Monday, June 16, 2025 Put In Bay

As usual, before a travel day I tossed and turned a lot last night. While we are not going far today, we are departing for 8 weeks or so, which makes it a major departure. 

We spent yesterday doing final preparations for our trip. I also got a ride on Jimbo's new boat, Liberty 3, which was fun. We had a dinner in the club house attended by the Kumars, Karpinski's, Orros and us. We all brought our own food. I grilled ribs. I'm a little off my blogging game and did not get a picture of the event, but it was a nice final dinner at VYC. 

We watched two episodes of "Alone", a History Channel show we enjoy before turning in about 9:00 PM. We have Starlink now which gives us great internet. I'm sure to be talking about it many times in upcoming blog posts. 

Our departure time is not determined, but likely around noon. I need to fill the water tanks, tie down the bikes and dingy, empty the garbage, pumpout etc. But, as is tradition on departure day, I enjoyed coffee with Jimbo at 8:00 AM. 

Kerry and I had all our duties done by 10:00 so we wandered down to Voyager to check the Orros progress. They also were ready so we chatted for awhile and also reviewed our plans for travel tomorrow and for our meetup in Port Huron on Friday. 

Unni and Mary Kumar came by to wish us all a safe journey. It quickly turned into a photo op as we hugged goodbye and discussed the possibility of meeting up with them on our return home. 

We made a quick stop at the fuel dock on our way out. Voyager passed as we were there. Jimbo's new Liberty can be seen on the right of Voyager.

We left Vermilion at 11:30 and followed Voyager to PIB. The trip was very pleasant. A slight NE wind had Annie rolling just a bit, but very tolerable. I was glad we have good screens as there were a lot of bugs on them most of the way. As we traveled the wind shifted South and diminished smoothing out the ride. One of Annie's new toys this year is an anemometer so now I am able to know the wind speed and direction. 

Voyager is spending the night at Middle Bass Island Yacht Club while we are picking up a mooring ball at PIB. We''ll meet up at 6:00 AM tomorrow for the trip to the Detroit river and beyond. Peter's AIS is picking up Annie's signal, but not her name for some unknown reason. I think he needs to register a complaint with Mark at Parker.

Jimbo snapped a picture of Annie leaving the VYC fuel dock.

It took us 3 1/2 hours to cover the 26.6 miles at 7.7 knots. We arrived with a boat load of black flies for all of our PIB friends, although there were only 2 boats on mooring balls when we arrived. It took two attempts to pick up a ball as we dropped the line the first time after we had put it through the ball ring. Surprisingly, we accomplished this maneuver with minimal language and violence. 

We went to town a little after 4:00 PM. Anne called just as we were exiting the water taxi, and we had a nice visit with her. Then we headed for the grocery to purchase some chocolate syrup for Peter's cappuccinos. Frosty's was the next agenda item. We had a pitcher of beer and one of their famous pepperoni pizzas. So good! We saved enough to have a nice lunch underway tomorrow. 

Our destination tomorrow is a place owned by Kerry's cousin that is on the Clinton River and Lake St. Clair. Marty Wall sent me the coordinates where his home is located. It must be on an island, as my GPS thinks it's located in the middle of the lake - which I know it isn't. It's about 70 miles away form PIB.Winds are projected to be favorable. Keep your fingers crossed!

We were quite tired at the end of the day. That, plus a big Frosty's pizza and beer dinner, sent us to bed about 7:30. But not until we rid the boat of flies. There must have been 30-40 of them. They just kept coming. We have three electronic fly swatters, one on every level. Our newest one is really strong. Sometimes it set the fly on fire instead of exploding it which left a rather unpleasant scent. Yuck. Hopefully fewer bugs tomorrow!