Finding friends

Leaving Drummond Island, our first U.S. stop we had planned was Mackinaw City. There is not much between Drummond Island and Mackinaw City, so this was going to be a long day. The night before I set up waypoints, and calculated that our trip would be a little over 90 km. Accordingly, we got up early, so we could leave early. Normally the weather is best in the morning, and winds build throughout the day, so early morning trips are the way to go. Leaving early also allows us time for a plan B in case something goes south.

Just after leaving Drummond we passed this ship waiting at anchor, it was almost 700 feet long.

Light house near De Tour village. We passed several like this one on the journey.

Along the way we got rid of some spiders that had been riding along with us. Louise uses this gadget that grabs the spider safely, without injuring it, so it will still be alive when you throw it in the lake.

The previous night we had heavy winds, but these dropped off around midnight, and the winds for our trip today were supposed to be "normal", about 15 kmph. Based on our weather apps, we were expecting waves about 0.5 ft high along the route, which would be in a fairly exposed area through the top of lake Huron.

The ride started out smooth.

Just outside De Tour inlet we passed two fishing buoys close together. The flags are small, and so we did not see them until they were fairly close. Not knowing what was under them, we swung wide to stay as far away as we could. The fast course change put us broadside to the waves, which really sucked, but only for a few moments. Really glad we gave them a wide berth. Louise googled the flag layout and found that they mark big fish traps, huge nets set below the surface. Even though they are supposed to be deep down, you don't want to go anywhere near them. Glad we took evasive action.

There were some light winds when we got up, but the water was calm, so we were expecting a calm day. For the first 30 km this was the case, but gradually the waves built up over the morning. It actually was not that windy, but the fetch was so long that waves were building big. To add to the fun, the waves were following (going the same direction we were) which tends to create handling issues for our boat.

Louise took a turn piloting.

There are two basic types of power boats, full displacement and planing. Full displacement boats always have their hull in the water, and their speed is limited by the ability to move the water out of the way. Full displacement hulls are rounded at the stern, like a sailboat. For a boat our size, full displacement means a speed limit of about 15 kmph. Planing boats have a hull which is designed to ride ON the water. The hull on these boats is much flatter on the bottom and on the stern. The motor pushes the boat fast enough to climb the bow wave, and so these kinds of boats skim over the surface of the water and can go at much faster speeds.

Our boat is a trawler design, which should mean a full-displacement hull. However, full-displacement trawlers don't sell as well as planing boats do, so manufacturers have come up with a design called semi-displacement. This is basically a displacement boat with a flatter stern. The boat cannot plane, but can ride up a bit on top of the bow wave and go faster than full displacement. Our boat has this design.

The flat stern and relatively flat bottom at the stern make the boat hard to handle in following seas. Sailboats and other full displacement designs handle these conditions much better due to the rounded stern that the waves cannot "grab". In our case, the waves push the flat stern of the boat, making it swing around. This is what we dealt with for hours today. The autopilot did not handle it well, so we had to switch to manual. As the morning wore on, the waves got bigger, eventually becoming about 2 - 3 foot rollers. To try to smooth out the ride, we tried to match speed with the waves, but could not get it exact. It appeared that we were in a mix of wave trains, which was giving us two wavelengths to manage. Coming in to Mackinac Island, we were sometimes "surfing" down the front of waves. Wheeeee.

As we rounded Mackinac Island the waves smoothed out in the lee, but now we had to deal with ferry wakes. Lots of ferrys here, and they go really fast (50 kmph) making huge wakes. We survived and made it to the marina, where we discovered that we were a snug fit in the slip. Our beam is 14 feet, and the slip was only about 16 feet wide, so we touched on both sides as we came in. Luckily the rub rail soaked up the hits. We had to set up fenders on both sides of the boat, and we actually had to wedge the fenders in. It was tight.

We even got waked by a pirate ship! Crazy traffic here with ferrys.

We got tied up and walked down the dock to check in with the marina. At the end of the dock were two ladies sitting on a bench and talking. As we passed by, Louise stopped dead and exclaimed "Chrisie?". Turns out one of the ladies was Chrisie, who we had met at Hurst marina last year and visited with her and her husband Steve on the Rideau. We have stayed in touch with them since that time, and were really hoping that we would meet up again and travel together. We knew that they were on lake Michigan, but thought they were ahead of us and much further south. So random meeting her here, but so wonderful! We were on our way to visit the icebreaker museum that is beside the marina, and it turned out that we met her husband Steve in the engine room of the icebreaker! We also met the captain of Act III, the looper boat who gave us the slow pass after we had been serially waked by the Maple Leaf rendezvous on Georgian bay. We finished our tour with Steve, then met up with both Steve and Chrisie on their boat, Miss K, to visit and catch up.

Fast forward and we all went out for dinner together at a terrible Italian restaurant. The decor of the restaurant was like a hunting lodge, and the food was like a frozen dinner. The mozza on my lasagna was not even melted. I think they just get their food pre-made from Costco and microwave it when you order. The meal was not cheap either! Total tourist trap. After dinner Steve and Chrisie came over to our boat for a visit, before we turned in for the night. 

The decor fit a hunting lodge better than an Italian restaurant.

Deer in the ceiling.

Steve & Chrisie.

Bill & Weez

We wanted to buddy-boat with them down lake Michigan, but unfortunately, not knowing we would meet each other, we had each made different plans and reservations for the following few days. We had booked several marinas so we could visit Charlevoix, and then to hunker down for a storm to pass, while they had plans at marinas on the Wisconsin side. We made plans to meet up after the storm passed, as we would cross over to the west side of the lake as soon as the weather allowed and catch up with them.

Next morning we got underway early for another long passage to Charlevoix. It was pretty calm, but again we had following seas, which our autopilot does not do well with. We used it anyway, but our course was pretty meandering. Making the turn near Hog island, we hit confused seas. It seems that there are 2 or 3 currents that meet here to create rocky conditions. We had experienced this two years ago when we were crew to bring Kylia's boat over from Michigan. The waves were not super-large for us this day, but did make the boat corkscrew and I had to disengage the autopilot for a while. Somewhat different from bringing Kylia's boat as the pyramid waves that day were more than 8 feet high.

Mackinaw bridge "Big Mac" as seen from the bottom.

Double Big Mac.

As we approached Charlevoix inlet, we overheard another boat asking about the bridge opening. Bridge opening? Ooops. I need to be more careful to check the charts for lift bridges. Anyways, we got lucky again as the conversation we overheard indicated the bridge would open in 5 minutes. I increased the RPMs to make sure we made the opening. 

Coming into the round lake in Charlevoix was incredible. The lake was completely ringed by high-end condos and houses. What a nice area! 

There were even two boathouses with what looked like 20 foot overhead clearances, with huge yachts inside. The small lake was completely surrounded by high-end homes and condos, and there were docks and marinas around the whole circumference of the place. Some absolutely huge boats. This is a nice place.

Massive boathouse.

Because we are travelling through multiple states this trip, we need something called as cruising license. We got this when we crossed the border in Drummond island. Part of the requirements of this license is that we have to report in to customs each time we stop for the night. This is done using the CBProam app, but when you notify them, they have to approve your notification. At Mackinaw City this was pretty smooth, but we had lots of problems the second time around. For some reason, the internet and cell service were both really crappy in the town (even Starlink) when we got here, and this time the CBP officer requested a video call. We tried several times to connect with him but could not get the call to work. The officer eventually approved our port, but we suspect we will be on a video call the next day.

Trout pond in the harbour. Some really big fish!

Dragon sculpture on one of the houses on lake Michigan. The house owner also owns the bookstore in town.

The town of Charlevoix is known for the Mushroom houses. These are 28 homes that all were designed by Earl Young, who used natural materials and always designed the houses without moving any trees or changing the elevation of the ground. Some beautiful homes, and each is designed differently. All are built with large lake stones, and feature hidden doorways and rounded roofs and walls. Apparently these are now mostly rentals, running to $2600 per night to stay at. Really impressive. 

This house had a thatch roof, that was made by specialists from the Netherlands. They even imported the thatch. These houses are really expensive to maintain. 

The retaining walls are designed to look like waves.

This house was built by stacking carefully selected stones. Really impressive workmanship.

Next morning they had a farmer's market set up on the street behind us, so Louise checked it out while I filled the water tanks and got the boat ready to move. 

Farmers market beside the marina.

While the farmer's market was going on, a yoga class was underway at the park beside the marina.

We got underway a couple of minutes before the bridge was scheduled to open, and had a really nice cruise to our next destination, Bay Harbour. 

On the way out of the harbour at Charlevoix, we passed a gill tug coming into the harbour that had been converted to a "pleasure" boat. Wonder what it looks like on the inside?

Just as we were about to go under the draw bridge we watched several private jets taking off from the local airport.

It was a short cruise day, only about 1 1/2 hours to get to Bay Harbour. Coming past the breakwater here was like entering billionaire's row. We saw an 80 foot boat coming out just before we got to the entrance. Luckily we passed the wake from his hole shot. The boat was doing 40 kmph on AIS! The first boat we passed on entering the harbour was a 102 foot mega yacht, and it was not the biggest boat in the harbour. 

102 foot mega-yacht.

Mansion and mega-yacht. The whole harbour was like this.

The docks were vast and loaded with really big boats, all of them polished and gleaming. The harbour is ringed by private residences that are castles, each with a bigger boat docked out front. This place is not a town, but a man-made harbour that is basically a resort for the super-rich. Money money money.

This wooden boat gleamed like polished furniture. Our furniture at home did not look this good. We used to keep our boat at Aylings boat yard, which specializes in wooden boats. The maintenance on these wooden boats is insane, and keeping it looking like this requires regular polishing. There were not even spiders on the boat.

We had a long wait for our CBP roam  check-in. After yesterday we were expecting them to call us, but they just approved us again, although it took much longer than the previous days. After getting approval from customs, we went for a walk. This facility is not a town, it is a resort. 

The resort has several patios.

The whole resort area is owned by one company, and seems to be a mix of hotel, condos and mansions. It was like billionaire Disneyland. Actually, it reminded me a lot of a ski-resort with boats. Everything was expensive. We asked if we could use the pool as marina customers, and they said sure, for $50 extra you get full use of it. We decided to go back to the boat and snooze. To be honest, we did not feel comfortable here. 

Tomorrow we have a short run to Petoskey, where we will stay until Monday to wait out a storm. The forecast is for 4 to 5 foot waves on the north part of the lake the day after tomorrow (8 footers on the south), but conditions will start to go bad tomorrow afternoon. The winds are supposed to pick up in the late morning, so we will leave here tomorrow morning early enough to make sure we avoid any drama. The trick is that we cannot leave too early, as we need to arrive when the marina is open. Kinda nervous tonight, but the show must go on.

Boat name of the day: Miss K