Monday August 16 – Got up around 8am and made coffee. I listened to the weather: the forecast calls for increased winds from the West going to 20 knots plus later this morning. We are going to get things together and get going as soon as we have checked-in with Roy.
We did our normal check-in with the Cruiser's Net, but moved quickly there after to get going into Little Current. We pulled up anchor by 10am and exited via the zigzag route out of Sturgeon Cove into some nasty wind and waves. Since the wind was from the West and blowing hard - we registered 30 knots and had 3ft plus waves (Kathi said she felt like we were already back in Lake Erie. We could have sailed by tacking back and forth, but this was really a time for us to power through the waves and make the turn south into the Waubuno Channel, which is exactly what we did. Twenty minutes of waves washing over the bow (cleaning up the deck and anchor) and some pounding, but we made it to the turn and put out some headsail. Even with only 1/3 of the Genoa out we were hitting 8 knots plus. Then we had to make the left into the narrow channel that leads into Little Current - no problem.
We arrived in Little Current harbor and prepared for docking. We circled a little to pick out a favorable slip on one of the western finger docks, put out fenders and prepared lines. We made it into the slip with the help of two dock hands. Well chosen, it was directly across from the ice cream parlor!
We readjusted dock lines and tied on spring lines (these keep you from moving forward or backwards in the wind), ran the electrical cable. I was in the process of running the hose to the dock water connection and Kathi was below cleaning up and organizing things, and opening hatches and portals for air circulation, when someone walks up to me on the dock and says hi. It was Roy Eaton from the Little Current Cruiser's Net VHF channel 71 (the Roy Show as we call it). He happened to be out on "B" dock checking out someone's VHF radio for them and saw us. He offered to check-out our VHF and came on board. We passed his VHF checks and then sat and talked for awhile about what Jenessa our daughter is doing in Haiti and our backgrounds. He is always interested in knowing about people. Roy is a great guy. Kathi talked to him further while I finished up with connecting us to dock water. Kathi said that we would try to come on up to the broadcast "booth" tomorrow morning, but that it is hard for her to get up a 7am to be there before the 9am start. We will see if she can do it!
We gathered up the dirty laundry and headed into town for lunch while the laundry was running. I got us a table outside at the Anchor Inn after dropping off the laundry with Kathi at the Laundromat - she got two loads going and then joined me. We placed our orders and each had a beer. It was pretty windy, so I actually moved to a more sheltered table before she joined me. Of course it was not sheltered enough and her menu got caught in the wind and tossed her full beer glass over on the table and spilled down my shorts! Kathi got splashed too on her Andrews School "hoodie" sweatshirt - that made a third laundry load for later. We replenished the beers and had a nice lunch. The wind mostly dried my shorts and Hawaiian shirt out.
Back to the boat where I had to sit in my under shorts waiting for the laundry to be done - all my shorts and T-shirts were dirty. I used the time to connect to the internet and check bank accounts and bills, and of course started working on this "Ship's Log" blog.
Around 6:30pm we headed back into town to look at gift shops, but everything was closed by 6pm... tomorrow is another day. We continued up the street back to the Anchor Inn and Bar, but this time frequented the bar. Sitting at the bar we met "Captain Ron" (actually one of the swing bridge operators). We had a great time listening to his stories and the information about the operation of the swing bridge and the 15 minutes he is allow to stop road traffic to open the bridge. It takes six minutes to open and another six to close the bridge, so there is not much time in between for boat traffic. He appreciates it greatly when boaters are lined up and ready to go when he opens the bridge and move through quickly. Some people we know have complained to us that the bridge almost closed on them. Captain Ron gave us a new perspective on the timely operation of the bridge that he as to stick to. He also bought me a couple rounds of Wiser's De Luxe Canadian rye whiskey - very smooth. He had some friends (regulars at the bar) that joined us in the story telling and related joking - we had everyone laughing hard. We also saw one of the crew from Spirit (the boat that anchored on top of our anchor at Croker Island) and had a few laughs with him too. All in all it was a very pleasant evening in Little Current. We topped it of with ice cream in a waffle cone - of course!
We did our normal check-in with the Cruiser's Net, but moved quickly there after to get going into Little Current. We pulled up anchor by 10am and exited via the zigzag route out of Sturgeon Cove into some nasty wind and waves. Since the wind was from the West and blowing hard - we registered 30 knots and had 3ft plus waves (Kathi said she felt like we were already back in Lake Erie. We could have sailed by tacking back and forth, but this was really a time for us to power through the waves and make the turn south into the Waubuno Channel, which is exactly what we did. Twenty minutes of waves washing over the bow (cleaning up the deck and anchor) and some pounding, but we made it to the turn and put out some headsail. Even with only 1/3 of the Genoa out we were hitting 8 knots plus. Then we had to make the left into the narrow channel that leads into Little Current - no problem.
We arrived in Little Current harbor and prepared for docking. We circled a little to pick out a favorable slip on one of the western finger docks, put out fenders and prepared lines. We made it into the slip with the help of two dock hands. Well chosen, it was directly across from the ice cream parlor!
We readjusted dock lines and tied on spring lines (these keep you from moving forward or backwards in the wind), ran the electrical cable. I was in the process of running the hose to the dock water connection and Kathi was below cleaning up and organizing things, and opening hatches and portals for air circulation, when someone walks up to me on the dock and says hi. It was Roy Eaton from the Little Current Cruiser's Net VHF channel 71 (the Roy Show as we call it). He happened to be out on "B" dock checking out someone's VHF radio for them and saw us. He offered to check-out our VHF and came on board. We passed his VHF checks and then sat and talked for awhile about what Jenessa our daughter is doing in Haiti and our backgrounds. He is always interested in knowing about people. Roy is a great guy. Kathi talked to him further while I finished up with connecting us to dock water. Kathi said that we would try to come on up to the broadcast "booth" tomorrow morning, but that it is hard for her to get up a 7am to be there before the 9am start. We will see if she can do it!
We gathered up the dirty laundry and headed into town for lunch while the laundry was running. I got us a table outside at the Anchor Inn after dropping off the laundry with Kathi at the Laundromat - she got two loads going and then joined me. We placed our orders and each had a beer. It was pretty windy, so I actually moved to a more sheltered table before she joined me. Of course it was not sheltered enough and her menu got caught in the wind and tossed her full beer glass over on the table and spilled down my shorts! Kathi got splashed too on her Andrews School "hoodie" sweatshirt - that made a third laundry load for later. We replenished the beers and had a nice lunch. The wind mostly dried my shorts and Hawaiian shirt out.
Back to the boat where I had to sit in my under shorts waiting for the laundry to be done - all my shorts and T-shirts were dirty. I used the time to connect to the internet and check bank accounts and bills, and of course started working on this "Ship's Log" blog.
Around 6:30pm we headed back into town to look at gift shops, but everything was closed by 6pm... tomorrow is another day. We continued up the street back to the Anchor Inn and Bar, but this time frequented the bar. Sitting at the bar we met "Captain Ron" (actually one of the swing bridge operators). We had a great time listening to his stories and the information about the operation of the swing bridge and the 15 minutes he is allow to stop road traffic to open the bridge. It takes six minutes to open and another six to close the bridge, so there is not much time in between for boat traffic. He appreciates it greatly when boaters are lined up and ready to go when he opens the bridge and move through quickly. Some people we know have complained to us that the bridge almost closed on them. Captain Ron gave us a new perspective on the timely operation of the bridge that he as to stick to. He also bought me a couple rounds of Wiser's De Luxe Canadian rye whiskey - very smooth. He had some friends (regulars at the bar) that joined us in the story telling and related joking - we had everyone laughing hard. We also saw one of the crew from Spirit (the boat that anchored on top of our anchor at Croker Island) and had a few laughs with him too. All in all it was a very pleasant evening in Little Current. We topped it of with ice cream in a waffle cone - of course!
Tuesday August 17 – I got up around 7:30am and hit the showers - have not had a normal shower in 7 days! I asked Kathi if she was going to get up and go to the Anchor Inn to be part of the Roy Show... "I'm going to rest for a little bit longer" - at 8:40am she finally got up after smelling my egg-in-toast, cheddar cheese, and a slice of peameal bacon (of course I had a slice waiting for her too). I checked the weather on the Environment Canada website.
I guess we will think about leaving tomorrow morning for Heywood Island for a night or two, and then head in the direction of Tobermory. We may make a straight shot, or stop in Rattlesnake, or if the wind goes light stop at Club Island (we have been told Club Island Harbor is dangerous as it has a shale bottom and in high winds everyone drags anchor!). The straight shot is about 54 nautical miles - very long haul for us, we normally like to keep it to 30 nautical miles or less per day.
Kathi is vacuuming the boat and is on another cleaning spree. When she is done, we will go shopping for gifts and then off to the grocery store to stock up...
We went to the Old English Pantry for lunch around 1:30pm. I had the lunch special: Cream of Celery soup and corned beef sandwich on rye. Kathi had a BLT as usual with water and a diet Pepsi. After lunch we went "shopping" on the main street to at the local gift shops. Got stuff for ourselves, family and friends - no, I am not telling what we got for each!
Finally we were off to Foodland and Valu-Mart for groceries. Foodland had the cranberry and clamato juices we wanted along with the Kashi cereal Kathi needs. I waited outside the Valu-Mart on a bench with our Foodmart purchases while Kathi shopped in Valu-Mart. After she entered, I noticed a sign that said they had stopped their rides to the marina. We took a shopping cart back to the marina and stopped at the LCBO for beer, scotch, and Pelee Island chardonnay. Kathi headed back to the Beer Store to return our bottles and cans for a refund and then to Foodland for a few items we missed. I stayed back and worked on the internet making phone VoIP phone calls to my voice mail and to Aaron about our Sandusky Harbor haul-out and winter storage contract fax to SHM. The faxes I used via Net2Phone PC2Fax failed - probably because I did not reduce the number of colors used to two. I tried again and talked to Aaron who got the PDF encrypted version with my signature this time and was going to print and fax from his work. Who would think this was so difficult!!! SHM called me and left a voice mail that I finally listened to and said they had received 10 cover pages but no contract fax! Hope they don't receive another 10 or 20 before it actually gets through.... Technology is so wonderful, especially for a computer guy like me! I have never been a low-level details kind of guy - I am a Software Architect! I don't worry about the low-level details. Well, until I have to deal with reality!
I guess we will think about leaving tomorrow morning for Heywood Island for a night or two, and then head in the direction of Tobermory. We may make a straight shot, or stop in Rattlesnake, or if the wind goes light stop at Club Island (we have been told Club Island Harbor is dangerous as it has a shale bottom and in high winds everyone drags anchor!). The straight shot is about 54 nautical miles - very long haul for us, we normally like to keep it to 30 nautical miles or less per day.
Kathi is vacuuming the boat and is on another cleaning spree. When she is done, we will go shopping for gifts and then off to the grocery store to stock up...
We went to the Old English Pantry for lunch around 1:30pm. I had the lunch special: Cream of Celery soup and corned beef sandwich on rye. Kathi had a BLT as usual with water and a diet Pepsi. After lunch we went "shopping" on the main street to at the local gift shops. Got stuff for ourselves, family and friends - no, I am not telling what we got for each!
Finally we were off to Foodland and Valu-Mart for groceries. Foodland had the cranberry and clamato juices we wanted along with the Kashi cereal Kathi needs. I waited outside the Valu-Mart on a bench with our Foodmart purchases while Kathi shopped in Valu-Mart. After she entered, I noticed a sign that said they had stopped their rides to the marina. We took a shopping cart back to the marina and stopped at the LCBO for beer, scotch, and Pelee Island chardonnay. Kathi headed back to the Beer Store to return our bottles and cans for a refund and then to Foodland for a few items we missed. I stayed back and worked on the internet making phone VoIP phone calls to my voice mail and to Aaron about our Sandusky Harbor haul-out and winter storage contract fax to SHM. The faxes I used via Net2Phone PC2Fax failed - probably because I did not reduce the number of colors used to two. I tried again and talked to Aaron who got the PDF encrypted version with my signature this time and was going to print and fax from his work. Who would think this was so difficult!!! SHM called me and left a voice mail that I finally listened to and said they had received 10 cover pages but no contract fax! Hope they don't receive another 10 or 20 before it actually gets through.... Technology is so wonderful, especially for a computer guy like me! I have never been a low-level details kind of guy - I am a Software Architect! I don't worry about the low-level details. Well, until I have to deal with reality!
The Dock Side Dairy Bar serving Farqhar's Ice Cream just off dock "B".
A'Ghrian in a slip at Dock "B" with the Little Current swing bridge in the background.
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