a reminder of why we "deal" with owning boats

hope town harbor last month, this was the night of my son's 14th birthday, we know the light keeper a little, he took him up and let him light the light as a present. was pretty darn cool.

Dougcole said:

hope town harbor last month, this was the night of my son's 14th birthday, we know the light keeper a little, he took him up and let him light the light as a present. was pretty darn cool.

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That is really cool!

OK I'll bite.

Egregious said:

OK I'll bite.

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Cape Lookout?

Egregious said:

OK I'll bite.

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Please don't.It hurts,but that is a nice area you're anchored in.

The beautiful Les Chenaux Islands in northern Lake Huron where access is only by boat. This is near Hessel, MI, where woodies abound and are treasured. Every turn presents incredible sights such as this. Boat houses are frequently more elegant than the homes.

That's a really great shot, Larry. The only Lakes I've had any experience with are Michigan and Superior at Isle Royale. Are there lots of things like barrel back and torpedo stern Chris Crafts and Hackers and Gar Woods in the area you've pictured?

Marin et all,

Note the woodie in the previously pictured boat house called "Whitecap". there also appears to be a "Duffy" style boat as well.

One of the largest and most popular wooden boat shows is held in Hessel, MI, each year and it is coming up Aug 11. Entries come from all across the US.

http://dotsub.com/media/b5ee5ada-5b37-4b0b-9916-e0896337ec4b/embed/eng

The E. J. Mertaugh Boat Works is located there and they specialize in restoration of wooden boats.

EJ Mertaugh Boat Works | Northern Michigan Boat Yard and Marina

There is even a Great Lakes Boat Building School in nearby Cedarville which seeks to maintain and preserve the tradition boat building skills.

Great Lakes Boat Building School

Wooden boat shows are fairly common at port cities around MI including large ones in Presque Isle, Bay Harbor, Traverse City, Pentwater and even one in our Spring Lake. Restoring and owning woodies is a romance and passion here almost as popular as restoring and owning Detroit cars.

Make sure you pack some karma when cruising remote locations. I love the out of the way places here in BC, away from marinas, away from the marked and busy anchorages. I live on board at a dock in the city with pleasure boat traffic daily by my door. We have no want to cruise to such regular crowded places.

But I am the odd guy out. I am aware of the risks, I love the no cell phone no VHF reception and spotty GPS coverage of remote cruising. I am prepared as best I can to cruise into these areas. I try to expect the unexpected.

So the oldfishboat sticks out when it’s the only boat around. When some one has issues close by to us yet too far out for usual help. I am the go too guy so it seems. Is what it is.

The admiral after this last long weekend is not all that happy with our cruising experiences. Three days of what should have been fun in the sun ended in me spending almost two of the days working on and towing pleasure vessels that where very happy to have us close by. One tow with my 12 foot Livingston took almost three hours after the original try and fix beach side that took ½ hour. I got too work on an old 90 HP merc outboard where the owner had no idea how the motor cover came off. I did walk away from a guy trying to anchor beside us when I found he had no actual anchor. I had the chance to work on a brand new jet boat second trip out for the family, with a skipper on board that had even brought a full set of tools. I even ended the trip towing a 17 footer home for a couple that added some time to our 5 hour trip making it 6.5 hours.

Not a real great way to spend the 17 year anniversary.

I loved the life choice my life style. This up and coming weekend we had plans to get out and about again. But the admiral is out, and at this stage out for? I hope time will pass and she will get that bug again. But this time I am not too sure. These events at times have placed her in uncomfortable places. Not fair of me yet how do you not help them in some need. However this seems to be part of our regular cruising experience.

Yup just don’t be there.

Just sharing some experience.

Larry--- If you have--- or have the time and occasion to take--- any nice photos of things like classic Hackers and Gar Woods from your area up there I'd love to see them. I guess you could post them in this discussion but if not maybe in the Interior Waters "bucket." I really like the designs these guys came up with and while I know very little about either brand I always enjoy seeing pictures of their boats. They're great reminders of what design aesthetics can be.

Marin, I will look for photos now and in the future of such and other woodies.

"Interior Waters" is a awfully general term attempting to cover everything in the US except the East and West Coast. I would have thought the Great Lakes with more shoreline than either coast would deserve its own dedicated area. Great Lakes boating is vastly different than boating on the interior river system or smaller lakes formed by dams or controlled by locks.

I note that the most active participants in most of the forum discussions seem to be Northwest and East Coast boaters and would like to see more Great Lakes input. Granted many of the maintenance issues exasperated by ocean and salt water are less relevant here, but there are many valuable lessons to be learned and experiences to be had in cruising these waters.

I read frequently that boaters completing the Great Loop find the Georgian Bay and the North Channel to be the finest cruising grounds they encounter. Plus every Great Lake is vastly different in its characterization and beauty. The glaciers left a phenomenally interesting legacy.

Sorry for the sales pitch. I lived on the West Coast for many years as well and feel the same about California's beauty, and I am looking forward to learning the East Coast during our Great Loop trip starting in the fall.

Moonstruck said:

Cape Lookout?

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You bet your bippie. This was one of the best trips we've ever taken. Cape Lookout is amazing. What the trip lacked in duration it gained in pure awesomeness! And we spent the 4th of July in Banks Channel in Wrightsville Beach. The day was crazy with boat traffic, but we were anchored and the fireworks show was worth it. Even though we don't like crowds we really enjoyed ourselves and we might do it again next year..

Larry--- I mentioned that my experience with the Lakes is minimal, being confined to a summer of being a councilor-trainee at a camp on the shore of Lake Michigan opposite North and South Manitou Islands. During that summer the councilor trainees took a one week canoe trip to Isle Royale, driving to Copper Harbor and then taking ourselves and our canoes across to the island on the Isle Royale Queen II (probably long since cut up for razor blades).

But I saw and experienced enough of the lakes to become quite intrigued by them, particularly Superior. And while it was summer, we saw what the winds can do to the water of that lake one day. So I know boating on them is not to be taken lightly.

As I have stated before I have not seen anywhere on the planet I would rather be, on land or on the water, than the Pacific Northwest from Puget Sound up through SE Alaska. My three most favorite big cities (so far) are, in order, London, Paris, and Beijing but a very close fourth is Vancouver.

But while I think the PNW has the best boating on the planet, there are two other areas that I think I would find almost as unique, interesting, and challenging. They are the northeast coast from Maine on up through the Canadian maritimes, and the Great Lakes.

The one aspect of the Great Lakes I would find a bit less than ideal is that being fresh water, there isn't the marine life we enjoy so much in this area--- whales, dolphins, seals, etc. But I am sure there are other aspects to the area both in and around the water that would fill that void.

It would be nice if there were more participants in the forum from the lakes. We have Dave from Maine who posts photos of the area pretty regularly and who does a good job, I think, of conveying what boating in that part of the world is like. From my perspective it would be great to get more of the same sort of input from the lakes.

Marin said:

As I have stated before I have not seen anywhere on the planet I would rather be, on land or on the water, than the Pacific Northwest from Puget Sound up through SE Alaska. My three most favorite big cities (so far) are, in order, London, Paris, and Beijing but a very close fourth is Vancouver.

But while I think the PNW has the best boating on the planet, there are two other areas that I think I would find almost as unique, interesting, and challenging. They are the northeast coast from Maine on up through the Canadian maritimes, and the Great Lakes.

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Marin, you need to do the Marlborough Sounds in the northern tip of the South Island of NZ before you sign off on the above....
No argument re London and paris though - never been to China - hope to get to Vancouver one day. Have relatives by marriage there.

I've seen photos of the south island and it looks beautiful, no question. I'd love to see it in person someday. But it's too hot down there for my taste, and I don't know of anywhere else where you can cruise a coastline for nearly 1,000 miles, almost all of it on inside waters amidst a bazilion islands and channels and bays surrounded by mountains, glaciers, waterfalls, whales, dolphins, bears, eagles, ravens, and mist. Or rain, which is even better. And, once you get north of Vancouver Island, be largely on your own the whole time outside of the harbor towns.

No argument there - one of the cruises that go up there through to Alaska is on my bucket list, as they say. Several of my patients and a staff member have done it and raved about it.
However, point of order...you would not find the South Island of NZ hot at all. It has a very temperate climate, even in Summer.

Egregious said:

You bet your bippie. This was one of the best trips we've ever taken. Cape Lookout is amazing. What the trip lacked in duration it gained in pure awesomeness! And we spent the 4th of July in Banks Channel in Wrightsville Beach. The day was crazy with boat traffic, but we were anchored and the fireworks show was worth it. Even though we don't like crowds we really enjoyed ourselves and we might do it again next year..

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Cape Lookout is a very special place. I feel very fortunate that we had it for a weekend anchorage for a number of years. My sons absolutely loved the freedom they had there.

For us it's as much the friendships and camaraderie as it is the vistas. It's tough to beat being on the water with friends.

Here's a shot of us this week on Mildred Island with Giggitoni and my buddy, Gene. We felt like we had all of Mildred Island to ourselves. We hoisted a few glasses, we ate well and we laughed plenty. A great 4 days on the water!

Peter B said:

However, point of order...you would not find the South Island of NZ hot at all. It has a very temperate climate, even in Summer.

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My only experience in NZ was in Aukland when we did an ETOPS project with Air New Zealand. Most of our time was in Aukland but we did have time to take a ferry out to one of the islands outside the harbor for a day's exploring and filming and the next day we drove as far north on the island as we could go for half a day and then came back, filming along the way. While it was not "global warming" hot it was bordering on too hot for my tastes. Whenever it starts getting above about 70 degrees I start thinking about being somewhere else.

For years our Flight Test office had a big coffee table book in their reception area that had been given to some crew or another during a demo flight down there. It was an "Over New Zealand" sort of thing and the photos were pretty spectacular. The part that most appealed to me, probably because it's the most like the coast from here north, was the south end of the south island.

We did another project fairly recently about a new type of navigation and approach system and as Qantas was one of the first airlines to begin using this system we went to Sydney and Melbourne to talk to them about it and shoot how they use it. The first approach they had transitioned to the new system was Queenstown, NZ which is arguably the most difficult approach in the world. I sent my videographer on a revenue flight with Qantas in the jump seat to shoot the approach and departure but there's only room for one additional person in a 737 so I didn't go. But in working with Tom's footage after we got home, the mountains in that area are pretty amazing.

I doubt I'll ever get down there unless we're sent down again, but the south island is one of the places on the planet I'd love to see in person.

Make the effort Marin, it's worth it. Oh, and by the way, being a northern hemisphere native you might have overlooked the fact NZ gets cooler as you go south, unlike the US, so whereas Bay of Islands is subtropical in summer, the South Island definitely is not.
Actually this fact caused my personal navigation radar to be confusing me all the time we were in the the UK and Paris last year. Without thinking about it I was relating my position to the sun, forgetting in the northern hemisphere the sun is to the south, whereas here it is to the north...kinda weird really...

Such a glorious way to start the day!

This was a year or two ago at the marina, but being on the water as the sun rises is great.

One from my ICW/FL cruise this past May:

rwidman said:

being on the water as the sun rises is great.

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I'm in the minority but to me sunrises are much more special than sunsets.

twiisted71 said:

I'm in the minority but to me sunrises are much more special than sunsets.

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They are to me, too. It's just that, when I'm on the boat, I sleep through most of them!

Or maybe it's an east coast/west coast thing. We all like the sun low over the water.

Sunrise over the eastern Lake Michigan shoreline. Sometimes when the water is warmer that the air, we get water vapor rising off the lake.

Does the "Red sky at morning, sailor take warning" saying hold true on the Great Lakes like it does on salt water?

Very nice photo.

"Red sky in morning, sailor’s warning"

Yes it is commonly quoted here on the Great Lakes as well.

A red sunrise reflects the dust particles of a system that has just passed from the west. This indicates that a storm system may be moving to the east. If the morning sky is a deep fiery red, it means a high water content in the atmosphere. So, rain is on its way.

Thanks for the explanation. I've heard the saying all my life but never really knew what it was based on.

Tangier Island, Chesapeake Bay sunrise over the Thorofare.