Island Hopping

The weather forecast held true overnight and winds were brisk on Wednesday.  We were on the leeward side of the island, so didn't really see if the seas were the 6 to 8 footers forecasted, but figured with the winds, it was rough, so we stayed at St James City on Beaver Island.  This is the second St James City of the trip.  Denise and I were anchored the second night out, back in April, at St James City on Pine Island, Florida.

The harbour looked like a good anchorage, so the plan was to leave the marina around mid day and then anchor in the harbour in anticipation of a departure at the "butt crack", a favorite time for George.  However, before leaving, Geo rented a Geo for a half day island tour.

At 55 square miles, Beaver Island is the largest island in the Beaver Island archepeligo.  Only about 300 people live full time on the island, but there are many, many more summer residents and visitors that stay in summer homes, condos and the few resorts.  Most arrive via a daily ferry running from Charlevoix, MI, about 30 miles away, but unlike Mackinac Island, this one is a car ferry.  There are also two airports that handle small planes.  We don't think there is much crime here because the jail hasn't been used for years.

 

Outside of the St James City business district, the island is pretty rural and there are only a few miles of paved roads.  Most of the rest, while unpaved, were quite scenic..

At the southern end of the island is the Beaver Head light house that is open for self guided tours.

Only 49 steps to the top.

The light is gone, but when it operated it stood 103 feet above the water and was visible for 18 miles to the south.

After the island tour we re-located from the municipal marina to the bay and anchored.  There was one more work project planned.  That was to repair a seat backing that had rotted.  We had already repaired one of these back in Port Huron, so we applied some learnings on how to best reach the back of the bolts.  Geo inserted himself into the seat compartment.

We were'nt exactly sure if getting out would be as easy as getting in, but it turned out ok and no extrication equipment was required.  The repair job also turned out good.

We were all set for our early departure, but had differing wind and wave forecasts from NOAA on line and the radio forecast.  We expected leftover rollers from the day before that would diminish as the day progressed.

I was awakened by the sound of the generator starting, which is necessary to make coffee.  One good thing about getting up at the "butt crack" on clear days is, you get to see the sun coming up.

I can't think of too many other good things about this time of day.

The first 12 miles of our trip was down the east side of the island, so we expected smooth seas.  We also expected them to be smooth when we turned west at the bottom of the island for another 6 miles.  Then we expected the leftover rollers from the previous days northwest winds.  To our surprise, they were'nt there.  Instead, we had nearly perfectly flat seas for the remaining 73 miles to Washington Island, WI.  I had heard other people that had loop experience say that Lake Michigan was the roughest part of the entire trip.  My own experience from when I worked in Holland, MI, was that the lake could be pretty rough more often than not.  It was a nice surprise.

Some of the other islands in this archipeligo are North and South Fox Islands.  This is South Fox.

Before we lost sight of these islands, another pair further south came into view.  North and South Manitou Islands, off the western Michigan shore.  And before we lost sight of those, we saw Rock Island, in Wisconsin off the northern tip of Washington Island.  So another surprise was that we crossed the entire lake without ever losing sight of land somewhere. 

There are two anchorages off Washington Island and we had chosen the one on the south side.  We were not afraid of the name given this narrow channel  that separates the tip of Door County and the island.  Porte Des Morts Passage or the other name, Death's Door.  Over the years, this passage has taken its share of ships down.  The bluff on the northwestern tip of the Door peninsula is called Deathdoor Bluff.  It was not a problem for us, maybe greatly aided by the extreme calm seas.  We wound our way into the narrow channel to the anchorage and found what looked to be a nice quiet spot.  That is until two couples from two boats anchored nearby got together.  We could easily hear one of the ladies, who talked excessively and loudly and thought everything was hilarious.  We were'nt sure if she had been over served or what, but this went on until after dark.  Finally, the one couple went back to their own boat and it actually got quiet. 

The day started with a picture of the sun coming up and ended with a picture of it going down.  It doesn't get much better