Tugboat Annie's 2025 Return To The North Channel

I felt fine when I woke up today, thankfully. I had quite a scare when I turned on the computer and saw a whole page of r's where my blog should have been. But the blog was still there above the r's fortunately. Killer margaritas for sure. I'll make a mental note of their power.  My weather check still shows Sunday as a good Lake Erie travel day. Fingers crossed that that does not change. Sunday also looks good for a Lake Stupid (St Clair) crossing. Today was the day we planned to wash Annie. Since I was all caught up with my activities by 8:00 I decided to wash the boat. Kerry had offered to help but I figured she would be happy if I did it while she slept. After I started I saw her up in the pilot house. I figured she wanted to help and would be appreciative that I was going to spare her that task. So, she opens the door and says" Do you know how annoying you are?" I guess it's hard to sleep when someone is washing the boat above you. But she did come out an...

We have reservations for three nights in Port Huron. It looks like the major heat will be gone before we get to lower Michigan and Ohio. Cousin Marty only has 110 power at the dock so I don't think we can run the air conditioners so I do hope the heat is gone.  The weather forecast for today is still good for travel to Port Huron. Sunday still looks like the one good travel day on Lake Erie. I sure hope it remains that way.  We pulled out of Harbor Beach a few minutes past 7:00. We are 10 miles into the trip now and the conditions are perfect. Winds light a 1.7 knots from the North, There are some following leftover seas letting us surf downwind on the bigger ones, although the sea is starting to flatten out.  Harbor Beach Lighthouse Navigation on today's cruise is almost as easy as the cruise to Harbor Beach. Although there is one course change that needed to be done at green buoy 3. I've already executed that maneuver successfully, so now it's a straight 47 mile shot ...

When I wake up I always look out our little porthole windows in the V-Berth - my first peak at today's weather. I saw a new sight today - the starboard one was full of spiders. I've never seen that before. Usually I see mosquitos or mayflies or nothing. That bothered me so I went outside, got the bug spray out of my locker and sprayed the daylights out of them. I returned to bed and had a nice clean screen when I looked out again. We also had a lot of small bugs on the curtains. So many that I decided to vacuum them up rather than fry them and have their little burnt bodies everywhere.  Cousin Marty sent me a nice text saying we we welcome to stay on the river. He has six people lined up to help with Tom's big art sale so does not need our help. We'll get to visit when they come home at the end of the day. Prior to his text I was researching the possibility of going from Port Huron to Put In Bay. It's about 100 miles. I estimated it would take us 11 hours if I could...

I heard people leaving about 5:45. It's hard for me to just lay in bed when I know it's a travel day, but I did so for about 1/2 hour. Then I was up. A bug check made it look like I would need to hose the decks at a minimum, which is all I wnted to do. The weather check showed 12 mph west winds coming out of Saginaw Bay. That's more than I hoped for, but they are forecast to diminish as the day goes on. At that speed, we'll have little beam waves that will prove annoying to Annie's crew. Timing is everything.  Peter got good news yesterday. As long as we have been cruising with him, he has been complaining about American gas cans, i.e., how hard they are to use. He would always buy his gas cans in Canada. Well, President Trump has decided to make gas cans great again. He has ordered the EPA to update regulations to remove some of the environmental requirements that have made them almost unworkable. I could hear the cheers on Voyager all the way from the North Channe...

It was a totally quiet evening. Not a sound except for Kerry's CPAP machine cranking away. I lay in bed wondering if the forecast was still the same. Finally I had to grab the phone and check. Some small changes, but the forecast was essentially the same. Tomorrow is still a good travel day, west winds instead of SW, 5-10 in the morning and diminishing. SE 5-10 today with rain, fog and a possible boomer. No rain is in the forecast here.  The winds were totally quiet early this morning. Fog did roll in about 8:00 AM. It's kind of neat to see and experience fog when you are safe in a harbor of course. By 9:30 it was mostly gone from the harbor. I could see spider webs in the windows outside. I took a mop and attached them. But  there were so many bugs I decided I had to hose them off. Once that was done, I needed to dry the windows off. Then since I had the hose out I filled the water tanks. Once I was done and inside, I hear Kerry say, "Well, I think I will get up now....

We are docked right next to a fishing charter boat. I thought they would be noisily pulling out at 6:00AM, but at 7:00 they are still here. I think the captain was here at 5:00 preparing the boat. The wind still looks good for travel today, 8-10 knots NW now, and diminishing later. I think it's a 6 hour trip today. Actually, the wind looks good for travel the next several days.  I decided to go back to the convenience store before we leave today to buy beer for me and vodka for Kerry. It's the closest place to a marina to buy booze on our trip home. The beer prices turned out to be good, $17.99 for 24 cans, although an extra $.10 per can charge negated part of the savings. The pictures for Photo Contest 9 are now posted.  We got off with no trouble at 8:45. We had a great downhill ride today. The winds were about 10 knots, from the NW, which made the waves treat Annie to a downhill sleigh ride. Very pleasant. We were both glad they were not beam sea waves. Annie did her usual ...

Photo Contest 9 involves finding a face hidden in nature. The entries are below. Judges are Jimbo and Jola. Photo 4, Pup E Dog was declared the winning photo. Congratulations to Peter. The judges thought all the photos were winners, but liked Peter's the best.  Miniature Pincher Puppy in Gray, by Kerry. Three Crocs a Swimming, by Marianna. Face of a Tortured Poet, by Don. The winning photo, "Pup E Dog." Congratulations to Peter!

I looked out my porthole windows at 5:45. There was plenty of light so it confirmed my plan that it will be light enough to leave at 6:00 AM tomorrow. The weather also looked good for fishing if Peter was so inclined.  Then it was time for coffee and a weather check. To my horror and disbelief, the forecast for Friday in the Mackinac Straits had changed dramatically. The forecast for today had improved. Now it showed medium strength winds for tomorrow from the west, instead of light south winds which had been forecast all week. West winds mean serious rolling for Annie, our worst point of sail. It would be 30 miles of rolling across the Mackinac Straits. Today medium strength winds are forecast also, but from the south or on the nose. It looked like today was a better travel day than tomorrow, although there is risk of a thunderstorm or two today.  I texted Peter to ask his opinion. He agreed that today was the better travel today. So, I decided to leave asap. I got Kerry up t...

I had a nice surprise when I got up this morning. Kerry had my little coffee station all set up for me. It was a nice statement of love. Very touching for me.  It was much warmer this morning than yesterday, 66 vs 56. It's supposed to be in the mid 70's today, vs mid 60's yesterday. What hasn't changed is the weather forecast winds for the Mackinac Straits. Still very breezy for today and tomorrow with high wind warnings in effect. Friday still looks very good. I'll get Peter's take as a double check when he stops over, but now it looks like 2 more nights here.  Random thought. We are going on a Viking trip In August. I'll be gone when Ohio State plays Texas on August 30. I had resigned myself to missing it. But, I wonder if I keep the app Express VPN that I'm using to watch Direct TV in Canada, if it will work in Europe so I can watch the game? It would be 6:00 PM in Germany. Google says it will work- Whoo Hoo! The judges have made their decisions for P...

This morning I flipped on Annie's electric heater before I made my coffee. It was 56 degrees in the main cabin. Brrr. Then I checked today's weather to see if the forecast had changed and a trip across the Straights of Mackinac would be possible. The forecast had changed, but for the worse. Now there was a high wind warning for Northern Lake Huron. Finally I made my coffee.  15-25 MPH winds are forecast for tomorrow and storms also on Thursday. I'm not sure it makes sense to leave here and go out to anchor. I'm not wild about spending three more nights here, but that might just be the best strategy. I'll get the first mates opinion in a couple of hours. Gore Bay is a nice place to be weathered in, and we could do some bike riding which would be fun.  I got a text from Big Jim saying I should be grateful that the fisherman who gave us the fish did not have the same catch and release plan that Peter and I have. That's for sure. And, after we had that delicious fis...

Here are the entries for Photo Contest 8, Reflections. Our respected judges are Jimbo and Jola. Good luck to all. The judges decision is in. Kerry wins again with her photo number 4. Following are the judges comments. The runner up photo was photo number. 1 capturing interesting cloud reflections on the water. Photo by Peter. Photo no. 2, an expanse of water reflecting the sunlight  met the criteria of the contest, but boring.    Photo by Marianna. Photo no. 3 a nice picture of Orro's boat. Photo by Don. After much deliberation Jola and I deemed photo no. 4 the winner. The reflections on the water are like a fine piece of modern art. Congratulations to Kerry. Two wins in a row.