Mixed Emotions - Back in Canada

Well we have made it to Gore Bay on Labour Day, our first night back in Canada, and we are experiencing price shock.  Overnight dockage has jumped from $44 USD to $60 cdn.  Worst yet is food and booze.  For the past month we have been pleasantly surprised every time we received the bill at a restaurant or bar now the cost has easily doubled.  I have yet to convert fuel prices but I know that will not be good either.  Welcome to Canada.

Now that I have vented a little, I can fill you in on 3 great days of cruising.  The water has been smooth all 3 days and it is such a pleasure to boat in those conditions for a change.  We departed Mackinaw City, finally, on Saturday and after filling up with fuel and emptying the nearly bursting holding tank, we looped under the Mighty Mac (the bridge) into Lake Michigan.  Linda and I have now taken our boat into four of the Great Lakes.  We have circum-navigated three of them, Erie, Ontario and Huron.  Not bad for only having the boat 5 years.

Anyway after picking up the bragging rights, we headed to Hessel, a small village in the Les Cheneaux Islands.  It was an easy trip as we just had to basically cross the Straits of Mackinaw and go east along the UP a short way.  It was a nice harbor with floating docks and a very friendly harbor master named Gail.  For a small place it was a going concern right through to 1 AM.  There were 5 commercial buildings in town, 2 of them bars.  The Islander was a sports bar, $1.50 beers and superb wings.  The Hessel Bay Inn had a very popular Tiki Bar and both indoor and outdoor seating and a fairly comprehensive menu.  The other places of lesser importance; marine store, ice cream shop and a junk store.  Boats were coming and going from early morning until very late at night.  I have never seen so many different Boston Whaler boats.  The next most frequent were the old wooden crafts.  So neat.  They look so good and shiny and different.  Many of them with just a single person.  As we found out the next day there are tons of homes throughout the islands and boats are the primary method of getting around. 

The Channel through the Islands is narrow but well marked.  Unfortunately, the weeds were so high that the shallow depth alarm was going off constantly.  In fact, I had to stop and reverse three times to free my brand new propellers.  It was a little scary but as I said there was plenty of depth or so the charts indicated.  It took us about 2 hours to get through the islands to the nearest passage to the South Channel on Lake Huron.  We could have continued further through the islands but my nerves were shot and going 5 mph, my idle speed, was getting frustrating.  Once we hit the lake it only took an hour to get to DeTour Harbor Marina.  This marina is on the shipping channel between Drummond Island and the UP.  It is a good spot with floating docks and the cheapest fuel since Port Huron a month earlier.  By the way, diesel fuel in Hessel was $5.55 /gal.  At DeTour I paid $4.66.  The village is close to the marina and it has a couple of restaurants and a couple of bars and a really neat Garage Cafe.  The cafe serves ice cream and all kinds of milk shakes, floats and ice coffees.  It was shades of Mac City; we decided to split a Turtles Cheescake with carmel topping, as our dessert at the Mainsail for our late lunch.  After walking a bit we discovered the aforementioned cafe and indulged ourselves again.  What a mistake; we were stuffed for the rest of the day.  I couldn't even choke down any more beer.  It so happened that there was a tug boat rendezvous gathering there for Labour Day.  Six tug boats, all converted for pleasure use and all of them Canadian, arrived shortly after we did.  They were all very friendly and it was neat to talk with them and to see their boats. 

This is for the family.  One of the churches in the village chimed out every 15 minutes just like mom's clock.  Go figure, we would come across this on August 31.  For the rest of you Aug. 31 was my mother's birthday and she had a clock for as long as I can remember that chimed every 15 minutes then on the hour counted out the time.  The church did the same. 

On Labour Day we decided to go all the way to Gore Bay and give Meldrum Bay a pass.  The difference was only 32 miles.  The North Channel was ideal.  Sunny, warm and no waves or wind.  It was a truly pleasant day cruising and we easily got to Gore Bay in about 4 hours.  The docks at Gore Bay are all new.  It was quite a surprise because we were there in 2005 and we ended up docked at the fuel dock.  Now they have about 12 60 foot docks and numerous 40's and then a ton of 30 foot docks.  All new power and water; very nice.  There was only one other boat on the 60 footers so we docked there with an unobstructed view across the bay to the woods on the other side.  We have been sitting out both at night and in the morning (it is now Tuesday night as I write this part of the report) as it seems that we are alone here.  We have been swimming right off our boat as the water is 16 feet deep and crystal clear.  It is starting to get a little chilly so we do not stay in very long.  We went golfing today at the Gore Bay Country Club.  It is only 9 holes but immaculately groomed with fast greens and an interesting layout.  We played it twice today. 

While we were having our morning coffee, we assisted an older couple to dock their boat, no super yacht, near us.  Doug and Phylis have a 2007, 63 foot Neptunus.  Possibly the nicest boat I have ever seen.  They spent the last few days anchored out at the Benjamin Islands and shared some of their favourite spots with us.  We later found out that he owns Manitoulin Transportation and was awarded the Order of Canada a couple years back.  They seemed so down to earth and even though they had an appointment to keep, they invited us on board and showed us all the places to go and to avoid around the islands.  Very nice people.

Well you are pretty much up to date.  This is now Wednesday and we will likely tour the islands on Thursday then head for Little Current before the T-storms hit this area on Friday.  Of course the weather and winds may change our plans as we have decided to become fair weather boaters again.  If the Benjamins are as nice as people say, we may go back and spend a few days in that area.  After that, we plan on overnighting in Killarney then head to Tobermory and start working our way down the Canadian side of Lake Huron.

Tom & Linda