eyes lite up when he recognized it and he immediately began to ask question about it. We were the first people he had seen with it. The interview was going smoothly before that and now he started to ask questions concerning the process of obtaining it.

Since it was done incorrectly I tried to explain why we had chosen to ignore it. My heart sank. I thought here we go, complications! And I was almost proved correct when he said we should wait here while he called headquarters to see if he needed to do something different that he did not know he should do. Despite the awkwardness of the situation both Charlotte and I piped up, stating that we had been given instructions by customs headquarters in Sault Ste. Maries and would attend to it ASAP when we arrived Chicago.

He asked the name of the agent I had talked to. I did not have a name. He furrowed his brow and instructed me that it is always a good idea to obtain the name of whom we talked to. He was ready to move on and gave us our Custom’s Check In number and as he step off Carrie Rose Charlotte pushed us off the dock. I quizzically looked at her because she had been coveting an ice cream cone at the marina store all day. She said let’s get out of here and we did to DeTour Village where they stuck us down such a narrow shallow channel that I couldn’t sleep a wink thinking about how I was going to get out in the morning. But that is another story.

Conversation



I have had many conversations while cruising in the North Channel. Some are repeated daily and others unique. Some are face to face, and more than you think utilize radio waves. We talk about the speed of transit, navigation, weather, and many calls are just to say hello and catch up with fellow cruisers. As a group we will try and meet each afternoon around 5:30 for a drink and banter. It can be on a boat, but mostly it is on a flat rock on shore, that is if one can be found.

The talk is not philosophical, unless we consider the philosophy of boating and the cruising life a valid topic, then I take back what I just wrote. Imagine the commitment that most boaters take on: debt (in our case more than our house), devoting winter months to maintenance and upgrades, and then disappearing for the spring-summer-fall. Anyone that has the nerve to marry, celebrate an anniversary, graduate or schedule any of the other activities that contribute to civil society during cruising season is spurned.

It is common for boaters, be they long-range cruisers or trailer sailors, to have left uninterested or hostile family and friends in their wake. This leads to an instant camaraderie even if they have nothing else in common. No matter if they own an 80-foot sports fisherman, a full-displacement trawler, blue water yacht, Sunfish or bass boat; believe me, there will be something to talk about.

The further afield I get there seems to be an unwritten code not to discuss religion or politics, and not ask about current or former professions. Controversy is not part of the equation unless it comes down to fuel management, the best anchorages or what appetizer to bring to happy hour.

Over the last two years I unknowingly contributed to this banter due to an unexpected gift from a former partner: a pair of family radios. In the past when we traveled with several boats channel 16 on the VHF radio—16 in Canada, 9 or 16 in the US—is utilized to hail the other boats. When we hear our name we response by acknowledging the request and state a different channel to change to because it is against the rules to talk on a hailing channel. I have a label just below my radio to remind me of the channels where unofficial boat-to-boat communications is allowed.

The conversation has a formality associated with it and goes something like this. “Carrie Rose, Carrie Rose, Carrie Rose this is Dolly.” We respond (that is if we have remembered to leave the radio on and tuned to 16), “Dolly this is Carrie Rose.” Now Dolly says, “Switch to 71.” And we say, “71” and switch. Next I usually say, “Carrie Rose” and then the conversation will commence. The discussion that follows is open to anyone with a radio. There is no expectation of privacy. As we cruise we listen to many of these conversations. They range from trivial to informative. Listening is also how we learned the appropriate way to use the radio.

So as I said I was gifted with two family radios and it dawned on me to give one to my fellow boater so we can talk off line. Family radios have none of the above formality. We simply call the other boat and talk, and chances are no one else is listening. Not that it matters much. No state secrets are changing hands. There may be a bit of gossip but mainly it is focused on the task of getting where we are going with the least amount of stress.

Generally we discuss who is going to call the harbor master, which harbor we should stop at, how deep the water is, where rocks are and most important, where is happy hour going to be!

Sunday, August 12, 2012

Thessalon, ON

When last I wrote we had made a dash to Thessalon, ON to hide out from rowdy weather. Cruising often gives us a lopsided view of the towns we visit. Thessalon is one of these. Wandering around as we are apt to do, we discovered that the town has a lot of character. It was Canada's Civic holiday the three days we were there. No one could explain what the holiday was about except to say that it was a way to give a few people (mainly government employees) another long summer weekend. After dinner one night we heard music off in the distance, walked towards it and found a spectacular sunset, a nice beach with a beautiful view, a temporary stage made out of a tractor trailer with a passable rock band in it across from a congested trailer park/camp ground where everyone looked like they were having a ball. Next stop America!


Thessalon River


The second largest building in town, next to the hockey rink


A Thessalon sunset


Rocking on the beach


Not your wilderness experience!




Monday, August 6, 2012

Photo Update

We are in Thessalon waiting out high winds. All the Loopers left in a rush this AM. Charlotte and I had to get up at six in the morning to let the boat in front of us leave. So, we stayed awake and the boat has been cleaned and topped up. I oiled the rusty bikes and we went for a ride to a nice restaurant on the other side of town. Now I am doing this and then back to Proust!


Sir Tugley Blue leaving Beardrop


Pizza before . . .


and one pizza after (pesto with potatoes and wild mushrooms)


Charlotte's favorite past time


What everyone does when not cruising, mess about in other boats!


Carrie Rose alone in Beardrop


Exploring Beardrop while we had it to ourselves


Still rubbing our nose in it

Saturday, August 4, 2012

Squall


All day we heard reports of possible thunderstorms, but then we have been hearing reports of this since we entered Canadian waters. It was bound to happen. It is summer after all on the Great Lakes. Rip-snorting squalls and thunderstorms are a common occurrence. Carrie Rose has ridden out many on her mooring in Montrose Harbor without incidence, but Carrie Rose has never rode out one in the wilderness on her own anchor, until last night that is.

A squall is a tumultuous child born out of conjoined hot and cold fronts. They course across North America conceiving tornados, leaving wind and rain and hail in their wake, and they are the nemesis of every sailor. A squall may announce itself with thunder and lighting but it may not. I know to glance over my shoulder every so often when on the Great Lakes to see if one is sneaking up on me. Last night’s squall was first spotted on Dave’s iPhone radar app. It was a band of green, yellow and magenta approaching West Hotham Harbor (our anchorage) at a 45-degree angle. It crossed stepwise across the tiny screen heading towards a blue dot that he explained was our location.

The intense mass of weather got us back in the dinghy and after a short downwind row, onto Carrie Rose. It truncated our farewell dinner with Dave and Judy on Sir Tugley Blue. Three of us, Dolly (who left earlier that day), Sir Tugley Blue and us had been travelling together since meeting in St. Ignace for the Nordic Tug Great Lake’s Rendezvous. We heard rumors that we were referred to as the Nordic Tug Fleet by fellow North Channel cruisers after a summer of cruising together in Canada’s northern Lake Huron.

Canada is a wonderful country and a sweet people populate it, but that said Canada does have a few quirks worth mentioning. The main one for my purpose here is the Canadian weather forecasting system, or the lack of it. The United States has many faults but its weather forecasting and reporting system is not one of them. NOAA provides comprehensive real time service and if you are willing to do a little research, enough raw data to make your own well informed forecast.

Our weather ritual consists of rising early in the morning and looking out the window, checking the barometer and turning on the VHF radio to listen to channel 3 or 8. Eventually we will listen to both. Channel 3 broadcasts in French and English, and channel 8 in English and MAFOR. Channel 3 is Environment Canada, and channel 8 is Canadian Coast Guard Radio.

Please bear with me as I expand on this. Of course French and English is self explanatory, but what in the world is MAFOR. I wondered the same for years. In US waters you rarely hear the Coast Guard reading strings of numbers, so I never concerned myself with its intricacies.


Canada is a different story. Much of channel 8’s time is taken up with the reciting of these numbers for Lake Superior, Thunder Bay, Georgian Bay, and North and South Lake Huron. The reader prefaces each of the above regions with how many series of 5-digit codes will be read. And what is this 5-digit code you ask, well the first number is the Code Number. This one is easy as it is always 1 and seems to be irrelevant. The second represents the number of hours in the future that the forecast is good for. Number three is the wind direction. Number four is the speed of the wind in knots. Remember this single digit code represents a range of wind speeds. If the number 5 appears in the forth slot the winds will be from 34 to 40 knots. Best not to venture out if you see this number. And finally number five is the weather condition as in number 2 for strong risk of ice.

If we turn on channel 3 and they are in French mode we switch to channel 8. What we are looking for is the North Channel weather. The wind will be discussed, then wave height, next the present weather from a list of available sites. I question the existence of Elliot Bay for in the 60 odd days I have spent here its weather has never been available. Gore Bay also stands out as it is always 10 km/h windier than the rest of the North Channel. And just to keep things interesting some wind speeds are reported in knots and some in kilometers per hour.

Finally, if we listen long enough and do not space out at the last moment we will hear the list of disclaimers that signals (and is often longer than) the forecast for the North Channel, “Winds light, becoming lighter in the afternoon and lightening after midnight.” Throw in a SW, NE or SE at random and you’ve got it. Both channels 3 and 8 fade in and out as the boat swings at anchor. At face value this may not seem significant except according to Murphy’s Law the signal fades precisely at the crucial moment forcing us to repeat the process.

But let’s get back to the squall. West Hotham Harbor is not a harbor in the traditional sense. Hotham Island is an unpopulated island in an under populated region of Canada. There are a few cottages but generally this area is under the control of mosquitos, flies, loons, bear, moose, bald eagles, never seen song birds, sea gulls and the reviled fish eating cormorants. The harbor consists of a divot on its NW shoreline. All that is here is rocks and conifers. It does have a great view of Mt. McBean, the highest peak in the area, and some serious mud (sans weeds) for the anchor to dig into.

When entering such a space there are many variables to consider. To name a few: wind, depth, weather, already anchored boats, escape routes, swing if the wind changes direction and well, some I have missed. Anchoring is also about the gear and if you want to get a taciturn group of old salts going bring up the topic of anchors. I am lucky in this regard. Carrie Rose was festooned with six anchors when we bought her. I have spent the last nine years taking them off one by one. It seems the first owner had an anchor fetish and I thank him for that. He left us with an oversized Bruce attached to thick chain that has served us well . . . knock on wood!

One of our cruising companions has been setting anchors for fifty years. Not the lecturing type he teaches by example. I watch him as best I can considering I also have to anchor. He has a sense of the size of his boat—we have identical boats—and the best place to tuck into at the proper depth. He picks a spot, lowers the anchor to the bottom, sends twenty to thirty feet of chain over the side after it, then sits and waits. This waiting is the tough part. Anchor, though a noun, is usually thought of as a verb. I mean what do you do with an anchor—drop the damn thing. To watch him stop and wait, if only for a minute, defies the time and space equilibrium.

One day, after a few glasses of wine had lubricated our tongues, we asked, “Why the wait?” The suspended moment is to let the anchor, and the chain, “settle”. As it were, find its own place in the weeds and mud before trying to set it by backing the boat. Once the wind and the current have tethered the boat then gently back up and set the anchor. It is like a caress as opposed to a karate chop.

We came into Hotham and did this. There were boats in front and behind, and boats to the side of us. There were large and small boats; sail and powerboats; old salts and novices waiting for the alluded to storm. A nervous energy prevailed. In such circumstances it is the anticipation that gnaws at you. I did what I could and then set about my daily life on Carrie Rose.

So now back on board we prepared the boat as if we were going to leave on a cruise. The computer was in its proper place with the GPS connected. I retrieved my red flashlights (so as not to destroy my night vision) and my shockingly expensive Surefire A2 LED Aviator flashlight in case I needed illumination as bright as the sun. I turned the battery switch to BOTH and took the covers off my instruments.

Suddenly night was upon us. The distant rumble of thunder and its accompanying white flash lite up the sky. It gradually intensified as I sat in the dark and watched. I was mesmerized and forgot to turn on my radios. I missed the warnings on Channel 16, but who needed warnings. Nature was doing a good job of that. Again the odd part in this is the waiting. Squalls come at you from a different direction, so one moment you are facing north and the next west. It happens in a second. Sometimes there is a lull in the wind and then POW!

Carrie Rose took her time in swinging into the 45-knot gust. I watched the coordinates on the GPS for any dramatic change, none appeared. I looked out through the torrent of rain and realized that the sailboats to my right were gone, blown down the channel. Suddenly the harbor was ablaze in lights: red and green running lights, white anchor lights, search lights, spreader lights, red cabin lights, all sparkling on my rain drenched windows.

Our friends in the boat directly in front of us were frantically trying to signal us. I was wondering why the kept flashing all these different colored lights in my face. It seems I had inadvertently turned off my anchor light and was sitting in the middle of the chaos blacked out. And I had forgot to turn on my radios, so was also blacked out in another sense. They were wondering if we were sleeping through it. Not a bad idea but no cigar.

The wind and rain kept coming. Behind me it looked like a ballet of lights as each boat sought to avoid the rocks, re-anchor and gain stability. We sat hushed, watching our perimeter for interlopers, the little triangle on the computer that represented our location and the numbers on my backup GPS. Nothing moved. We stayed put and got a glimpse of what was happening when lightening lite up the entire harbor for a millisecond. Not very long but long enough to cement the surrounding boats locations into our brains.

One boat came pass us several times because its anchor refused to grab. Our friends helped light the forlorn boats way. They called out advice, which they graciously took and eventually, after letting out one hundred and fifty feet of rode the anchor stuck. I felt a slight ease in the wind. The rollers that were coursing down the harbor were not so distinct. There was still lightening and thunder but I could no longer feel it rattle my chest.

As I settled back into my chair the rain started in earnest. A spot on the salon roof that has never leaked in the decade we have own Carrie Rose dripped water onto the settee. The rain signaled the squalls end. It was finally spent after an hour. Not that long, but long enough I reckon to get my merit badge in North Channel nighttime squalls.