Pushing North

{Maryanne: While we've made it to Lake Huron, we haven't quite made it to the area we really want to spend the summer in... so North we must continue}

[Kyle]At Goderich, the wind veered to the south again. We pulled up anchor just as the sun rose, raised the spinnaker, and made a very slow getaway.

As the day wore on, the wind slowly picked up until we were romping along nicely. When Maryanne woke me for my afternoon watch, we were going six knots in an eight-knot tailwind under bright blue skies. That lasted for about fifteen minutes. Then clouds appeared over the western horizon. A squall line was approaching.

None of the rain or lightning came near us. The cells to the north and south, however, completely screwed up the wind. It died almost completely, swirling around the compass at no more than two knots. As soon as it did, even though we were twenty miles from shore, black flies arrived in a steady stream until they were everywhere. They were merely annoying until they started biting me. Once the word got out that I was edible, they all tried to have a go.

I waited as patiently as I could, but after a couple of hours, I realized the wind would not be returning for a while, so I gave up and started an engine, hoping we could outrun at least a few of the flies. That sort of worked. Now only the stronger, faster ones remained.

When Maryanne came on watch, I had bundled up to protect my skin from the little monsters. Now I was sweltering and still getting occasionally bitten through my clothes. To make matters worse, it looked like a second line of convective cells was about to arrive that we would not escape. We were about to get drenched.

Maryanne could sense my guilt at leaving her to deal with it, but she told me to go to bed and try not to think about it. She would be fine. The next thing I remember, it was midnight and it was my turn again.

She was surprised to hear that I hadn’t heard the rain, the thunder, or her stomping around on deck dealing with the sails. Nope, I slept through the whole thing. Now we were going six knots again in an eight-knot breeze again with the spinnaker up again. I really like it when she does that trick on her watch.

The wind soon pulled too far forward for me to use the spinnaker, so I did some of my own stomping around to get it stowed and get the other sails up. The strength stayed consistent, so if anything, we sped up a little. When daylight broke, I saw that our clear skies had been replaced by thick smoke from the forest fires to our southeast. I hadn’t smelled a thing, but the visibility was down to just over a mile.

By afternoon, the first islands of the Georgian Bay area materialized as grey silhouettes in the smoke. We wove our way to the entrance to Baie Fine, reputed to be the world’s largest freshwater fjord. There, the hills completely blocked the wind, so we started an engine for the ten-mile trip to the end, known locally as "The Pool". We anchored amongst six other widely-spaced boats.

It was a relief to be finished with an eventful thirty-eight-hour sail. I let out an especially long sigh because we were finally here.

The sailing season is short at forty-six degrees north and I wanted to get here as early as possible to make the most of it. I knew even a few weeks delay could potentially erode our season down to nothing. That is why, every time Maryanne suggested we spend an extra week or two somewhere during the last eleven months and eighteen thousand sailing miles since leaving the Kimberley, in Australia, I have had to put down my foot and say that we couldn’t, because we needed to keep moving.

My intent, and thus my implied promise, was that we would be able to slow down and relax once we finally got here. Internally, I was worried about two things: The first was that one thing or another would interfere with the plan, which would get us here with a lot to see and no time to see it, making it more of the same type of exhausting push I told Maryanne we wouldn’t have to do once we had sailed more than halfway around the world to get here. My other worry was that we might succeed in covering the distance, but that it wouldn’t end up being that nice once we finally got here. Thinking of the look Maryanne would shoot me if this part of Lake Huron ended up looking like the part of Lake Erie between Toledo and Detroit made me wince.

Looking out at The Pool now, I was pleased to see that it is much prettier than I had even expected. This is a place worth going through all the trouble to see. Best of all, even though we are a few weeks later than I would have liked, we still have plenty of time left in the summer to slow down and enjoy ourselves. Wheeeeeewwww!

Mixed sailing, but WOW, so worth it as we made our way along the world's largest fresh water 'fjord' of Baie Fine with its quartzite hills, and splendid coves. It was great to finally be at anchor after the long haul to get here

Goderich, Lake Huron

[Kyle]From our spot anchored just outside of Goderich Harbor (which the locals pronounce "God-ritch," with a barely perceptible pause at the e), it didn't look too appealing. Every single thing you buy in a boat store has a label that says the same thing, "Rinse thoroughly in fresh water after every use". Yeah, right! That's actually one of the nicest things about sailing on the lakes; the whole boat doesn't get covered in salt every time it's not flat calm.

You'd never know it by looking at the freighters tied up in Goderich. The whole place seems to be in a losing battle with rust. That is because Goderich Harbor is at the entrance to the world's largest underground salt mine, the dust of which apparently does a good job of replicating the salty sea. The complex is so enormous that the prim little public beach is almost lost in the background of giant industry.

We landed our dinghy amongst frolicking children and then climbed the stairs to the clifftop lighthouse. From up there, the character of the place completely changed. Beautiful homes, presumably paid for with salt money, made up tidy neighborhoods under the shade of big, mature trees. Goderich is a planned town, built as an octagon, with generous allowances of space for everything. The roads are wide, with more than enough room for parking, lots are large, so every house seems to have a big yard, and there is plenty of public park space.

Blue skies and NO bugs... Heaven!

Our first stop was the museum. We go to a lot of these and I must say this one is one of the best. It is large out of proportion to the town, full of interesting things, and organized so that everything gets explained and nothing gets missed. It was here that we learned the extent of the salt mine, which extends under Lake Huron at about three to four times its depth for miles and is larger in area than the entire town and then some. Two-hundred and fifty freighters a year are loaded full of salt here. We saw others coming in, unloading mountains of rock and gravel. Perhaps that is used to backfill areas once the mining is done to keep the ground stable. I don't know, but it sure seems like more than anybody local could need otherwise.

The county museum was impressive and extensive! It even incorporated the old school house building (not shown here), and a train which the building was built around.

Following the museum, we went to the old gaol. It seemed unpleasant, but not especially so, like Alcatraz. That is until you notice the number of wood-burning stoves. Each staff room had one, sometimes two. Cell blocks had none. Inmates must've shivered their way through their sentences.

The Gaolhouse (American's spell it "jailhouse"), was used through to 1972!

This particular day was nice and warm, so we finished up with a long, sweeping walk out of the town, down the gorge to the Maitland River, through a forest trail and then back along the old Goderich to Guelph railroad grade, now a great place for runs and bike rides.

The highlight of the walk was the old trellis bridge, where we got long, elevated views of the valley. Maryanne even spotted a beaver below, presumably being busy.

And a nice long walk through the local trails ended with an old railway trellis bridge (and another beaver sighting)

We were hungry from our long day, but didn't want to spoil our dinner, so we decided to split an order of poutine from the concession stand at the beach. It didn't work. Poutine is very filling.

As you can imagine, the comings and goings associated with the world's largest underground salt mine dominates the town waterfront

On To Lake Huron

[Kyle]Paul and Lynne had repeatedly said that we had been really lucky to miss the swarms of fish flies, as the locals call them (American’s call them Canadian Soldiers). They are Leamington’s arrival of the Caddisfly plague we suffered in the Niagara River. (Actually, these ones are Mayflies)

The insects caught up to us again!

When I emerged in the darkness to prepare for a pre-dawn departure, I immediately realized our luck had run out. Every surface was covered with them. I hosed off the ones that had drowned in the dew on the decks, but live ones just replaced them. They seem to have no survival instinct whatsoever and will not flutter away if approached. Maryanne had a sickening walk to the marina showers where she said the crunching underfoot sounded like walking on gravel, except that the soles of her clean shoes ended up covered in bug goo. As I prepared Begonia for departure, my shoes did the same to the decks as I searched the sky in vain for the birds from Erie.

They thinned out after we left the harbor and headed for the Detroit River. They were replaced by a whole diverse collection of other flies. There must’ve been twenty-five types. If I were an entomologist, it would have been fascinating, but I am not, so it was just really revolting instead.

New arrivals stopped once we got to the Detroit River. Perhaps they didn’t like the smog or the dirty water from the smelting plants. We hugged the Canadian side because it is nicer and also because it is out of small-arms firing range.

Despite our early start, the current in the river was really killing us. We had pretty much a consistent knot-and-a-half against us for the whole thirty miles to Lake St Clair.

Just near the end, as we were passing downtown Detroit itself, the radio started crackling with all sorts of warnings of mayhem from an approaching convective squall line. The broadcasts warned of lighting, dime-sized hail and sixty-knot gusts. We furled the sails and started both engines for controllability. This is where being near the city worked for us. Our mast was nowhere near the tallest thing around, which gave all the lightning around us somewhere else to go. The buildings probably helped break up the wind as well. The most we saw was 47 knots and it was from directly astern. That actually helped to make up for our poor speed up until then.

Our passage started off well, but we were soon chased by lightning storms, and strong winds, and hamppered by conspiring currents (and a boat covered with mayflies)

Our twenty-four-hour watch system works great offshore, but is a lot less fun in a busy waterway. There is just too much going on for the on-watch to do everything with zero help, which makes it hard to really rest for the off-watch. Even a quick pee requires planning and preparation.

When Maryanne woke me at midnight, she had been glued to the helm seat for the last five hours straight and was ready to hand it over to me for the long, up-current trip up the St Clair River to Lake Huron. I only saw one or two down-bound ships, but the river was just bendy enough that I had to keep the wheel within arm’s length until it was her turn again.

A couple hours later, after needing both sails and an engine to fight the 4.3 knot current at the north end, she finally entered Lake Huron proper. We were back to having an unobstructed horizon to ourselves, which gave us the freedom to share lunch together inside, out of the wind, keeping watch through the forward-facing windows.

We arrived in the salt-mining town of Goderich, just before the wind turned against us, and also just before the sun set. Neither of us had slept well and we were really in need of a lie-in the next morning. The wind wasn’t going to make a dinghy landing on the beach tenable, so we would have no pressure to get up early to leave the boat.

Oh, Canada!

[Kyle]Finally, FINALLY, we had a sail go the way the forecasts told us it would. Blind squirrel and all...

We motored out of the Erie harbor entrance, turned left, set the spinnaker and left it there for the next twenty-four hours until we rounded Point Pelee (the southernmost point of mainland Canada). From there, we switched to working sails for the upwind leg to Leamington, with Point Pelee flattening the seas for us.

Our timing was a bit weird. We left Erie because of the great weather window, but that got us to Leamington two-and-a-half days earlier than we wanted. We considered throwing another stop in, but everywhere we considered would have required a real bash to get to Leamington afterwards. We decided to get there early and have a couple of easy days instead.

When we were anchored, we called the Canadian authorities to report our arrival. Apart from their having a difficult time understanding that we were anchored right outside the Leamington harbor entrance and not forty miles away, they were friendly and efficient. They gave us our entry number and told us to call again once we are tied up at the marina.

After a couple of days at anchor, we moved into the marina next to Arabella
After officially clearinging into Canada, the Babins entertained and spoilt us

Our main reason for clearing into Canada at Leamington was because that's where our boating friends Paul and Lynne Babin keep their boat. In fact, they managed to get us the slip right next to them.

Uh, oh! This was a bit intimidating because of the way we met. When we last saw them in person just over twenty years earlier, we had just taken possession of our new boat, Prydwen, a Tartan 30, which was their old one.

Paul had annoyed me then because we were really broke and try as I might, I could not get him to haggle. He didn't have to. The boat was impeccable. I cursed his name a few more times in the years to come, usually while working on something difficult and hard to access. He didn't design the boat, of course, but how the hell do you remove the engine without scratching the teak?

I suspect Paul didn't. He is the sort of person who, if he scratches the teak, he pulls it all out and redoes it so that it looks better than the original factory job. Who has time for all that? Paul does, because he can do it in a tenth of the time it would take me. Thus, when we finally sold Prydwen, she was a nice boat, but she no longer looked like we had just sailed her over from the factory last weekend.

While we were busy buying and sailing our two catamarans, Paul and Lynne bought two more Tartans, a 34' and then their current 37'. The Tartan factory is right across the lake in Fairport, Ohio. I thought they had finally gone for a new one, but they tell me their boat was a half-sunk wreck in Brooklyn when they found her. They ripped out the interior, built a new one, redid all the systems, gave her some paint. Oh, of course! Now, I bet the Tartan factory wishes they could deliver a new boat so nice. We put a lot of effort into keeping Begonia seaworthy, but the time-consuming cosmetic stuff always seems to fall off the bottom of the list.

Despite the years, we recognized the Babins at once. When they started towards us to say hi, I put up a hand and said, "That's close enough right there! We will come to you."

That only kept them at bay for so long. Soon, they were climbing aboard. They said many nice things, allowing that Begonia is in great shape considering all the sailing she has done.

The Babins kindly offered to take us on any errands we needed to do. Since we had done most of that in Erie, we only needed one or two minor things. The rest of the time, we spent being guided by them on tours of the area, including a walk to Point Pelee, Canada's version of Land's End. On the walking path, we passed the sign marking 42° North. Actually, Canada has two bits of land even further south than that, Pelee Island, the largest in Lake Erie, and even farther away, uninhabited Middle Island, sixteen nautical miles from Point Pelee.

On hearing about our winter haulout plans farther north, The Babins suggested we consider coming all the way down to the Detroit River instead, to the yard they have used for years. The idea made a lot of sense and they even drove us up there to have a look at the place. It's not as fancy as where we were originally planning to go, but then again, it's not as fancy. We'd have to deal with being stored on gravel instead of concrete, but there is also a refreshing lack of additional charges on the price list for every tiny thing.

We visited Point Pelee, and were treated to a drive to many of the lovely towns along the coast - all with great stories and info from Paul and Lynne

The other thing is, and this really surprised us, that the Canadian side of the Detroit River is really nice. I mean, it's right across from actual Detriot, which is, uh…less so. I honestly think the Canadian government poured a little bit of extra money into the area just so that the Americans could see what a prosperous, well-ordered society looks like. Amherstburg is so charming, it seemed like the perfect place to retire to a life of waterfront walks, cozy cafés, and incredible restaurants.

The one thing it will be missing when we return is the Babins. They are heading through the Erie Canal for a winter in the Bahamas, so they will be gone by then. It really was great to see them again. I hope our next reunion doesn't take so long.

Tranquility and wildlife at Presque Isle

[Kyle]After experiencing most of what Erie has to offer, we motored the short mile-and-a-half to Marina Lake in Presque Isle State Park. Despite being just across from Erie the city, it feels remote and peaceful and gave us time to decompress while waiting for a suitable weather window. I had been to Presque Isle briefly while working. I remember it being pleasant enough, but the main thing for me at the time was that the round trip from the hotel was exactly a half-marathon. This time, Maryanne and I took it much slower, and I must say it is just wonderful.

We took the dinghy well into the shallows and made a point of walking miles of the less-used trails away from the main road. We saw and heard songbirds galore, as well as terrapins and even beavers with their big lodges. It felt good to be walking on soft ground through miles and miles of chlorophyll, occasionally stopping to study some fascinating new flower or critter. Our phones are mesmerizing and all, but it really does feel nice to observe the world in its own time and to realize how interesting it all can be if we just take the time to slow down and appreciate it.

{Maryanne: We hiked all over the park from our anchorage in Marine Lake (there are plenty of trails, and aside from the ones that can take bicycles seem rarely used), and we rowed through miles of water-lily covered waterways. We missed out on a morning guided tour unfortunately, but still managed to enjoy plenty of wildlife. We were both surprised at how nice it was to spend time in the park}

We enjoyed the tranquility, and even had a beaver swim by the boat at anchor