LAKE MICHIGAN’S SCENERY, SUNSETS AND BIRDS

16 SEPTEMBER 2021 – CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

We have now circumnavigated Lake Michigan—up the eastern shore, across the north, and down the western shore—and are having a grand time. The scenery and
sunsets have been quite memorable and we continue to see beauty everywhere
we go. Here are a few examples:

Leland Harbor MI
Mackinac Straits Bridge
Beaver Island MI
Port Washington WI
Milwaukee Arn Museum
Downtown Chicago

Most of the birds we’ve seen are familiar to us—seagulls, cormorants, pelicans, Canada geese, mallard ducks–but the other day, while walking along the waterfront to the Wisconsin Maritime Museum in Manitowoc (and a fascinating tour of a WWII submarine), we came across a very large bird standing on rocks at the harbor’s edge, just 20’ away. I took what I thought was a very good photograph of it…and then Gary (with his exquisite photographer’s eye) took one from a different angle. Here we share with you our find of a young Great Blue Heron.



Annie: Good Shot
Gary: Great Shot

Cruising continues to go very well. Since our departure on August 13, we’ve had
just five days on Lake Michigan’s rough and tumbling “washing machine” waters.
The rest of the time it has been quite smooth, bringing us great joy. (We don’t
leave the harbor if the winds are more than 15 knots and the waves are more
than 3 feet high; we’ve changed our schedule twice so far because of weather.)

We are loving this whole experience and are now enjoying Chicago—a very
beautiful and vibrant city. Tomorrow we start river cruising—down the Chicago
and Illinois Rivers toward the Mississippi—but we will always remember the friendly people and the natural beauty of Lake Michigan. We hope you enjoy cruising with us.

Red sky at morning…

From the Bridge:

0935hrs

7 September 2021

We extended our marina stay in Sheboygan WI because the forecast was well beyond our safety limits and we have found that although the boat is really seaworthy and handles well in wind and wave, the Captain and First Mate have a much lower tolerance.  We awoke this morning to heavy air, an eerie morning with dense red sunlight on the eastern horizon.  Checked all the moorings and told Annie to close all the windows and hatches, “We were in for a good one!”

They do Thunder Storms here in the mid-west unlike what we see on the west coast.  They are awesome to behold and at the same time a little scarry.  Really glad that our current travel schedule is “not a schedule at all.”  So today we will hunker down, do some laundry and write this blog. 

Hope you enjoy the short video clip taken from the bridge of S.L.O. Dancer.

Things we are learning

28 AUGUST 2021 ESCANABA, MI (On the Upper Peninsula aka The U.P.)
We’ve learned a lot since beginning our cruising journey on August 3 and
officially beginning America’s Great Loop on August 23 from Mackinac Island.

  1. “Island Time” occurs in many places including Mackinac Island, where we
    enjoyed hundreds of live butterflies at The Butterfly House and thought we’d be
    late to rent our own horse and carriage. But the message was, “No worries!
    Everyone’s on Island Time.” Ahhh….it’s all about S.L.O.-ing down. We love it!
  2. Boaters help each other! We’ve now docked in 10 marinas and we’ve had
    help arriving and leaving each one. At first we were quite surprised when two
    boaters nearby helped us load the boxes we’d shipped from home onto our boat.
    Our new boating friend Reed explained with a shrug and a smile, “That’s what
    boaters do!” And so it is!
  3. There is more than one definition of “FETCH.” Lake Michigan is about 307
    miles long and roughly 100 miles wide. The greater the distance the wind moves
    across the water, the greater the “fetch.” When we crossed the northern part of
    the Lake, from Beaver Island, MI to Washington Island, WI (85 miles), we had
    quite the rock, roll and pitch adventure as the fetch from the south (having
    crossed about 200 miles of lake water) met the fetch from the west (crossing
    about 50 miles) creating what Michiganders call “the washing machine” effect.
    We did fine and the boat is very seaworthy, but I think I’d rather play fetch with
    our next door neighbor’s dog!
  4. Always keep one hand for the boat! Even during smooth cruising (which has
    been most of the time so far), a sudden roll or lurching can happen from a seen
    or unseen boat’s wake. It can really toss you around. Fortunately there are sturdy
    handholds and rails throughout the boat, inside and out.
  5. Being thankful is an important practice. I am so grateful for Gary’s boating,
    chart reading and other navigation skills, together with the way he is teaching me
    to be the best “first mate” possible. I’m getting pretty good at working the lines
    when we arrive and leave a dock as well as wielding the very heavy 50’ power
    cord. I’m very grateful for my strong legs and arms! We are also extremely
    grateful for the latest versions of our “Navionics” and “Boat Beacon” apps that
    allow us to see other boats nearby plus every light, channel marker, underwater
    rock and other hazards to avoid. We are also oh so grateful we have both air
    conditioning (it’s been quite warm and humid) and autopilot. Some boats we
    considered did not. This allows us to take turns at the helm, where one of us is
    always on watch and the other can snooze a bit nearby. We are deeply grateful for each other and are happy to report we are dancing along very well together! Yay!

    Tomorrow we’ll head down the Wisconsin and Illinois (west) side of Lake Michigan, with planned stops in Menominee (2 nights), Egg Harbor (1), SturgeonBay (2), Kewaunee, Manitowoc (2), Sheboygan, Port Washington (2), Milwaukee, Kenosha, Wi plus Waukegan and Chicago, IL (2). The S.L.O. dance continues!

Away we go!

18 AUG 2021   LELAND, MICHIGAN

FROM THE FIRST MATE (aka Annie)

We arrived at Spring Lake, MI (west of Grand Rapids, near Grand Haven) on August 3, where our boat had been “on the hard” since early June for various survey repairs, maintenance and some upgrading. We’d planned to take a few days to get things in order, but lots of rain, lightening and some monstrous thunderstorms delayed us, so we had plenty of time to get everything in its place and settle in. We finally left on Friday the 13th (always a lucky day for us since my birthday, my grandson Ty’s birthday and Gary’s 2 children’s birthdays are all on the 13th!).

AND, our 41’ boat is amazing! I had never seen it before. [Gary and grandson Eldon did the “shakedown/training” cruise in late May from Grafton, IL where we bought the boat (just north of St. Louis), taking it up the Illinois River through Chicago to Spring Lake.] I was excited to see the boat and quickly became ecstatic at how spacious it is—lots of living spaces, roomy sleep spaces and plenty of storage. The galley is fabulous and easy to work in. The whole boat is in beautiful condition inside and out for a 1995 Cruisers 395 and the décor is inviting and comfortable.

Even better, the boat handles beautifully in both the rough (1 day) and calm waters of Lake Michigan, which locals call “The Big Lake.” Best of all, we both LOVE being on the water and find it both exhilarating and soothing while fully enjoying the… S…L…O…pace. The boat can go up to 35 knots (at 25 gal. per hour per engine), which is nice in an emergency, but its best cruising speed is around 8.8 knots (about 10 mph), using just 2.5 gal. per hour per engine. Not only is this much easier on our pocketbooks, but it gives us time to really take in all the beauty as we cruise along. We’ve even seen a few monarch butterflies fly by!

The eastern shore of Lake Michigan is amazing, with dense green forests growing right down to sand dunes and shorelines, charming houses tucked in among the trees and friendly marinas right off the Lake that often lead up rivers to small inland lakes. There are also lots of lighthouses, which we also enjoy. Pictured here is the Little Point Sable Light, located between Muskegon (1s night) and Manistee (2 nights)—a  sweet, restored Victorian port with a beautiful River Walk.

We are now in Leland, MI on the northeastern shore of the Lake en route to one of our favorite places—Mackinac Island (at the top of the Michigan “mitten” and the northwest corner of Lake Huron, pronounced “Mackinaw”). That’s where we plan to officially start our America’s Great Loop adventure. So from there we’ll head west across the top of Lake Michigan and travel down the western shores of Wisconsin and Illinois. When we get to Chicago, we’ll start river cruising down the Illinois River to the Mississippi and beyond. We look forward to all of it—one day, one port at a time—as we continue our S.L.O. dance. Thanks for dancing with us!

P.S. Most of our blog posts will be much shorter, but we wanted to share a bit more with you about our journey & its beginnings! We are already loving it all!

Little Point Sable Light, on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan

First Blog

1 AUG 2021   SAN LUIS OBISPO, CALIFORNIA

CAPTAIN’S LOG

Welcome to our Blog. Blogging is a new experience for us so it will be a work in progress about two people on the front end of a learning curve called boating.  The tag line for the America’s Great Loop Cruisers Association (aka AGLCA) is “The Adventure of a Lifetime,” and I’m sure two people ages 78 (G) & 81 (A), going 6,000 miles in a full year on our own, will be full of Joy and Challenges.  Our various Sprinter van trips over the last three years have shown us that we are really happy traveling “the road less traveled” and that being together in a small space 24/7 can be a real joy. The writing will be mostly from Annie, and I will contribute the images and hopefully some videos so you can travel along with us. The Blog is interactive, so if you have questions, comments or topic ideas, please send them along. For now,

LET THE ADVENTURE BEGIN!

FROM THE FIRST MATE

After nine months of research, boat shopping, planning, training, getting our home ready for year-long tenants and continuous list-making (!!!), we are off on our most exciting adventure ever—cruising over 6,000 miles through the inland waterways of the eastern United States called “America’s Great Loop.” We’ll be traveling in our own boat, just the two of us, on a 41’ Cruiser that we have named “S.L.O. Dancer.”

S.L.O. stands for San Luis Obispo, CA, which is just 12 miles east of our small hometown of Los Osos on the Central Coast, overlooking Morro Bay, Morro Rock and the Pacific Ocean.

Why “Dancer?” Many years ago we heard the lyrics to a song that we’ve never forgotten:

                        Life’s a dance, you learn as you go

                        Sometimes you lead, sometimes you follow.

                        Don’t worry ‘bout what you don’t know.

                        Life’s dance, you learn as you go.

Our life IS a dance that we continue to enjoy. And never before have the words to the third line been more meaningful. Countless hours of preparation will certainly benefit us, but we don’t pretend to know everything. In fact, early in this cruising dance Gary said, “I’m not sure I even know what I don’t know!”

We continue to learn, continue to plan, continue to brush up on our boating and navigation skills, and will simply take each day one day at a time, doing our best to enjoy the boat, the cruise, the journey and each other. One thing we know for sure is that it’s not about the destination…THE JOY IS IN THE JOURNEY!

And so it is!