Day 11 Sunday, May 31, 2015

Hammond Bay Harbor to Presque Isle

Winds were strong from the NW all through the night, bringing serious cold with them. Several days in a row were now close to freezing at night, my propane stove was working overtime. I took to wearing my hat even inside the cabin during those cold days.
I left Hammond Bay without having seen a soul. This is clearly extremely early in the season, most cottages on shore are deserted, no other boats, very few people and tourists. Good for me.
Sailing was very good initially, but the wind clocked E eventually and forced me to tack to stay on an efficient point of sail. The Caprice doesn't move well when pointing, so zig-zagging is overall faster than going a straight line in such conditions. Unfortunately the wind now diminished and I started motorsailing. The day was beautiful though, only the waves on my beam made for a rolly ride. I kept the main up though to reduce the rolling. Approching Presque Isle, a sailboat going NW passed me, and he didn't have any sails up and was rolling so bad it made me sick just watching him.
I got to Presque Isle and anchored in this very well protected bay. Because the east-west waves cause a swell in the harbor, I deployed the stern anchor to stabilize the Caprice. I've gotten fond of using both anchors, even though retrieving them is much harder than a single one.

Talking anchors - so far the Rocna has been outstanding. Not a single case of dragging anchor, and I've anchored every night apart from the one night at Mackinac Island. Unless I'm in a tight spot I don't even bother with the anchor alarm anymore.
I rowed ashore and visited the two pretty lighthouses on this peninsula. 'Presque Isle' means 'almost an island'. There's a narrow strip of land connecting the island to the mainland, this was often used by the natives to 'portage' their canoes across instead of paddling along the shore.

They displayed a lifeboat from the days when ships were often foundering around here, and its name St. Crapo could be the motto of some of my less successful days.

Again no propane refill here, it's also pretty deserted, but the store has the little propane bottles and I buy a bunch of them this time, even at the high prices, because the coming nights are still going to be freezing.
They also sell those little smoked hunter sausages I first found at Harbor Springs and got to love, so I got myself a few of them. Not enough though as I ate them all before even getting back on the Caprice.

Mackinac Island photos

As promised, a few photos from this pretty island

Normal mode of transportation is either bikes, or horse drawn wagons.

Giant ships have to pass through the narrow channel between Round Island and Mackinac Island. You can see the Caprice docked in the harbor opposite the big motor yacht.

Houses here tend to be ugly and cheap

Day 10 Saturday, May 30, 2015

Mackinac Island to Hammond Bay Harbor

I haven't been able to post anything for the last few days as I've been in places with very weak cell signal, let alone luxuries like wifi.

I stayed on Mackinac Island a few more hours. I walked up to the fort first, and was pretty much by myself. I got a cannon shot demonstration (they shoot it every full hour during the day), and walked around the battlements. Mackinac was a strategically important place for much of the 1800s.

On the way up the fort I saw a strange structure - a tree bark chapel. Apparently this is a replica of some chapel the missionaries here built to convert the natives. Those missionaries and explorers were seriously nuts, travelling the lakes in canoes. Compared with that travelling on the Caprice is the height of luxury.

My propane situation was getting a little tight. So far on this trip I hadn't found anywhere to refill my 10 pound aluminum tank, and the little one-pound bottles tended to be very expensive. Here they were $6.99 (in Chicago you can find them for $2.50-$2.99).
I next rented a bike to go around the island - there's an asphalt road all the way along the coastline which made for a quick circumnavigation of less than an hour. The flies and cold got to me a little though, and after lunch on the Caprice I got out of there.

I headed south across the strait and then ESE along the coast. With brisk following winds but manageable waves, this became a very fast sail, often reaching Caprice max speeds. This boat is made for those kinds of conditions. I decided I couldn't stop now and continued down the coast towards Hammond Bay Harbor. I briefly toyed with the idea of even going further to Rogers City, but that would have been a very long ride. When I had to turn into the wind outside the harbor to lower the sails, I realized that wind velocity had gotten pretty high, one often doesn't notice when one has wind and waves from the quarter.

Hammond Bay Harbor was deserted, apart from one forlorn docked sailboat and fishing boat. Nobody to be seen anywhere.

Day 9 Friday, May 29, 2015

Sturgeon Bay to Mackinac Island

It seems to be a rule that an easy day must be followed by one of 'agony' as Danny is aptly putting the sailing life. After an uneventful night I took off sailing and set myself the challenge not to use the engine until arrival unless absolutely necessary. As the winds were predicted to be a nice southern breeze it looked hopeful. It started well but the wind slowly diminished, but I was hopeful that once I'd passed the old abandoned lighthouse and turned east, things would improve. I had been complaining about the flies in the last days, but I hadn't seen anything yet. Today I was swamped by them. In the following pictures you can see them everywhere (they were on me too)

The old abandoned lighthouse at Grey's reef. All the dots in the air around the Caprice are those pesky flies.

After turning east the wind really started pushing me nicely, and even the flies diminished a little. But after just 20 minutes of wonderful speedy sailing the wind totally died. And the flies had me now. After suffering through them another ten minutes I threw in the towel and finally started the engine. Damn flies.

Finally approaching the bridge. I had used the hose to attempt to clear off the flies, but that was hopeless, they were back within minutes (or rather, the brothers and sisters of the drowning victims)

When it started raining I actually welcomed it since that washed many of them off, at least for a few minutes.

I love engineering, and man, look at that bridge. Imagine the engineers and the workers that built this. 

Even though it was raining, my admiral advised me that satellite maps gave hope for a nice afternoon, so I called Mackinac Island marina and asked if they had a slip for me. They took a little to check for me and then said 'yes'. Which was a joke when I later found that they had all of 6 boats or so in right now.

The wind had picked up after I passed under the bridge and I started sailing towards the island, but after I crossed the NW-SE shipping channel the wind diminished so I restarted the engine to get clear of all the shipping and ferries. At least there were no other sailboats in sight.
Suddenly, the engine alarm came on, with a 'Cooling water temperature' warning light. I quickly checked the exhaust and saw no water coming out there, so I shut down the engine in a hurry and left the autopilot in charge while I checked the engine. Just then a tanker passed me but I was well off his side, so no worry.

I quickly established that the intake all the way to the pump was free by unclamping the hose from the pump and observing free water flow. I also felt that the hose up to the pump was cool, but hot right behind it. The engine was pretty warm, but the alarm had prevented any serious overheating. Don't you love Yanmars? I unclamped and took off the water pump and took it into the cockpit to check the impeller. There it was:

No big deal! I have spare impellers (because I get them but forget to actually replace them on a regular basis). It took only a few minutes before I had it all together, and all was well again. The autopilot in the meantime had steered me close to the island and I finally docked.

Mackinac Island Marina is usually packed, it's hard to get a slip without a prior reservation. Not today! There are some advantages to being here early in the season. Also, they tell me the flies get worse later. Hard to imagine.

Mackinac Island is as gorgeous as the guidebooks say, even the main tourist drag downtown is attractive. I'll stay until tomorrow lunchtime and check it out some more (and post more photos).

Day 8 Thursday, May 28, 2015

Fisherman's Island to Sturgeon Bay (MI) via Harbor Springs

Since I had missed my window of opportunity to get through the straits I decided to take it a little easier again today , also since the day started foggy. That eventually cleared up and turned into a beautifully clear day, albeit without any wind. Today was to be a 98% motoring day. I headed towards Harbor Springs for a supply run, and to look around that posh place. I got there without incident (apart from losing my bucket that I foolishly tried to dip into the water at full speed, ripping off the handle.

I got diesel and a well deserved pumpout at Harbor Springs, but no propane refill, just a single 1 pound bottle. I'll have to keep searching.

Harbor Springs coastline is dotted with cheap shacks as you can see above, but the grocery store was indeed making my eyes well up with tears. Chicago is a cheaper place to buy your food for sure...

Moving on north I was planning on anchoring in Sturgeon Bay (not the Wisconsin town but rather a small, uninhabited bay just south of the strait.

As the promised east wind didn't appear I kept on motoring almost all the time, teased by occasional puffs that made me set the sails, but which quickly died. This made me run somewhat late, and I was glad to reach my destination just after sunset but before it got dark. There were many uncharted fishing stakes in the area that I'd rather not get entangled with (and their owners).

There hadn't been phone reception for almost the whole way from Harbor Springs, but at my destination a very faint signal allowed me to tell my admiral of my safe arrival.

Day 7 Wednesday, May 27, 2015

Northport to Fisherman's Island

The trip so far had been without any mishaps, even the break in Frankfort for weather wasn't really needed but since I'd been making good time I felt I could relax a bit. Things were going to change in a hurry today:

Since the weather forecast for Thursday predicted east winds, which would make the Strait of Mackinac a real pain, I thought to press on and possibly make it to there today. I left Northport really early, ignoring a small craft advisory. The wind was blowing rather fiercely. I unfurled Ginny's jib (my converted and repaired J105 jib that Ginny from the club gifted to me last year) and it promply flogged itself to bits before I could even trim it. Well, I had my doubts if it would last long, and it got me through the first 6 days, but now it was curtains for that sail.

I refurled the jib but elected not to attempt to raise another jib just yet, as the wind was really picking up, and the hated swell from aft was making my life rather miserable. I raised a tiny bit of mainsail just for the extra free drive it would provide in addition to the engine, but kept the main in its cradle.

Even so I was running before the wind at a nice clip.

Looking back I noticed the dinghy doing its usual race with the Caprice, but also that it was filled with some water. I had bailed the dinghy before departure in Northport of the copious rainwater from the day before, but the following seas were sometimes depositing nice buckets of new water in the dinghy. I feared that it might fully swamp itself and went on reverse course to shield the dinghy from the waves as I attempted to bail it. As both dinghy and Caprice were doing a crazy dance by that time, the waves had become rather inconveniently large, this was a difficult undertaking. I had to be careful not to get my fingers between the boats when they bounced on and against each other. As I attempted to keep the dinghy close to the stern, the Caprice several times jumped on it and attempted to sink it outright, even hitting it with the rudder (the rudder on the Caprice is far under the overhang and hard to get hit by, really.

As I had to go really slow to prevent the dinghy line to snap, the rolling turned even worse, and I eventually had to feed my breakfast to the fishes. I managed to bail the dinghy enough to continue, and decided to give it some more line, expecting that this would let it run free and be less likely to be pulled up in front and flooded in the stern. Unfortunately that was just the wrong way to deal with it - the dinghy ran off in all kinds of directions while the Caprice was yawing all over, and quickly got totally swamped, and even turned turtle!

I was by now really worried about losing the dinghy. I had no way to right it, and conditions were nasty enough for me to be careful not to attempt acrobatics on the foredeck. The dinghy acted as a drogue, slowing progress, and I was worried to either break it or rip its line. The cleat on which it was attached was groaning in torture.

After trying a few things to flip it, I decided to move slowly into shelter behind a nearby anchorage. Nearby that is, if you can go at a decent speed. I was going only at 2 knots however.

Curiously, after continuing like this a mile the dinghy righted itself. It was totally swamped, of course, but didn't put such a break on our speed any more. It still seemed to take forever before I reached that anchorage. I started the oven, took off my drenched clothiing and hung it on a clothesline in the cabin, and promptly took a nap on the bunk.

The weather was finally starting to turn nicer. I cleaned up the mess below, then had a little lunch, and tackled bailing the dinghy. Countless buckets later, and I could use it to row around the anchorage for a few shots. 

The weather now turned actually pretty nice, but I decided to stay put here for the night. The thousands of flies liked my sail:

Yes, those dots are not dirt!

Day 6 Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Frankfort to Northport

No photos today, which is a shame because the Sleeping Bear Dunes are very impressive when it's not foggy. As it was, soon after leaving Frankfort I was in increasingly dense fog, Sailing was great though, as long as I had the wind and waves not straight on my tail.
Going through the Manitou Passage I knew that there was some commercial traffic in the passage, as I saw one of them on AIS, and heard him talking to another captain on VHF. I couldn't see or hear a thing however, and carefully kept at the extreme right of the passage. I had played with the thought of anchoring at South Manitou island, but it would have been too dangerous to cross traffic in this visibility.
The autopilot started misbehaving all of a sudden, over correcting my course. I took his cover off, expecting the usual problem with a pulley that likes to jump off one of the wheels occasionally. This time the pulley was all right, so I was initially stumped and put its cover back. It's kind of hard to diagnose the thing while out sailing in fog, but eventually I decided to look it over again when I got bored steering by hand. This time I realized that a sliding contraption on the main puller/pusher bar was very loose. After tightening its screw the autopilot was working very well again. Come to think of it, maybe it would have worked better the day before when the spinnaker drove me to distraction.
Weather was getting increasingly nasty, more and more rain, and eventually started getting through to me even under the bimini and dodger. I called Northport marina on the phone to advise them of my arrival, but got an answering machine only. Navionics and GPS really saved my bacon, because for several hours I saw nothing around me at all. On my way into Traverse Bay I passed one buoy with a bell at a distance of less than 100 yards but only heard its bell. Another buoy I almost ran over, I only saw it as I passed it at 10 yard distance.
Arriving at Northport the weather momentarily cleared, but I found the marina deserted. Not wanting to dock by myself without any idea where I should berth, I exited the marina and anchored outside. Soon the fog returned.

Day 5 Monday, May 25, 2015 (Memorial day)

The weather was predicted to be rather nasty, with high chance of thunderstorms and strong winds from the south. I decided to make it a rest day. I rowed to shore and chatted with Zach the harbormaster, who told me that the hardware store was already closed. The town was pretty, with a beach resort feel to it. The season hasn't really started though, and the few tourists I saw looked rather lost (probably like myself).

 At the beach at the west end of town, kite surfers and old-fashioned surfers were plying their trade

Day 4 Sunday, May 24, 2015

Pentwater to Frankfort

This was a pretty uneventful sail. With following winds and swells, the Caprice is capricious to control, and the autopilot tends to overcompensate (more on that later). I tried to run with both jib and main to one side or the other, then the spinnaker, and finally wing-on-wing. Neither is comfortable and because the Caprice rolls like a mother and will not keep a stable course with the autopilot. Steering by hand for hours and hours wasn't much fun. My usual routine when weather and conditions permit is to set and trim sails, then set the autopilot and grab a book. My egg timer reminds me every 15 minutes to look around.

I got attacked by swarms of little flies early on, but they seem to live literally only hours, and either get eaten by spiders, drown or just freeze to death. No photos today.

As I was experimenting with different sails another sailboat, a larger Hunter, caught up with me on a straight course going north. I kept zig-zagging away from shore and towards it to gain some stability and speed, actually. I ended up meeting this Hunter several times when I zig-zagged.

Day 3 Saturday, May 23, 2015

Pt Washington to Pentwater

Today was a beautiful day to cross. Initially, as predicted by my dependable mission control Chris Inniss, it was almost dead calm, but a breeze started picking up from the south during the day.
You can see the Pt Washington power station dead astern

Picked up a passenger: This little bird fluttered on board miles out at sea, How do they fly that far? He proceeded to hop all over the deck, I hope he ate many spiders

Since it was peaceful I entertained myself with fixing the throne room. A plug on the bottom of it leaks, with the obvious results. My previous attempts to fix this with teflon tape, and then with silicone both failed, so this time I decided to use Polypoxy, a powerful epoxy compound ment to work even underwater in emergencies. This was on board from the previous owner for who knows how many years. The stuff was incredibly thick and hard to get out of its tubes (which I in fact broke when squeezing them too hard), but after mixing stuck so well to the plug that I doubt it will ever come off again. The leak is finally fixed.

I got to Pentwater without incident, and anchored in the 'French Town' area.

Anchored in Little Bayou, Pentwater:

Day 2 Friday, May 22, 2015

Racine to Pt Washington

Since the wind was predicted to be less than perfect for crossing the lake today, I decided to move north along the coast to Pt Washington, a place Peter Kovats had recommended. Precisely as predicted, winds were very nice and with no waves I had a relaxed time. I didn't see a single sailboat out (but several fishing boats), even though it was a gorgeous day.
I arrived at Port Washington in the late afternoon and anchored in the NW corner of the outer harbor. I had to anchor twice since the first time I ended up too close to the wall. The next morning after breakfast I rowed ashore and took this picture:

You can see the dinghy on the wall to the left.

Day 1 Thursday, May 21, 2015

Chicago to Racine

I started my cruise a few days later than planned. First I couldn't get everything finished in time (actually, a boat is never ever finished until it's sunk or wrecked, there's always something that needs doing). One of the more important things to do was to get a better anchor, and get the bow roller fixed to easily deploy and retrieve it. I got a 33 pound Rocna:

I also replaced my Trojan T105 golf cart batteries with new ones. I had planned to keep the old ones and basically double my capacity, but I couldn't find any space on board to mount them, they are real monsters and hard to move around. I thought the old ones were likely worn out anyways, but I think I was wrongly blaming the batteries when it was badly oxidized contacts that caused me to have less capacity than planned.
I got myself a true sine inverter, finally they have become affordable, and that Xantrex 1000 has worked like a charm so far. Finally my microwave works beautifully, and that is such a handy thing to have. Think heat up your cereal in the morning, a cup of water for tea, or leftovers from the last meal.

Then when I was ready enough the weather was very bad - cold winds from the north and rain. But on Thursday I finally headed out north.
I had bought a brand new club burgee and a Stars and Stripes windsock since I never had replaced my flag pole that I lost in the Straits of Macinac a few years back. Unfortunately, I managed to lose the burgee on the first day already, I must have attached it wrongly. Stupid...

The day started cold but with a good steady west wind, and it became clear and a perfect sailing day. I pressed on to Racine where I anchored in an area my older charts didn't show. I had sprung for Navionics software on my Android tablet, which helped me find this place (after a hint from Active Captain). Unfortunately the Navionics software is kind of crappy, occasionally just not showing details on maps unless you reboot the program, and lacking even the most rudimentary of features like marking and following a route. They want you to pay extra for their 'Navigation module', but after my disappointment with the bugs and general clumsy, non-intuitive feel of the software I'll hold off buying this.
Anyways, this was the first test of my anchor, and here is my rather odd technique. The Caprice is almost impossible to steer backwards, so after deploying the anchor, when one is supposed to backup hard and let the anchor dig in, I usually find myself not being able to back up in a straight line. Instead the old cow always breaks out to the left or right. Once she's in a curve, there's nothing on earth to get her back on course. So, the next best thing is then to let her go until she's off perpendicular to the intended anchor line, and then go forward and turn away from the anchor. Not too hard though, and with care not to entangle the line in the propeller. She then moves away from the anchor until it's taught and then jerks her around. It seems to work, but to onlookers I'm sure it looks crazy.

Here's the view the next morning:

Other good news - I took some frozen food, thinking that I'll have to eat it pretty soon when it defrosts. Turns out that my fridge when turned high will keep it frozen. In fact I have ice cubes (great for drinks!) and frozen milk (not so useful).