North Channel 2015 - Benjamin Islands

I wake up early, swallow a couple little white candies and walk up the dock to showers at the marina facility.  It is a beautiful morning, cloudless, and a bit windy, but not nearly as bad as yesterday.  Once everybody else is up, fed, and watered, we throw off the dock lines and motor over to the fuel dock for diesel and a pump-out.  It seems I inadvertently cut in the queue because a big Coast Guard ship I thought was leaving harbour was actually waiting and he honks his horn at me angrily.  It’s not good to piss off the Coast Guard as he might be the guy pulling us off the rocks tomorrow.

Sometime in the last hour a massive cruise ship has pulled in and is tied up at the dock.  It certainly seems strange to have a cruise ship on the Great Lakes, but here it is.  The gas dock staff instructs us to sneak in just in front of the cruise ship so we have a bird’s eye view of its grandiosity as we get pumped and dumped.

Today we are going to the Benjamin Islands, the premier anchorage in all of the North Channel.  We leave Little Current and follow the Lansdowne Channel south-west.  There is a steady line of boats going in both directions, probably en route to or from the Benjamins.  After an enjoyable, 21 mile and 2.5 hour sail we arrive and are not disappointed with what we find.  The islands are tree covered but with large areas of smooth, expansive rocks which glide down into the water creating steep drop-offs, making it possible to sail and even anchor very close to land.  There are at least a dozen anchorages which offer shelter no matter what the wind direction is.  We find a dreamy little cove with only a single boat anchored and decide on that fine spot for our temporary home.  We decide to do the double anchor/rope to a tree method, hoping for better results than last time.  And we pull it off without a hitch.  Well, at one point I tripped when I was trying to tie the rope to a tree on shore, and squashed a small bush, but escaped serious injury.  In fact the only repercussion was a thin coating of sap on my hands, feet and back which attracted a layer of pine needles.  I found a scrubbie brush back at the boat and spent twenty minutes sitting on the swim platform scraping myself off.

We all board the dingy and I paddle us over to the shore across the bay.  We seem to be the only cruisers in the North Channel who have a dingy without a motor.  But you see, we do not have a regular dingy; we have the Hydro Force – Marine Pro 2.  It is an extraordinary, twelve foot long piece of engineering excellence available exclusively at Walmart, usually in the camping section between the disposable barbeques and pool noodles.  Our friend Andrew was always jealous of the Hydro Force.  He had a standard issue dingy with a nice new outboard motor and thought he was pretty cool when he could zip around at high speed doing wake jumping and trolling for lake trout.  But then he would see me yank the rolled up Hydro Force from the rear cockpit locker of Bella Blue, where it didn’t actually fit, but somehow it did, though I had to use a winch to pull it out.  I’d unroll this mass of wrinkled rubber, lay it on top of the sailboat, then hook up my 12 volt inflator (also available at Walmart) and pump her up.  She would slowly take form, and soon the magnificent vessel was there for all to behold.  Sure, she has a few patches, and much of the rubber rail is falling off, and there are dots of Marine Super Goo here and there plugging the smaller holes, but all in all she is pretty impressive.  I’d launch her into the lake over the gunwales of Bella Blue and she would nearly always float.  The ingenious makers of this sweet tender has the foresight to construct collapsible paddles.  They each break down into several pieces and are screwed together with flimsy plastic fittings that don’t hold so well and are pretty close to disintegrating completely.  But besides all that, the oars are pretty solid, so I would gently piece them together and rig them up on the Hydro Force oarlocks and we are ready for business.  I would ease into her gently, as too much force would likely cause me to pass straight through the flimsy rubber floor to the black depths of Davy Jones locker.  Then the rest of the family slides in and we would be off.  Ana would usually sit in the back with a bag over her head so nobody could recognize her.  Magnus and Stella would sit in front and fish, at least until they got their hooks stuck into the rubber hull, at which point I would remind Ana to pick up more Marine Super Goo the next time she was at Walmart.  My spot was right in the centre where the water coming in from the leaks would collect and soak my arse, but that just made me row harder to get where we were going so I could wring out my underwear.  Rowing a dingy is a little tricky because there is no centreboard or fin keel so you can actually do continual 360’s while traveling in a constant direction.  If we were just on a pleasure cruise we’d paddle around for a while until either everyone in the marina had seen us and had a good laugh, or my back muscles gave out and the two kids had to jump in and flutter kick us back to the boat.  If we were on a mission, such as to get groceries in a foreign port, then we’d hightail it to the dingy dock, tie her up, go shopping, and then load the two hundred pounds of dry goods, wet goods, booze, clothing and toys into the Hydro Force until she was nearly underwater.  Then we all pile in and she would always remain just afloat.  To get back I’d need both the kids flutter kicking off the back, me rowing like hell, and Ana holding up her dress to try and catch some wind.  Now that kind of entertainment just can’t be had in a regular dingy, and that’s why Andrew liked the Hydro Force so much.

We reach the shoreline, hauled the dingy up on land and go for a hike, which is almost exclusively scrambling up and down various rock structures.  We make it to the top of one rock cliff and are rewarded with a stunning view over the anchorage.  There are forested areas on the island but we can’t find any trails cut through them and the bush is extremely thick.  There are some parts of the shoreline that have deep wells in the rock that allowed for only a single boat to squeeze in and there are even steel rings drilled into the rock to serve as tie down spots for anchor ropes.  Of course, all of these are already occupied by boats as they are clearly the premium anchoring spots, but we aren’t too disappointed as our anchorage as just as good.

We paddle around to a few other areas of the island, the last of which has a little snake on the path that scares the bejesus out of Magnus.  He inherited his great grandfather Max’s fear of serpents and gets uncontrollably terrified at the sight of them.  So that was it for island exploring, and Magnus swears off further hikes and even swimming in the lake for fear that snakes might take periodic baths.  As the thermometer is rocketing up to 28 degrees today, I suspect he may change his mind about the swimming part.

We dingy back to the boat and get chairs and towels set out on the boat deck for a glorious afternoon sunbathing session.  I fall asleep for a while, laying there like a rasher of extra fatty bacon, waiting for the crisping process to happen, which it does.  I wake up a while later, groggy as hell, and stagger back to the shaded cockpit where I collapse on the nice soft cushion and lay there for a while trying to wake up and listening to all the forest and lake sounds.  There are a pair of chattering squirrels on shore bickering at each other, some loons calling in the distance, so many different bird songs it was hard to distinguish them, the occasional put-put-putting of a dingy engine and, of course, the sound of the water splashing up against the sides of Bella Blue.  It is a glorious day, and it occurs to me that it’s a Thursday and I am not at work.  This makes me smile and retrieve a cold beer from the fridge, then I actually laugh out loud a bit when I think again about not being at work.

The kids and I decide it’s time for a swim so we strap on the snorkelling gear and dive in.  The water is 21.5 degrees here, which is cold, but not bone chilling, and I’m able comfortably snorkel for twenty minutes.  The water is not as clear as in the main body of Lake Huron, but the visibility is nonetheless excellent and I can see at least fifteen to twenty feet.  The rock and mud bottom is covered with these funny looking little fish called gobies – an invasive species that have radically changed the ecology of the Great Lakes.  Two other such critters are the Zebra and Quagga mussels, and these small shells blanket many of the rocks lying on the bottom.  One thing I do not see are any sport fish, but I have heard it’s possible to catch bass, walleye and pike in these waters.

Some sort of situation develops between Magnus and Stella which centers around a ring Magnus found in the street gutter back in Tobermory.  He calls it a mood ring but it’s just one of those cheap, coloured rings you get in a plastic bubble from those vending machines at the grocery store that drive parents mad.  Anyway, he has been flaunting it around Stella, saying it’s his good luck ring, and taunting her because she doesn’t have one.  I’m surprised he still has it because it fits only onto his pinky finger, but it’s very loose and keeps falling off, but somehow we are always able to track it down when he loses it.  So Stella finally flips her lid and storms down below and convinces her mom to get her one.  Well, this enrages Magnus.  He found it so he gets to keep it, and it’s not fair that Stella will get to buy one.  In fact he gets so mad that he takes it off and flings it overboard and says, “There!  Now nobody gets a ring!”

Stella looks overboard and says, “Ha ha Magnus, it landed in the dingy!”

This further enrages him so he leaps in the dingy to retrieve the Ring of Power and destroy it once and for all.  But he discovers it didn’t actually land in the dingy and is at the bottom of the lake so says, “It’s gone for good.”

I do the smart thing and stay out of the melee and soon both the kids go downstairs pleading their respective cases to their mother, resulting in one locking herself in the v-berth and the other wrapping himself in a blanket and isolating himself on the couch.  See thing this for what it is – a great opportunity for alone time - Ana and I retire to the cockpit for happy hour and hope the passage of time will heal the wounds, but not before we finish our drinks.  By the end of the night the kids are at least talking to each other again, so I expect that by tomorrow things will be back to normal and I will probably find myself diving for a ring.

North Channel 2015 - Little Current

 

This is the most beautiful anchorage that Bella Blue has ever experienced.  It is 6:30 am, dead calm and all I can hear is the sound of loons calling.  Magnus wakes up early and we decide to go for a hike.  We paddle the dingy into the nearby shore and stomp for a while through the trees.  The mozzies are wide awake and attack us with a ravenous northern fervour.  We get back in the dingy and paddle all the way across the anchorage to the other side where there is a towering rock face we are hoping we can climb.  And we do find sort of a path and scramble our way up to the top and snap some fantastic photos overlooking the entire anchorage.  We also find a spread of wild blueberry bushes so we gather up a sample to take back to the girls.  The only suitable satchel I can come up with is my left sock turned inside-out.

We are a little sad to leave the anchorage but perhaps we will spend another evening here on our return journey.  We haul in the anchors and slowly meander our way through the boats and out into the open lake where the wind is blowing hard right in our face.  We are going to a town called Little Current today which is the gateway to Manitoulin Island and the location of a unique swing bridge that allows both land traffic and boats to pass.  We follow the Lansdowne Channel and it is thankfully well marked with buoys as there are reefs and rocks to hit everywhere I look.  There is a steady stream of power and sailboats going in both directions.

The wind is relentless and we battle it the whole way under motor power only.  Thankfully the waves are not that high so the ride is relatively smooth, but the 20 miles seem more like 40.  We finally arrive at the swing bridge and notice that the west wind has created a strong current, at least 4 knots, making me wonder if the name “Little Current” is meant to be ironic, or perhaps just somebody’s idea of a little joke.  Now if I had done my research I would have learned that you do not want to arrive at this bridge at 2:10, because the bridge only swings open for boats once an hour, on the hour.  I guess that’s why five boats in quick succession passed me a mile or two back.

So I shut off the engine and let the current wash us downstream while Ana serves up sandwiches and we enjoy lunch in the cockpit.  After floating half a mile I power her up, drive upstream to the bridge, then drift back down, and we repeat this until the hour approaches.  The entire bridge pivots on a giant cylinder in the centre and slowly swings open.  I slam the throttle down and we charge full speed into the raging current beneath the bridge.  Progress is slow, and the boat is thrown from side to side by the current.  I expect there have been more than a few boats that have been rammed into the steel and rock pilings.  As we clear the bridge I look back to see two sailboats about a mile back powering at full speed to catch their window of opportunity.  But as soon as we have cleared through, the operator instantly swings the bridge closed again, and I can imagine the exasperated moans coming from the poor sailors behind us.  I hope they have sandwich supplies on board.

Ana calls into the marina and they assign us a dock number.  We are practically sideways approaching the dock as the current has its way with us, but she slowly spins around and we ease into the dock with only a small crash of the bow hitting the wooden boards.  The dock hand assures us this was the smoothest docking of the day as the combination of wind and current has provided for some horrible docking episodes.

Little Current is a nifty little town.  The municipal docks span nearly the entire length of the downtown area and the waterfront is beautiful.  I pick up the “Ports” guide for cruising Lake Huron from Wally’s Marine, which is sandwiched in alongside the docks, and I believe I met Wally himself, who was sitting on a chair yelling orders at his staff.  I think he has been there a very long time.

We spend a couple hours exploring the town.  Magnus gets an overdue haircut and the ladies get some retail therapy in the form of a new pair of shoes for Stella.  There is a neat department store called Turners and the second floor features an amazing gallery of art, publications of local lore, clothing, marine charts, nature books, and a bunch of Canadiana stuff, but not junk like dream catchers and maple syrup, but interesting things like moccasins, carved walking sticks, paintings, sculptures, cards and the like.  I’m tempted by a 300 page book on North American mushrooms, thinking I will become a great mushroom hunter, but when I scan through the index and can’t find the word “hallucinogenic” I put it back on the shelf.

We find a grocery store and pick up supplies including one of those nice roast chickens for dinner, which scuttles our original plan of going out to a restaurant.  Roast chicken, veggies and fresh bread on the boat trumps dinner out anytime.  We do the “boater march” which is where each crew member carries two or three plastic shopping bags (and usually a case of beer, but not this time) and you walk around aimlessly until you find the path back to your boat, which we eventually do.  After a nice dinner Ana takes off with a giant bag of laundry while I stay back and do some dingy repairs with the help of Magnus.  Stella has met another little girl on the dock and they are busy playing soccer in the marina park.

I meet the girl’s father and he comes on board to show me a few interesting anchorages on the map.  He is sailing with his wife and two children and they are based out of Kincardine.  He is sailing on a 44 foot sailboat that was custom built in 1988 by his parents and a local boat builder.  He takes me over for a tour of his boat, and the highlight is the 78 horsepower John Deere diesel engine he affectionately calls “The Beast”.  It is a rugged, heavy, powerful boat built to withstand anything the oceans can throw at it.  He sailed to Germany and back with his father shortly after it was built, but since this is has been on the Great Lakes.

After Ana returns our new fiends join us on the Bella Blue to polish off those Tuborg tall cans that Tony and I bought back in Tobermory, and we swap sailing stories. The kids are thrilled to have other kids to play with, and they are very close in age so they all get along well.  It is close to midnight when our friends leave, so we gather up all the empties, find an available bed and are finished for the night.

North Channel 2015 - Collins Inlet and Covered Portage

 

After hitting the snooze button a couple of times, we finally arise and shove off from the dock at 6am.  That pesky west wind, though not quite as strong as yesterday, is still blowing hard so we set partial sails and head north.  We pass Flowerpot Island and cruise right by the two rock formations that make this place famous.  I have no idea why they call them “Flowerpots”.  To me they look more like giant, poorly rolled, upside down reefers.  You can sucker tourists into paying $40 to see pretty much anything, as long as it sounds cool.

I set a north-east course to the eastern entrance of Collins Inlet and we move at a fine pace with the strong wind and gently humming motor.  We all pile into the cockpit and load up with sweaters, jackets, blankets, and I even grab a toque as it is windy and cold, but sunny.  Once we get into the far distant shadow of Manitoulin Island the waves subside somewhat and make for a gentler ride.

After 43 miles we reach the entrance and it is bordered with treacherous looking jagged rocks but the deep channel is clearly marked with buoys that show the way.  We cruise easily through the channel and are into a large bay full of islands.  With all the rocks and trees it now feels like we’re truly in northern Canada.  The only thing missing is a beaver crossing our path and a loon surfing our wake.

We find a decent looking spot to anchor for lunch, but can’t seem to get the anchor to stick, and the shifting wind is blowing us around so instead we continue on and Ana makes up some tuna fish sandwiches for us to eat as we sail.  The bay becomes more and more narrow then ends in a channel with marker buoys that are as little as fifteen feet apart so it is a relatively tight squeeze.  The channel then turns and opens into the Collins Inlet, which looks like a drag strip for boats, as it runs completely straight and has towering rock walls on both sides.  Stella checks the instruments and finds that the water is a balmy 25 degrees, which ignites great enthusiasm for a swim.  We follow the channel for a few miles then find a decent anchorage and stop for a dingy ride and plunge.  Ana and I sit in the sunny cockpit and enjoy a drink while we consider staying here for the night, but soon the bugs swarm in so we decide to continue a bit further to see if we can find something less buggy.  We travel to nearly the end and find some nice anchorages but there are already a number of boats there, so instead of trying to muscle in for space, we decide to continue to Killarney, which is a small town only a few miles away with plenty of boat slips.  The Collins Inlet ends in a terrifying, shoal ridden channel which is made worse by the three foot waves crashing in and 25 knot gusts, resulting in a miserable, but thankfully short passage.

We reach Killarney and travel slowly up the channel investigating what lies on the shoreline.  And what lies on the shoreline are marinas, small shops, a famous fish and chips restaurant and lots and lots of boats in slips.  I check the clock and it’s not quite 7pm, which gives us time to pass right through Killarney and go to an anchorage called Covered Portage, which we have heard is a must-do for any first time North Channelers.

I become so enwrapped in reviewing the chart to Covered Portage that I forget I’m the guy steering the boat and look up just in time to see the bow heading straight for the rocks beneath the big “Killarney” sign.   With ten feet to spare I swing the wheel back to port and just miss crashing into the rocks.  Lesson learned – don’t review charts when you are navigating through an unfamiliar channel.  Anyway, I apologize to the crew and continue north-west through pounding waves and lashing winds and beat a path towards our target.  As we arrive I see at least ten boats already anchored in the outer bay, so I glide by them and ease into the inner bay, which is a beautiful, circular cove surrounded by towering rock walls and forest, and perfectly sheltered from the punishing winds.  In fact, there is not even a ripple across the water.  There are at least fifteen or twenty boats anchored so we squeak our way through these and find a nice spot to throw out the hook.  Ana notices that a few of the other boats have put one or even two anchors out the bow and tied the stern of their boat to a tree onshore, probably to keep themselves completely stationary.  So we decide to do this.  It takes three attempts to get our anchor set properly, and remember that each failed anchor attempt causes a small dent in one’s marriage.  The reason for this is because one spouse is driving the boat from the stern while the other is putting the anchor up or down at the bow and this causes what Led Zeppelin once called a “Communication Breakdown”.  It’s always the same.  Anchoring causes breakdown after breakdown and they drive each other insane.  If your marriage can survive anchoring, then it can survive anything.  Instructions are screamed back and forth.  Failings in technique are pointed out readily.  There is indignation, belittling, scornful looks, evil eyes, exasperation, but eventually the damn anchor finally sticks and then there is a thirty minute cool down period, normally lubricated with gin and tonics.  Then everything goes back to normal.

But this time we also had to tie the boat to a tree.   I have quite a few ropes, but none are very long, so I tie three of them together which looks like it should be sufficient.  I toss the rope in the dingy and command the children to take their posts.  Magnus is assigned the port oarsman post and Stella will feed out the rope as we move away from the boat and approach the land.  I will be in charge of yelling orders and working the starboard oar.  Well we paddle like hell but the boat has swung away from the shore and the rope is too short by half.  So we double up on paddling in an attempt to drag the stern of the boat closer to shore but it just isn’t working so I have Ana fire up the boat and put her in reverse to swing the stern around.  We paddle like mad and are now able to reach the shore so Magnus and I jump out, nearly breaking our ankles, and wind the rope around a poor pine tree, getting all gummed up with sap in the process.  As I tighten the rope the boat gets closer and closer to shore but we are being devoured by mosquitoes so we leap in the dingy and paddle back to the boat, where Ana has supper waiting.  As we eat, we notice that the boat is now so close to shore that we can practically step off the stern right into the enchanted forest, so the anchor must have let loose.  We have a crew meeting and decide that the tree idea just isn’t going to work tonight so we load ourselves back in the dingy, retrieve the rope, give the boat a shove and drive back into the bay for another try.  This time we set out two anchors and they stick on the very first try.  Yay!

Darkness falls and the anchorage goes silent except for one sound – the sound of a sailor playing a beautiful and haunting song on a flute.  I don’t know which boat it was coming from, but it was a magical end to a 70 mile journey and 14 hours on the water.

North Channel 2015 - Exploring Tobermory

What a sleep!  I wake up completely refreshed and ready to explore Tobermory in a fully conscious state.  I brew up a coffee, grab the laptop, sit myself down in the cockpit and alternate between writing and watching boats leaving and entering the harbour.  I check the weather forecast to find that it’s going to be a windy day, but otherwise there is only a slight chance of rain.  Ana has been texting back and forth with our friends Angela and Tony as they are planning to fly here to spend the day with us if the weather cooperates.  They have a nifty little five seater airplane and are always looking for new and interesting places to visit.

I strike up a conversation with the sailor in the slip next to us and he tells me about Collins Inlet which is a long, narrow channel whose west end pops out close to Killarney – one of the few marinas in the North Channel with an sizeable population and places to stock up on provisions.  It sounds like a great target for tomorrow’s run.

After a slow and relaxing morning, Ana and Magnus walk down to the shops to pick up supplies while Stella and I attempt to find the marker to the western terminus of the Bruce Trail – an 850 kilometer nature trail that runs from Tobermory all the way to Niagara-on-the-Lake.  We find the marker then take a short walk on the trail to the main Park office, where Stella immediately makes friends with some little girls there and they put on an impromptu puppet show.  We all meet back at the boat around 11, just in time for the arrival of Tony and Angela, who are looking dashing as usual and fresh after the 90 minute plane ride.  We decide a morning coffee is in order so we walk together up to the coffee shop on the hill and watch all the activity unfolding before us in the harbour as we sip our fancy coffees.

After letting the ladies explore the shops, trying on fancy hats and fantasizing about buying $200 pairs of shoes, we return to the boat for early happy hour on the dock and a spot of lunch.  I then fail at two things.  First, convincing Tony to have a beer.  Those damn pilots can be so sticky about the 12 hour “bottle to throttle” rule.  Second, during my attempt to open a Corona using a board on the side of the dock, it escapes my grasp and plummets like a bullet to the bottom of the lake, 22 feet down.  But the water is so clear that we can still see the beer bottle standing up perfectly, waiting patiently to be opened.  Tony and I look at each other stunned.  Who’s going to break the bad news to Magnus?  He’s going to have to dive for the beer.  News spreads fast of my shameful error and the Tobermory glass bottom boats started lining up so all the touristos can take a photo of the legendary “Beer in the Lake” on their way to other important historical sites like century old shipwrecks and Flowerpot island.  I’m glad I could contribute to the local culture and lore in my own special way.  We call off the diving mission and Magnus is quite relieved.

It is mid afternoon and the wind is howling so it seems like a nice time to take Tony and Angela for a hair-raising, terrifying, moderately risky sailboat ride.  We motor over to Big Tub Harbour to see the two shipwrecks that lie in shallow water at the far end of the harbour, but the water is so choppy we really can’t see much.  Also, I forgot to ask the ladies to wear dresses (all good captains know to do this on windy days) so we aren’t treated to any underwear flashes either, making the first leg of our trip a little dull.  I motor Bella Blue out to sea and then cut the engine and throw up the main sail.  I’m thinking we’ll sail out to a place called The Cove, which is 12 miles east, but less than halfway there we soon realize the winds are either going to capsize the sailboat or rip the sail to shreds, so I turn her around and we sail back in, taking a few photos along the way, mainly of the passengers with hair flying in their face so you can’t really tell who’s who.

After a quick stop at the gas dock for a “suck and blow” (suck out the sewage, blow in some diesel) we wait for the glass bottom boats to clear out of our slip, then squeak back in, get her tied down, and walk into town for dinner.  The moment we are seated by the server at The Crows Nest restaurant the heavens open and a massive rain storm ensues.  We congratulate ourselves on our excellent timing and then are led by Stella in some sort of iPhone charades game which soon finds Tony a crazy duck walk across the restaurant to the bewildered stares of the other patrons.  Who wants to be normal, anyway?

We take Magnus’s suggestion and grab some post-dinner ice creams and then walk back to the boat in the light rain.  Tony and I now look like a couple of Bulgarian village farmers as our wives have wrapped hideous babushkas over their heads and are walking ten steps behind.  The storm continues and after consulting the London airport, Tony and Angela decide it’s not safe to fly.  We strongly suggest they spend the night on the Bella Blue, even offering to make the kids sleep on the dock to free up some space, but they tell us it’s been quite a while since they have spent a dirty night in a sleazy, cheap motel.  So Ana books them a sleazy, cheap motel and they are overcome with joy.   Tony and I grab a ride out to the airport from a friendly local bus driver to get their overnight bag, and then make the mandatory stop at the liquor store on the way back to grab fresh brews.  The owner is pissed because we arrive three minutes before closing time and he threatens to lock us in the beer cooler, but he’s threatening the wrong guys because we would have been just fine with that.

We walk the Bruce Trail (about 25 metres of it) back to the boat and then Angela and Ana join us on the dock for the evening happy hour.  We also enjoy some lovely Romeo and Julieta Cuban cigars that Tony had stashed in his pocket.

With that, we wrap up our visit and issue Tony and Angela each their very own Bella Blue signature toothbrush and mini-toothpaste.  In return Tony hands us a cool “Tobermory Shipwrecks” book he stealthily picked up one of the shops.  We then part ways, but I know we will meet again.  Probably in two days when they get bored of Brantford again and fly out to meet us in the next town with an airport!

North Channel 2015 - Tobermory

Overnight sailing runs are a great way to make the miles on a long trip, but they do take a toll.  The sleep you get is shallow and usually haunted with visions of your spouse falling unnoticed off the back of the boat, and then you waking up and having to deal with all the damn paperwork that would entail.

Though Ana usually takes the first shift on the night run, tonight it is me as I was somehow wide awake so I will leave her sleeping with Stella until either I begin to hallucinate or she wakes up on her own.   I finish writing my journals and consider writing tomorrow’s journal even though it hasn’t happened yet, but decide against that and instead put on an episode of “Ray Donovan” – a television series we’ve recently discovered.  I watch five minutes worth, then pop my head outside the boat, and with the binoculars scan the horizon, though it’s so damn dark I can’t tell where the horizon actually is and there is absolutely nothing in sight.  So I watch five or ten minutes more, then repeat the lookout scan.  This routine continues for nearly a full episode until I pop my head out and discover the boat is completely enveloped in a thick blanket of fog.  I shut down the pc, gear up and get settled in the cockpit for full time lookout duty.  The winds have picked up so I shut off the engine and set the sails out fully so that it is easier to hear any boats approaching.  The protocol in fog is to sound a horn every few minutes to make other vessels aware of your position.  But since I don’t want to scare the living crap out of my sleeping beauties, and since I haven’t seen any other boats for hours, I decide to instead just keep a vigilant looking and my ears cocked for boat noise.

It is now 3am and Ana is with me in the cockpit keeping watch.  The US coast guard is reporting tha there are storm cells passing through Lake Huron with damaging winds and hail.  There is also a big massive storm system we can see to the east with frequent lightning flashes illuminating the ominous, black clouds every few minutes.  And the fog is thicker than ever.  Shit.

In the end, it all missed us and the fog cleared up near dawn.  I slept in the cockpit for a while, wrapped up in a blanket, then went down below after conditions improved and got a solid hour or two of sleep while Ana maintained watch.  We arrive in Tobermory and pull into Little Tub Bay at 7am, making it a 27 hour journey of 143 nautical miles averaging 5.23 knots.  Here’s a fun fact : the nautical mile is 1.15 times larger than a regular statute mile, and 1 knot is the speed at which you can cover 1 nautical mile in 1 hour.  So that means we traveled 164 regular miles and averaged 6 mph.

The town is still sleeping and the gas dock and office look closed so we pull Bella Blue into an empty slip, get her tied down , and then pace the dock for a while to get our legs working again.  The kids are now up so we have breakfast together in the cabin and I take them with me for a walk to the office to get a slip for two nights.  The town is now waking up and is a quaint, lovely place.  To reach the office we need to walk around the entire harbour and along the way we pass a pizza place, candy shop, coffee shop, book store, trading post, two restaurants, a bar, a dive shop, a grocery store, several clothing stores, a marine chart store, and even a touristy shop selling beaver tails, which are these wretched slabs of fried dough with a bunch of sugar and cinnamon dumped on top.  It’s the way us Canadians like to poison tourists. In addition to the beaver tails, we passed numerous glass bottom boats and dive boats, leaving no doubt that Tobermory is a bona fide tourist town.

We go for a walk to check out the town and stop at pretty much every aforementioned shop and find several more, including a groovy looking Bob Marley surfer bar playing Jimmy Buffett which I pledge to visit later.  We all agree that Tobermory is a fine place and are happy we decided to spend two nights here.  We return to the boat for lunch then Ana and I head down for a nap, as we are getting blurry eyed and dopy.  The kids are instructed to not get kidnapped or fall off the dock while we rest.  I fall asleep quickly in the v-berth but Ana fears for her spawn and relocates to the cockpit so she can keep an ear on them.  Two hours later I wake up refreshed, just in time for an afternoon lounging session in the cockpit.  The temperature is about 23 degrees and the clear sky provides for some lovely sunshine.  We are sitting in the back and Ana says, “Do you want a drink?”

“Absolutely!” I reply.

“Could you get me one too while you’re down there?”

Nice.  It’s usually me pulling those kinds of stunts on her.  I pour us some drinks and announce, “Well, from Nappy hour to Happy hour, here’s to the boat vacation!”

After a couple drinks I put the dingy in the water and we all pile in for a short ride across the channel to the one clothing shop that Ana somehow missed during our earlier walkabout.  Now most cruisers have a rigid dingy with a motor, but we’re cheap and don’t want to deal with storing an outboard motor and gasoline so we instead we have a giant 12 foot inflatable dingy called the “Hydro Force – Marine Pro 2” that is oar driven and magnificent.  So I row, row, row the boat gently down the stream, merrily, thinking life is such a dream, tie up at a dock, and disembark.  We visit the clothing shop, wander around a bit, and then we realize we are starving so I paddle us back to the boat, drop the girls off to start dinner, and I put Magnus on the oars for some dingy training as I want him to be able to ferry us around the anchorages in case I get too intoxicated to be trusted rowing.

Ana prepares a stupendous meal of schnitzel, rice and fresh salad and we eat like kings.  After dinner we take our final walk of the day and pass by the ice cream shop for a cone then walk over to see Big Tub Harbour, the ferry terminal, and take one last look at the Bob Marley bar, but there’s hardly anybody there so we continue back to the boat.  I find a great family movie for us to watch (Mad Max – Fury Road) and though the plot is inexplicable there are some awesome, ultra-violent battles and car crashes and nudity that the whole family can enjoy.

North Channel 2015 - Sarnia to the Middle of Lake Huron

We rise at 4am, brew coffee, untie the lines and set off for the first leg of our adventure.  Outside it is warm, still, humid.  We quietly slip out of the marina like burglars and are soon beneath the Bluewater Bridge under full engine power battling our way against the relentless 4 knot current.  Bella Blue makes slow progress but eventually pushes through into the wide open lake where I then pointed her directly towards Tobermory and set the autopilot, which will steer us all the way there.  Ana grabs a blanket and falls asleep in the cockpit while I keep watch, enjoy my coffee and wait for dawn to break.

With the dawn comes a thick fog, and soon I can see no further than a quarter mile.  This is an especially dangerous situation for a boat, especially when you do not have a radar system that can detect approaching vessels.  Fortunately I still have a cell phone signal so I look on marinetraffic.com to see if there are any nearby freighters.  This website is quite incredible as it shows the location, speed, heading and much more information for commercial vessels outfitted with an AIS transmitter, which is a global standard marine signaling system that broadcasts and receives vessel information.  I see there is a large freighter coming at me, but he is still a long ways off so at least I don’t have any big ships to worry about; just the little ones which don’t often have AIS equipment.  An hour later I do indeed find myself on a collision course with this freighter, and he hoots his high volume horn to suggest I alter my course before he pounds us into little fibreglass chunklets.

As the morning sun heats up it burns off the fog and the visibility improves considerably.  The wind has died completely and the lake is a sheet of glass.  By now the kids are up so we have a breakfast of cereal, toast and fruit and settle in for the long ride.  At 10 am we have already been on the water for 6 hours so we stop the boat, strip down and have the morning bath, which has become almost a ritual during these trips.  Lake Huron is a big, deep, cold lake and the surface water temperature is only 18 degrees, but what a way to wake you up in the morning!  After watching Magnus and I jump in and suffer instant cold water paralysis, the ladies decide to skip the morning bath and come to terms with their grime.  Since our nerves are frozen and we are feeling no pain, I grab two masks from the cockpit lazarette and ask Stella to fetch us some pennies, as we want to check the water visibility.  The water in Lake Huron is the deep blue colour of the cleanest ocean water, unlike any fresh water lake I have ever seen.  Magnus and I float on top of the water and let the pennies drop and watch them flutter down at least fifty feet, then lose track of them.  It seems almost impossible that the water can be this clear.

We are now back on autopilot, enjoying the beautiful day, but not enjoying the dozens of flies who have decided to hitch a free ride on our boat up to the North Channel.  Ana and I take turns beating them to death with the Portuguese basura (miniature, multi-purpose corn broom, see http://blog.lifeisgrand.org/2013/07/2013-lake-erie-sailing-trip-day-13.html for a elaborate description of these versatile tools), but it seems that as soon as you kill one, two more land on the same spot.  But since I really have nothing else to do, I spend two hours killing flies and make quite a sport of it.

At around 2 pm Ana notices the skies to the west darkening so we put the boat into lock down mode and just barely get everything secured before we are hit with a squall.  The high winds and heavy rain lasts less than 3o minutes, and soon the system passes by us.  It’s always a little scary when you watch a storm bearing down on you knowing you are in the middle of a giant lake and have absolutely nowhere to go to escape it.  There were a few lightning flashes in the storm, so sitting in the belly of an enormous lightning rod brings with it a certain level of anxiety.  I am very glad when it passes.

The time somehow goes quickly, and soon it is already dusk and Ana takes photos of the gorgeous sunset.  A giant trimaran sailboat (triple hull, very fast) passes by in the distance, which is only the fourth boat we’ve seen all day, the rest being large freighters. The kids are busy reading, playing games and drawing and throughout the day each of us has taken the opportunity for a nap so we are all feeling pretty good.  I heat up the chili that Ana prepared earlier this week and we enjoy a delicious boat supper.  I think every sort of food tastes twice as good when consumed while sailing.

Darkness falls and we discover it is a moonless night, granting the stars their chance to really shine.  If you can get past the horror of being in the middle of a freshwater sea, in pure darkness, with nowhere to turn to for help and nobody to count on except yourself, then sailing at night is the most peaceful  activity you can imagine.  It is actually easier to see other boats at night than during the day (as long as they are lighted properly) and you can spot an oncoming vessel when it is many miles away.  After a while the sky clouds over and we are left in complete and utter blackness, which still sort of creeps me out a bit, even though we’ve done it dozens of times.

As midnight approaches, so does the end of day one of our journey.  Magnus is sleeping soundly on the converted dinette, knocked out from the seasickness pill he took after the rolling waves started making him nauseous.  Ana is snuggled up with Stella in the v-berth.  I sit with my pc typing these very words, and pop my head out of the cabin every ten minutes to scan the horizon for lights.  I will stay awake as long as I can, but when I start to fade I will wake up my partner for her night shift.  By morning, we will be in Tobermory.  But for now, we are at 44° 38’ 72” N  81° 54’ 60” W

North Channel 2015 - Sarnia

July 17^th, 2015.  Lake Huron.  The annual Olson family sailing trip.  Oh yeah.

This year’s sailing season began in May, when I moved our sailboat Bella Blue from Port Dover, across Lake Erie, up the Detroit River, through Lake St. Clair, then up the St. Clair River to the city of Sarnia, which rests humbly at the far south end of Lake Huron.  I was joined by my dad and two brothers, which was the first time the four of us had been on a trip together for 19 years.  We had an excellent voyage and kicked off the boating season in fine style.  But after spending four glorious seasons exploring the wonders of Lake Erie, why did we feel compelled to move the boat?  Quite simply, it was time to discover a new Great Lake.  Living where we do in south-western Ontario provides easy access to three out of five of these freshwater oceans and we want to sail all of them.  Though we have no plans to leave our home anytime soon, we felt that it was the right time to move on to the next lake, and what better lake to explore than Lake Huron with its 30,000 islands and 5000 kilometres shorelines.

 We chose Sarnia’s Bridgeview Marina to be our new weekend home as it is a 90 minute drive from our house, is situated directly on the American border (think cheap US suds...) and is simply a top class marina.  When we were searching for a new base on Lake Huron our initial inclination was to choose between Grand Bend and Bayfield, both of which are amazing seaside towns and less than two hours from home.  But when we went to check out their marinas we just weren’t that impressed.  During our investigations somebody we met suggested we consider Bridgeview Marina in Sarnia, so we made a trip there and after a warm welcome and guided tour by the marina manager Mike we knew it was the right place for us.

The day the boys and I sailed into Sarnia was gorgeous, hot, cloudless, and the perfect launch into an expected beautiful Canadian summer.  How wrong I was!  It would be two full months before we saw a daytime high anywhere close to what we experienced the day we arrived.  Though Ana, the kids and I still travelled to the boat nearly every weekend, the days were characterized by unseasonably cold temperatures, frigid north winds, torrential downpours and docks that were practically deserted except for us.  Since we weren’t able to enjoy much time on the water, we spent a lot of time exploring Sarnia and Port Huron, which is her US sister across the river.  Sarnia has the unenviable claim to fame of being home to the largest petrochemical processing centre in Canada.  “Chemical Valley” is a three mile stretch of oil refineries, chemical plants and other sorts of industrial monstrosities that feature tall smokestacks with fire shooting out of the tops of them.   But as usual, the places with the worst reputations are usually where you find amazing culture, friendly and humble people and lots of hidden gems if you are willing to spend the time exploring.  So that’s what we did and we were not disappointed.  We found festivals, shows, antique markets, cool shops, coffee houses, a horse racing track, farmers market, pubs and, most importantly, an Olive Garden restaurant in Port Huron which is literally a ten minute drive from the marina.  And since that is Ana’s favourite restaurant we have become Saturday night regulars.

Directly beside the marina is a nine hole golf course so Magnus and I bought golf clubs and begin most Saturday mornings with a round of golf, while the ladies cruise around Sarnia checking out garage sales.  As a kid I spent many summers at our family cottage in Fishing Lake, Saskatchewan and an integral part of those summer days was playing at least two rounds of golf per day.  So I was very happy that Magnus took an interest in golfing, and Stella too is very excited to start too once she gets a bit older and strong enough to clobber those balls.

So though we enjoyed our May and June weekends in Sarnia, the weather was an absolute bust.  In fact, we had planned an extra long weekend sailing trip up the US coastline for the last weekend in June, but the weather forecast was so atrocious that we threw in the towel, flipped the middle finger to Sarnia and instead took a driving trip down to Pittsburgh, Washington, Annapolis and the Finger Lake region in upstate New York and had an amazing trip.  Thankfully, as soon July arrived the temperatures went up and summer really began.  We spent the first two weekends on the water in glorious sunshine exploring the lake, river and did even manage to make that long weekend trip up the US side.

So here we are on Friday, July 17^th ready to embark on our annual two week sailing trip.  We bolt out of work at 4:30 sharp, go home to load up our gear, and arrive at the marina by 7:30 and the boat packed and prepped for the ride.  Our plan is to leave tomorrow morning at 4am and head straight up the middle of the lake for 143 miles to reach Tobermory, which is at the tip of the Bruce Peninsula and serves as the gateway to Georgian Bay and the North Channel.

After readying the boat and cleaning off five pounds of bird droppings from the topsides, we meet up with our dock friends Rick and Patty and invite them into the Bella Blue saloon for a Friday night drink.  They are local Sarniavians (Sarnittes?  Sarnappians?  Sardines?) and Patty serves as the Lord Mother of our dock.  Her responsibilities include organizing the annual potluck breakfast and Canada Day BBQ, official greeter, gossip verifier, and most recently, chief boater lobbyist who has convinced marina staff to provide fresh Timmy’s coffee and doughnuts every Saturday morning in the gazebo....for free!  Rick and Patty are lovely and pretty much the only people with whom we have struck up a friendship, firstly because they are so cool, and secondly because they actually spend time at their boat on the weekends.  The docks have been literally deserted most weekends and we really haven’t been able to figure out why.  Bad weather, sure, but there were still hardly any people on the docks during the past two beautiful weekends.  We think that most are locals and therefore just come down to the marina, jump 0n their boats and take off, then return when they are done and immediately go home.  Or maybe they come down during the week when we are not here.  It has been one of the biggest differences from Port Dover, where most of the boaters were not local and therefore stayed on their boats all weekend, which provided for a very active social scene.

Our guests part company with us around midnight and we pack it in shortly after that, wanting to get a few hours of sleep before our planned early morning departure.