Story of Our Summer Cruise 2013

June 19 - Northport to Elk Rapids

Chart of Grand Traverse Bay showing Our Route to Northport and Elk Rapids

A beautiful, if cool morning, greeted us today for our short ride of about 20 nm to Elk Rapids on the East Bay. Judy took the boat out of the harbor and we soon had a course set for Old Mission Pensinsula which divides the East and West Bays.

We passed inland of Bellows Island (aka Gull or Trout Island) with its ruined building still standing. Bellows Island was first settled by birds and then by humans in the 1850s. The ruined house was built in 1910 and was last occupied in the late 1920s having lost the battle with the birds - shades of Alfred Hitchcock! The property passed through several hands before it was purchased by the Leelanau Conservancy to protect it as a nesting site for the largest Herring Gull colony on the Great Lakes, cormorants and mergansers.

Bellows (Gull, Trout, etc) Island

After rounding Old Mission Peninsula, we just had a slight course correction to bring us right into Elk Rapids Marina where we arrived at about 1130 and were assigned a great slip looking south.

Several Nordics were already here including Ingomar (37) and Jillian (32). Albin & Co arrived soon after us followed by Taitug (37) from Canada.

M/V Taitug

I just found out that one of my entries into the current Western Michigan Area Show, organized by the Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, was awarded one of three Director's Prizes and purchased for its Permanent Collection.

Arlington Row - A Palladium/Platinum Print on Vellum with Gold Leaf

This historic photographic process using rare metals has been modified so the image is printed on translucent vellum. The vellum is then backed with 24 carat gold leaf to give a gold tone to the image such that it appears almost icon-like. There only a few printers in the US using this technique.

More boats continued to arrive for the Rendezvous during the afternoon while we washed the boat for the first time since leaving and cleaned up the inside. It was soon time to head for our meet and greet in the new pavilion at the marina where we will be spending the next few days. We had a great few hours meeting old acquaintances and some of the new members of the fleet.

June 19 - 22 GLANTOA Rendezvous in Elk Rapids

See www.glantoa.net for Rendezvous Report

June 23 - Elk Rapids to St. Ignace

 

We were on the water by 7:30 in calm water and sun but it soon changed as we headed north in Grand Traverse Bay when the fog started to move in. Soon visibility had dropped to less than half a mile and this continued until we made the turn east near the top of the chart. Running in fog is not too big a concern for us as our radar is very good and we get plenty of accurate warning when other boats are around. AIS also gives us warnings of all commercial boats within an 18 mile radius so it help us keep out of their way - a good thing! For example, we were able to "see" the St. Mary's Challenger, a tug we encountered heading south last week pushing a barge near us in to Charlevoix. From the screen we can tell the vessel's name, length, beam, draft, course and even how close they will get if we both maintain the same course.

Our trip in the fog was uneventful and when we made the sharp turn east at Gray's Reefl we passed a normal landmark, the abandoned lighthouse, 400 yds distant but never sighted it.

 

Zoomed Right In!

As normally happens, just when we were not looking forward to another couple of hours in fog, it suddenly lifted and we could see back south along the coast for around eight hours.

Accompanied by several sail boats we made short work of the trip to the Mackinac Bridge, once the longest suspension bridge in the world, towering over us by more than 150 feet.

 

 

 

In a short time, we were safely docked at the St. Ignace Municipal Marina and their first question was - "When are you bringing the Nordic Tug fleet back?" They were very pleased we had decided to return for our 2014 Rendezvous and gave us a few ideas for the Program.

June 24 - St. Ignace

Nice day with warm temperatures but lots of bugs in our corner of the Marina. If you ever come in here, try to avoid a slip right at the west end on C dock. They had a couple of hatches and the bugs like the protection in the corner.

Later in the morning, "Carrie Rose" and "Dolly (Bill and Jo Schaars)" joined us from Mackinac City just across the Straits. This gave us a good opportunity to catch up with Bill and Jo with whom we spent the last two summers. The rest of the day was spent on the mundane port activities of shopping and laundry before a very good dinner at the Mackinac Grille.

June 25 - St. Ignace to Thessalon

Thunderstorms rolled in early in the morning and the line was stretched back into the UP - it did not look promising for a departure but, by late morning, the skies had cleared and we all headed out to Canada.

Our route took us north of Mackinac Island and then east to the Detour Passage with a short winding course through a number of island before crossing the border into Canada. The journey is normally relatively easy with the odd freighter seen in the distance. Today was to be a little different!

To understand the day a little better, it helps to have a a bit of background on the area. The dashed lines on the chart above represent designated shipping channels used by commercial boat traffic. We are not restricted to following these courses but the larger freighters have to stick close to them for safety reasons otherwise they would be all over the chart. If you look carefully, you will see that around eight of the course lines converge in the small gap in the center of the chart. At this point the Detour Passage begins between Detour to the west and Drummond Island to the east. This channel is relatively narrow and leads off to the northwest to the Soo Locks which are the gateway to Lake Superior.

Freighters carrying primarily iron ore, coal, stone, and grain travel from a number of ports in the northern US and Canada down this channel before heading south into Lake Huron, where their journey could taken them anywhere in the world, or west to any number of ports on Lake Michigan.

This could lead you to conclude that there must be a lot of boats going through this channel every day. And you would be correct. I don't know the number of boats per day but in the 3 mile stretch we encountered four freighters and one large ferry.

Before we arrived at the channel we had our first encounter with a freighter, Joseph L Block, heading for Port Dolomite on a course that cut right across our path. This freighter is 200 m or about 640' long and 20 m or 65' beam (wide) and runs at about 15 mph. We could see him on radar and AIS and knew his course, speed, etc. and even when he would be at the closest point to us if we both maintained our course. The available information showed he would be within 400 yds when he passed us. The difficult thing to judge is whether he would be 400 yds in front of us or 400 yds behind. Regardless, 400 yds is very close to get to a freighter. We had a few choices, slow down but then we could put ourselves in the path of the freighter, speed up and we could still be in the path of the freighter, or move close to the shore off his course (not much room there). Dolly and Carrie Rose were behind us and were probably closer to the freighter than we were.

We passed safely in front of the freighter when it was clear that we had ample room, Dolly also made it ahead of the freighter but was a bit closer while Carrie Rose had to break off her course and circle to allow the freighter to pass. I think this was the closest any of us had been to a freighter and they are BIG! We did get some good close-up photos.

Dolly and the Joseph L. Block

We then encountered four additional freighters and tug/barge combinations all within two miles of the Detour Lighthouse shown below.

 

After this experience, navigating the small island to reach the Canadian border was a relief and we soon entered Canadian waters with the ceremonial hoisting of the flag on the bow. By custom, a foreign vessel flies a courtesy flag of the host country on the bow.

 

Just a short run from the border we were in Thessalon on the north shore of the North Channel, safely docked for the night, and cleared by Canadian Customs via a telephone call and a short interview.