Lake Superior, Hilton Beach to Parry Sound, 2015

And on the 6th day there was wifi/internet coverage finally at Parry Sound.

The dock sentinels at Hilton Beach.

 The Hilton Beach sentinels (seagulls) cover the dock. Note how they all face into the wind. This is only half of the ones that had been on the dock. The first half flew away when I came out of the boat to take the picture.

Our travel days are relatively short days, about 40 nautical miles taking 5 hours. I say relatively short compared to Lake Superior, where every travel day seemed to be an 8 hour day. That was beginning to feel like work.

Blind River, Ladies & Escorts Entrance

We moved from Hilton Beach on St. Joseph Island to Blind River.  Blind River, "Deja Vu", that feeling that you have been there before. Has it only been a month and a half? We have seen and done so much. Blind River is the only place that has a tavern where there still is a separate entrance for Ladies and Escorts, and one for Men. And never the two will mix, even once inside. 

Senior Crossing Sign

It was Blind River where we found this sign for "Senior Crossing" Jim and Peter were good to pose for the photo; however, we know that neither of them qualify as a Senior. Or at least not that they will acknowledge.

Music in the Park.

Blind River had Music in the Park while we were there, so we joined them. Quite the punishment. Thank goodness for the violinist who carried the night. The female guitarist and vocalist was the punishment. She knew the words, but the tune eluded her. Although she would cross it from time to time during a song. The bass fiddle player was merely background music and he did a good job of that. I should not be critical, as I could not have done as good a job as any of them. 

From Blind River we were off to Clipperton Island. Anchored out for the night. There were severe thunderstorm warnings for the east of us and we had a calm night. We are now seeing many more boats in the North Channel. On Lake Superior, we were often the only recreational boat moving around. While in Thunder Bay, one boater said they had not gone beyond the breakaway. Amazing.

We had a relaxing evening, cocktails on Symmetry, dinner on Deja Vu, and then sunset viewing from the deck of Symmetry. 

We had a slow morning start. We all enjoyed coffee from the aft deck. So peaceful and calm. A little breakfast and then a leisurely trip into Little Current. Lunch at the Anchor Inn. There must be new owners. It has been redecorated, and they must have a new chef also. Herbed trout on a bed of spinach with fresh strawberries and a vinaigrette dressing.

La Cloche mountains along fjord.

Our boating day continued on to Baie Finn. Bay Finn is one of the few fjords in North America. Such a scenic journey. We anchored in the Pool. Jim and Peter were in for a swim, water temperature of 74F. 

Symmetry thru safely. Not much room for error.

Sunday, Baie Finn to Collins Inlet. The plan was to stop in Killarney for Fish and Chips for lunch. There was no room for us to dock, so we decided to push on for Collins Inlet. The winds were up, so it made for a lumpy ride to the opening of the inlet. Once inside the waters calmed right down. Our plan also was to anchor in Beaverton Bay for the night. Once we got thru the very narrow, very shallow area on the corner into Beaverton, the winds were very high. We looked around and could not find any protected area for anchoring and decided to go back thru the very narrow and very shallow area to anchor in Collins Inlet. We anchored immediately around the corner. Very protected and quiet. The winds were to go up to 25 knots this afternoon. A much better anchorage.

And now it is our turn.

Monday morning was calm, quiet and peaceful. Great way to start the day. Our plan was to get to Britt, one of Peter's favourite places. We rounded the corner, thru the very narrow, very shallow buoyed area again. With all this practice we are getting good at it. And it is not so intimidating. The winds were up already in the rock pile called Beaverton Bay.

Bed made, fenders and lines up, decks are rinsed and mopped. Third cup of coffee in hand and up to the flybridge with my book and sudoku in hand. Apparently about 30 miles to Britt. It will probably be a lumpy ride. We stuck our nose out into Georgian Bay and it was pretty rough and getting more rough. And we had not even made the turn down towards Britt, which would have put the waves on our beam. Thankfully, Linda made the call to turn around and anchor. Wait for a better day. Good call Linda. We found a great protected anchorage behind Toad Island. You wouldn't even know that it was so nasty out on the open water. Looks like a good reading day.

Tuesday morning we left early after washing all the tiny bugs off the decks. Easier to it before they ground into the decks and dry. A little foggy but nothing like the dense fogs of Lake Superior. We can always see Symmetry. Light winds, and a slight roll to the lake. Perfect day to make our way to Britt. 

Jim and Linda had been listening to the weather radio and said that the winds were building for the next day and then would be very high by Thursday. We were trying to get to Parry Sound for Steve and Linda Franko to join us. They made the suggestion that being as it was such a good travel day that we make a change of plan and go directly to Parry Sound. It pays to be flexible when boating, as the plan is in constant flux depending on a number of constantly varying factors. 

The tiny flies that we washed off our decks in the morning have stayed with us, very annoying. And they were joined by biting flies, and Peter had to kill a huge deer fly. 

We got into Parry Sound a little after 4 pm, a 9 hour day, covering 70 nautical miles. Another good day on the water. Off the boat for a bit of a walk. Dinner at the new Boston Pizza near the town dock, and then Kawartha ice cream cones while we took in the old car Shine and Show. We stopped into the Stocky Theatre where a band was playing. Inside they were very noisy. We sat on the back deck, enjoyed the music and watched the sun set. 

Looking forward to Steve and Linda Frank joining us tomorrow for a couple of days. They have already suggested lunch at the Chinese Restaurant on the main street. Need to get this boat ready to receive guests. Wonder if my Mom can join us?

The Soo to Hilton Beach on St. Joseph Island, 2015

Tuesday, Aug, 11th. Laundry day. Followed by a visit to the Valley Camp Museum boat. Valley Camp was a great lakes boat. Much smaller than the 1000 footers that are used today. This was a good opportunity to explore one of these boats. The museum was very well done. Too much information.









A museum trip takes about 3 hours.  Or perhaps I should say a good museum takes about 3 hours; and this was a good museum. Really quite exhausting. By the time you get through it you are wrung out. And all of the information begins to jumble together in your mind. It is only when you look back on your pictures that some of the information starts to settle.

And what Lake Superior museum would be complete without the Edmund Fitzgerald portion.   They had a timeline for the day of November 10th, 1975. That fateful day. The theater had a presentation of what is the most commonly suspected cause of the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald.










There was two crumpled buoys, that looked like someone had crushed a pop can. They had secured a research boat over the resting place of the Edmund Fitzgerald. A strong storm came in and blew the research vessel off the buoys, and the buoys sunk 250 feet. At that depth the pressure is 10 times the surface pressure, and the pressure crumpled the buoys. That led us to a discussion of what the pressure must be like for submarines that go much deeper than 250 feet.

It took 3 hours to begin to do this museum some kind of justice and by then we were exhausted. Back to the boat. It was after 3  pm and the winds had got up. Too late in the day to fuel the boats and make our way to the Roberta Bondar Marina across the river, so we signed in for another evening at George Kemp Marina. A quick lunch and we were off to the local Walmart for provisions. While there was not a courtesy car, the boy in the marina office said we could borrow his. Now that is some local northern hospitality.


Wed, August, 12th, Dawned with another beautiful day. Little moth type bugs had covered the boat once again overnight. We hosed  down the decks to get rid of the pesky little things, filled up our water tank, and refuelled. Believe it or not, it was after 10 a.m. by the time we had this done.

We left the Soo and were off to see what we could see. A different route this time. Rather than use the St. Mary's River we went behind Sugar Island and thru Lake George. Lake George, while a good sized lake, has some very shallow spots. You don't want to get off the channel, only 1-2 feet of water. What a pretty trip.

The currents in some parts were adding 1 to 2 knots to our speed.

We saw the first coloured leaves of the season. Bright red. And more than just one tree. Pretty, but a little early. It doesn't feel like we have had summer. It has only been the last 4 to 5 days where we have enjoyed summer like temps. It is way to early for fall colors.

The summer clothes have not seen the light of day until this past week. Sure hope we get more use out of them before this trip is over. We would like to enjoy some summer before the season changes.

 Although it was only 2.30 pm we checked in to the Hilton Beach Marina on St. Joseph Island. The winds were building and white caps were beginning to form.

While Peter and Jim were checking the boats in, Linda and I enjoyed a glass of wine on her back deck. How civilized. This is the first time on our trip that the weather has encouraged this.

When the boys got back to the boat, they made their telephone call to Customs to check in by phone. Both boats are now legal in Canada and we did not contaminate Jim and Linda's boat this time.

After a short rest, we went to the local restaurant for dinner. Found out that there were still 4 seats available for the local theatre. Tonights entertainment was Sophia Perlman an up and coming Jazz/Blues singer. We were a half hour late for the opening of her show as the restaurant took awhile to get our meals.

The theatre, The Old Townhouse Theatre,  is run by volunteers. Jim figured there were about 400 people in the audience.  At $37.50 per person; they are not giving the performances away. It looked like locals and cottagers in the audience.  At intermission people were breaking off into groups. While they knew each other, Peter pointed out that he did not recognize anyone. Nor did Jim. Jim thought he was too far away from home for that.

The local theatre company hope to break even with their productions. Apparently the max they pay for the entertainment is $7,500. This Perlman group of four; Sophia, the singer; a piano player extraordinaire, a base fiddle player, and a drummer; all come from Toronto. We figure a 10 hour drive for them.

And that is the cultural portion of our trip.

We walked back to the boats; all down hill. Whew! It was after 10.30pm. Time to call it a day! We will wait and see what tomorrow will bring.

Marquette to Grand Marais, and Sault Ste Marie Michigan, 2015

We had a good weather day so we left Marquette early in the morning about 7 a.m. to try and make our way to Grand Marais. There was only one port where we could get into for protection if needed. Munising. Everything was perfect for a days travel.

Miner's Castle 

Sail Rock

We did go in behind and around Grand Island so that we could see some of the famous sights. Miners Castle Point, Sail Rock, and the much talked about Pictured Rocks. Pictured Rocks was the first National Lakeshore Park designated areas. To be protected. The rocks have red, white, blue and green areas. And for a very imaginative/creative eye pictures can be depicted.  The coloured areas are created by different minerals. Red from iron, blue and green from copper and white from lime. This has to be the most beautiful part of the entire Lake Superior shoreline. Lots to take in.














The weather was still good so we decided to push on for Grand Marais. What's another 4 hours. It was such a beautiful day. May as well get some miles under our keel. There was still one more amazing natural vista to behold. As we made the turn towards Grand Marais the Grand Sable Sand Dunes made their appearance. These sand dunes extend for six miles along the shore. They have to be 300 feet high. One pint of interest in connection with these dunes is the Devil's Slide, once used in logging days to transport logs down the dunes to the lake where they were then floated via log booms to the mill at Grand Marais. The pictures don't do the dunes justice.

Grand Marais had a small and very busy grocery store that we were able to get some things that we needed for the galley. We finally found summer on Superior. It was very warm and Jim decided that he needed to swim, at least once in Lake Superior and this could be our last night on Superior. The water was a chilly 64 degrees. Burrrrrr. Chilly.

Had a little visitor to the boat. Quite aloof. 

While we were having cocktails at a picnic table a small power boat came along the dock. They had been fishing and caught their limit of lake trout. 4 people on board, so their limit would be 20 fish. They opened the cooler to show us. Beautiful. Peter spoke with a local who said that he normally would get his limit in 2 hours time.

Sunday dawned with another beautiful day. We best get on our way. Original destination was Whitefish Bay Point Harbour, but we arrived about 1 pm, and the weather was still holding so the decision was made to proceed another 4 hours to Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. We arrived about 5 pm.


Customs and Border Patrol, always a challenge. Even when you do everything you have been told to do, you can still get into trouble.   It turned out that we had been given some bad information from the Customs girl at Isle Royale. She had told us that she was only able to clear us for the Isle Royale area, and that we would need to clear US Customs again once we arrived in Salute Ste Marie, Michigan. We called and Customs met us at our boat. They proceeded to tell us that we were in "Violation". We should have been told to go directly from Isle Royale to a Customs Office. There are only 4 on all of Lake Superior; being Duluth, Grand Marais, Grand Portage or Sault Ste. Marie We were to go directly to one of them without stopping anywhere else. The rule book was definitely not created with boating distances in mind. There is no way you can make any of those destinations in one day. Customs were very good about and understood that we did not know about this rule so they gave us a letter outlining our violation and the letter said if we did this again that there could be a $5,000. or $10,000. charge.

Unfortunately for Jim and Linda, because they had been travelling with a "foreign" boat that was in "violation" they too had to clear U.S. Customs. Linda told the officer that they had been boating with us for 5 years and we did not seem foreign to them. The officer said he understood.

After dinner we went for a walk to explore the area and see if we could find some ice cream cones. Success.

Hopefully looks like boat is carrying the building.

Monday morning it rained for most of the morning. The skies cleared shortly before lunch so we decided to do some more exploring and have lunch out. Jim needed to find a post office to mail a letter. With that completed we were on the search for a restaurant for lunch. Which one, which one. There are many to choose from. We decided on the restaurant that overlooked the locks and went upstairs so that we would have a good view of boats locking thru. We were fortunate that one boat was locking during our lunch. Ice cream cones all around. What summer day is complete without an ice cream cone.

After lunch we went to the lock visitors centre, watched some videos, and then we went to the raised viewing area as one of the 1,000 foot lake boats was coming thru. These boats are beyond huge. It takes 22 million gallons of water to lift one boat in the lock. And it only takes about 15 minutes to raise the boat up from the St. Mary's River into the Whitefish Bay/Lake Superior level. About 21 feet.

Karl's Cuisine Restaurant.

There was a second boat preparing to come thru the lock right behind the one we had just seen. It was time for dinner and a restaurant named "Karl's Cuisine" had been recommended to us and we thought we would try it. The restaurant building itself was the shape of a great lakes boat. It was a family run business. They had a 40 acre farm also, and they made their own wine for the restaurant. We tried a bottle of their red Zinfandel. What a delight. The meal was outstanding. Everyone enjoyed their meals. A good recommendation.

Some shopping on the way back to the boat.

Tuesday morning had been declared laundry morning. We plan to tour the great lakes boat, the Valley Camp Museum boat. It is right beside the George Kemp Marina where we are staying.

After the museum, the plan is to fuel the boats and make our way across the St. Mary's River to the Bondar Marina. They have a courtesy car and they will take us to the local grocery store for some much needed provisions. Thunder Bay was our last grocery shopping trip.

With clean clothes and a full larder we will be ready to make our return trip thru the North Channel and Georgian Bay. It had been a very rushed trip up the west side of the bay to get into Lake Superior as quickly as possible. Now the plan is to enjoy the east shore.

Wooden Lighthouse near Munising on Grand Island. 

Isle Royale to Marquette, 2015

We have been 7 days without Wifi. Once we crossed over into the US our phones and wifi no longer worked. And yes the different marinas boasted that they had wifi, but it was illusive. Couldn't get onto any of them. I think it is a trick. One that I fell for. Finally Marquette has wifi and we are able to connect. Yahoo! Feel like we are back in touch with the world. Good to get caught up on FB, and still working thru email.

Every leg of our trip seems to be so long. The distances between ports on Lake Superior is a long trip. Thunder Bay to Isle Royale, 45 plus nautical miles. It also seems like there is a constant 10 - 15 knots of wind from the southeast, gusts to 20,  with waves calm to 2 feet. Another trick. I think the weatherman should get another ruler! Seas are on the side more often than not, which makes for an uncomfortable ride. Oh well, that's boating.

Ranger III loading a 25' powerboat

Once we got to Isle Royale, we found that we were going to be stuck there for  3 nights. Waiting for the weather to be favourable for the next leg of our journey. The Queen, a passenger boat that brought campers and hikers to the island was disabled, which left a lot of people stranded on the island. There was one father and son who wanted to hitch a ride with us whenever we were going. As it turned out, they got a ride on the Ranger III, a National Parks boat out of Houghton on Monday.

And we're off for Lake Louise.

View of Lake Louise. Worth the hike!

While at Isle Royale we took a 6 mile  (one way) dinghy ride around the peninsula to make a short 1 mile hike up and over the peninsula to the Lake Louis Lookout. The hike had a fair portion that was uphill on uneven ground which made it feel more like 2 miles. We were climbing over rocks and along wooden planks to make the 1 mile trek. The view at the top was quite rewarding. We stopped for a snack and some water at the top before our return.

King of the Castle, on top of World

"How far is that?"

"Oh, I need a picture of that"

Jim had noticed that the fuel tank was getting low. We all crossed our fingers on the return trip, hoping that we had enough fuel. Good news. We did. It just added a little more adventure to the trip. There are few boats that travel these waters, so counting on someone to help and provide a tow wasn't necessarily an option. I don't think that the 2 kayakers  we saw, would have been up to the challenge of towing 4 adults in a dinghy for miles and miles.

After Isle Royale we made our way to Copper Harbour, another long distance. (45 plus nautical miles, ???) The historical significance for this area as you may guess is copper. The area boasts the purest copper in the world, and the largest deposit. Most of the copper mining has ceased. Apparently nuggets of copper originally could be found on top of the ground, although it took a geologist to determine where the heaviest concentration was located to start the mining process. We only spent one night at Copper Harbour as the weather was favourable to move along.

We were off to anchor in Lac La Belle. Probably the shortest destination, port to port of the entire trip. Everything we read said the channel leading into the lake possibly only had 3 feet of water as it continually silted in from the dredged depth in excess of 10 feet. Symmetry draws 4.5 feet and Deja Vu only draws 3.5 feet so we lead the way in. No problem! We never saw anything less than 10'. There was a lesson to be learned here. Do not always believe what you read. Sometimes it is good to be brave and just try it. In this instance it sounded like the restriction was due to silting, not rocks. So glad we did. The lake itself is quite deep throughout and then it shallows up very quick as you approach shore. In about 2 boat lengths, we went from 24' to 8.9'. Hmmm. Perhaps we will back up a little and set the anchor. We had a wonderful evening at anchor.

The following morning, we had an early start to make our way to Houghton/Hancock on the Keweenaw Peninsula Waterway that bisects the peninsula. The waterway is 22 miles across, and cuts off about 100 miles of travel to circumnavigate the peninsula itself. The big freighters use this waterway in the spring and fall as a safe passage when the weather turns nasty on Lake Superior. We didn't see any freighters on our travels in the waterway. Hancock was on the north side and Houghton was on the south side of the waterway. (I apologize if I have this wrong, my sense of direction is really being challenged on this trip.) Hancock had the marina with full services so we stayed there. It was a short walk across the bridge to Houghton.

Little Mac, Houghton/Hancock Keweenaw Peninsula

The bridge was the heaviest bridge in the world when it was built. It is the second largest bridge on Lake Michigan, second to the Mackinac Bridge. It is called the "Little Mac". Hancock's fame and existence was due to iron ore mining. And an unused mine shaft still stands on the top of the hillside. They offered tours down 1.5 to 2 miles below ground level. Not for this girl. I think my claustrophobia would kick in big time. No one wants to see an out of control, panicked 63 year old losing it 1.5 miles underground.




Houghton on the other side of the waterway boasts that they get the most snow. Last season the total snowfall was 246.4 inches. Snow started falling November thru April, with a dusting recorded in October and May. And this recorded amount was not the greatest which happened to be 374 inches in 1978/79 (I could be corrected on this, but close enough, you get the idea) We may complain bout the snow at home, but it is nothing like this. Another thing to be thankful for!

Well we had another good weather day so we agreed that we would be on our way by 7:30 am, with a destination of Marquette if the weather would hold. 70 plus nautical miles, 9 hours on the water. Lake Superior / Keweenaw Bay was mirror smooth when we started out. Something to behold. These are really long distances along this shore, with very few anchorages, or harbours of refuge. Big Bay Harbour was the only opportunity in between Hancock and Marquette.  Marquette was only 24 n. miles away from Big Bay, the winds were southeast 10 to 15 and the waves were about 2' and we were travelling into them. The decision was made to push on for Marquette. The last hour of our trip was really uncomfortable once we made the turn towards Marquette. Now the waves were on the beam, and every so often there was that wave that was 3' or so that would knock the boat around.  We were really glad to make our way around the breakwall into calm waters. I will maintain that they make breakwalls so wives can compose and collect themselves a little before getting the boat ready for docking. Frazzled wives are not very pretty at the dock.

When we finally stopped and went below ....... what a mess. It looked like a tornado had touched down inside the boat. Almost everything had moved. The sofa was in the centre of the salon, and any bottles of pills that had been left on a counter was on the floor. Peter said "it gave new meaning to 'over the counter' drugs." We had about half an hours work to put things in order.

Washed my hair, and we were off to explore Marquette and dinner out. Ice cream cones after dinner. Jim and Peter wanted to do some more exploring, and Linda and I returned to the boats with a hot shower and some relaxing top of mind.

Marquette was established around the iron ore mining in the area. There is a huge structure on the waterfront for the loading of the ships. Trains would bring the ore in on the top of the structure and dump into the hoppers. And then once the boats were alongside, multiple huge troughs/arms would lower and fill the ships. There must be 20 troughs along each side of the structure. What once had been a 1-2 day job, now was reduced to 92 minutes. And they could fill 2 to 4 boats simultaneously.  What an innovation. There are a number of these structures around the lake. They now are dormant. It is such a shame to see such a marvellous structure unused. Perhaps someday, someone will come up with an idea of how to put these to an alternate use.

Perhaps a better view. 

It was decided early this morning that we would layover in Marquette. The weather pattern has rain today, followed by a good day, next day rain, followed by another good day. Seems like every other day for the next while. Linda thought that it could be Tuesday before we get another travel day. And Marquette is a good place to be. It is only about 100 n. miles plus,  to Sault Ste Marie so we can choose our travel days. Once again there are very few places to stay along this shore so the next leg will be another long day.

APetunia Tree, Marquette

Breakfast out at Dunckers. Highly recommended. Then we crossed the street to the Bookstore and Music shop to stock up on some new books and tunes. Jim and Peter wanted to explore some local museums and Linda and I chose to return to the boats for R&R.