We cast off from our home port in the beautiful Apostle Islands in Bayfield WI on Lake Superior at 7am on Friday, September 5th. So much planning and work has gone into this day since we decided to move up our Loop trip to 9/08. We remodeled our house in St. Paul and sold it in 3/08, downsized all our belongings and moved them to a condo in Denver while we continued to live in an apt. in St. Paul until we retired on 9/2/08. We also spent the summer outfitting Baby Grand, our 32 foot Grand Banks trawler, to be our home for the next year. We are overjoyed and thankful to begin our Loop adventure together.
We had choppy seas with 2-3 foot waves and wind from the NE as we journeyed to Ontonagon 72 miles away. We have been on Lake Superior for 28 years and it is an inland ocean which must be respected. When we brought our trawler back here from the Chesapeake in 2005, we encountered 4-6 foot seas and 40 knot gusts which kept us in port for 3 days. Today was much more forgiving. The old lift bridge is gone now replaced by a highway bridge and although it makes entering and leaving the harbor easier, some of the nautical charm is missing. Helpful marina staff and hot showers awaited and luckily the exhaust from the paper plant was not blowing our way.
Since we are starting the Loop relatively late from this area, our plan is do longer distances on Lake Superior, weather permitting. We left Ontonagon for the lower entry on the Keeweenaw Waterway on Saturday, 9/6. Last weekend, we were lugging all our provisions onto the boat and it was wonderful to be out on LS today with calm seas even if the skies were overcast, temps were in the high 50's and it rained intermittently. We stopped in the Houghton-Hancock area and tied up to the City Marina to stretch our legs after a 6 1/2 hour trip. We were just about to leave when a bridal party and their photographer asked us if they could use our boat for nautical wedding photos. How can you refuse true love! The bride and her attendants all attired in long gowns and stiletto heels gamely climbed onboard with the able assist of the groomsmen.
After goodbyes, we proceeded down the Waterway to the lower entry and recalled an earlier sailing trip here in 1990 with our boat Cabernet and a fleet from the Bayfield Yacht Club sailing wing-on-wing gracefully through the water. We docked this night with the lower entry Light off our bow and the sun shining through the clouds finally and felt very thankful to be here.
Sunday, September 6th was very foggy and drizzley as we departed at 7:15. With some Southwest wind it was a little bumpy traveling to Marquette where we arrived at 3:15. We will stay here until Tuesday as the winds are expected to be 20-30.
We had choppy seas with 2-3 foot waves and wind from the NE as we journeyed to Ontonagon 72 miles away. We have been on Lake Superior for 28 years and it is an inland ocean which must be respected. When we brought our trawler back here from the Chesapeake in 2005, we encountered 4-6 foot seas and 40 knot gusts which kept us in port for 3 days. Today was much more forgiving. The old lift bridge is gone now replaced by a highway bridge and although it makes entering and leaving the harbor easier, some of the nautical charm is missing. Helpful marina staff and hot showers awaited and luckily the exhaust from the paper plant was not blowing our way.
Since we are starting the Loop relatively late from this area, our plan is do longer distances on Lake Superior, weather permitting. We left Ontonagon for the lower entry on the Keeweenaw Waterway on Saturday, 9/6. Last weekend, we were lugging all our provisions onto the boat and it was wonderful to be out on LS today with calm seas even if the skies were overcast, temps were in the high 50's and it rained intermittently. We stopped in the Houghton-Hancock area and tied up to the City Marina to stretch our legs after a 6 1/2 hour trip. We were just about to leave when a bridal party and their photographer asked us if they could use our boat for nautical wedding photos. How can you refuse true love! The bride and her attendants all attired in long gowns and stiletto heels gamely climbed onboard with the able assist of the groomsmen.
After goodbyes, we proceeded down the Waterway to the lower entry and recalled an earlier sailing trip here in 1990 with our boat Cabernet and a fleet from the Bayfield Yacht Club sailing wing-on-wing gracefully through the water. We docked this night with the lower entry Light off our bow and the sun shining through the clouds finally and felt very thankful to be here.
Sunday, September 6th was very foggy and drizzley as we departed at 7:15. With some Southwest wind it was a little bumpy traveling to Marquette where we arrived at 3:15. We will stay here until Tuesday as the winds are expected to be 20-30.
