Sailing the Great Lakes: Kidd Bay to Wiarton

Tuesday June 15th - We got up around 8am and started getting organized. There was supposed to be sunny but then turn stormy in the evening, with thunderstorms, so I wanted to get to Wiarton early in the day. We have been finding that many of the marinas close at 3pm or 4pm, and we needed the pump-out and wanted to fuel-up. We were on our way by 10:30am. Wind was from the Northeast so we were able put the spinnaker up and sailed all the way to Wiarton (about 8.5nm) at about 4 to 5 knots. We had a dock by like 2:30pm and went into town to shop look for a lunch spot, but everything closed by 3pm on Tuesdays for some reason. We did find on open, the "Three Friends Restaurant". No beer, but we had very nice sandwiches (BLT for Kathi and a Corned Beef for me) with pop. Went to LCBO and stocked up with scotch, rum, wine, and beer, and then on to the Foodland, which was a pretty large one. Used our luggage carrier to haul our canvas bags full of seltzer, cranberry and orange juices, soy milk, a couple steaks, some seasoned chicken souvlaki, and a few other items - too many items!

Overall, so far, we like Wiarton. The facilities at the marina are great! Right now (Wednesday June 16th evening) I am sitting in a lounge that has WiFi, a TV (with limited over the air stations), but also with DVD and VHS players with a library of movies. Hans, a resident boater, put on "Legends of the Fall" - a great movie. We also met a very nice fellow sailing family who shared stories with us, anchorage suggestions, and their dinner this evening (the local fresh blueberry pie was great). This is a warm and friendly harbor and I would highly recommend stopping here.

Wednesday June 16th - It rained over night, and it was pretty windy. The rain continued all day - light mist to a constant rain, off and on. Last night we left out our starboard side enclosure rolled up and exposed to the weather. Our nice cockpit seats got soaked and the cockpit table was covered with water and drowned mosquitoes and muffle-heads. The leak in one of our sky-lights was not getting fixed today. We spent some time in the marina lounge on the internet checking bills and emails and then went into town. Went to the "Green Door" restaurant for an early dinner of local baked whitefish - it was great! Then to the hardware store, and two other "department" stores - more like general or dollar stores, and found a few things we wanted. Our sailing friend suggested getting a gadget that is an electrified (two AA batteries) racquetball side racket that zaps bugs when the touch the wires. We found one at the hardware store, but no adequate mosquito netting. Then back to the boat and then to the marina lounge for more internet, watching "Legends of the Fall", having some more to eat and and planning where to go next.

Garry VanGelderen, our friend in Penetanguishene (formally sailing out of Huron, Ohio) suggested that we might sail over to the east side to join them for about a week before we head to Collingwood on June 30th. The weather suggests it will be sunny tomorrow, so we may stay another day in Wiarton to go hiking and see the castle ruins. Then we may head back to Kidd Bay for a night and then over to Beausoleil Island to meet up with Garry and Ann. More updates tomorrow....