Saturday - Leaving Mary Ann Cove for Little Current

 Gorgeous morning, this morning before we dropped the line on the stern and headed out into Baie Fine and made our way west.
Mary Ann Cove is a very sheltered anchorage and a favorite of the locals.

9^th August, Saturday.

Our young neighbors departed fairly early this morning. We had made up our minds to leave Mary Ann Cove when we saw the first of the new comers arrive. It looked like we might be full by sun down. The weather forecast for the next four days looked good, but we had Tuesday to worry about…story weather coming our way, and we were going to meet it in the middle as we travel west.

The decision was made to up-anchor and head for Little Current. It was only 27 miles, so we didn’t have to rush.

Waz duly untied us from the tree and we hauled the water heavy rope (1 inch) onto the duck board, and eventually onto the cockpit to dry out.

 Getting out of Baie Fine involved some more narrows and shallows. Not much wiggle room, and we had fast boats with large wakes coming at us.

 

The dinghy loaded and tied down, we were free to set off out of our idyllic little overnight spot, out into Baie Fine, the narrows to the entry and then out onto the main channel to Little Current.

Not much to photograph on the way down Frazer Bay, so I didn't.

This is the Little Current Light House on the corner as you enter the Little Current Channel.

 Coming up to the swing bridge. It opens on the hour for up to 5 mins, depending on how many boats there are that need to get through.

 In a holding pattern with three yachts, to go through the bridge when she opens.

 And we are away...

 ...following the yachts.

 and after a first try, we are safely docked at the Town Marina which is very well serviced.

There is a large swing bridge at the entry to Little current…it connects the mainland to Manitoulin Island where Little Current is the eastern point of the North Channel. Little Current is kind of a misnomer…it should have been named Greater Current. All that water from the North Channel funnels down the skinny channel, under the bridge and out the other side, between the town and the mainland. All the books we read beforehand mentioned to watch the current at the swing bridge, which can run as much as 4 knots, we were told. We were fortunate that the current was flowing the way we were going (west), and we didn’t have to fight it while we waited for the clock to strike the hour, and the bridge to open, as we were in a holding pattern with three sail boats. There were an equal number of boats on the other side waiting to go east.

We had also been warned about the current at the town docks, which are extensive and very nice.

We had radioed ahead to secure a spot on the dock there, and two dock hands were waiting for us to tie up to C5. This was starb’d of a 36ft motor yacht…They were stern in on the dock, but we were asked to bow in and starb’d tie. The current was indeed strong here, and it took a second go for Waz to get us into the dock, with our stern sliding with the current.

I threw the bow line successfully but stuffed up the mid line royally…doing what I hate to see others doing…I'm human after allJ …Meanwhile the stern was sliding over to the other boatL   Waz gave it a rev and we managed to get a stern line on well before hitting the other fellow who came out to protect his baby…fair enough too…I had removed the fenders on that side…foolish in retrospect. We were all safe and unscathed. Phew!

We had intended to dock just long enough to re-provision at the supermarket, and then leave for another anchorage. After visiting with Connie and Joe, who were on the town wall, we decided to stay the night. A bit pricey at $1.75 per foot, but what the heck. Waz connected the electricity and water, and we were on!

We got ourselves together…with our red shopping bags and cooler, and made the trip up the hill to the supermarket, which had an excellent selection of goods….but wait…

We arrived just after 1pm, and were hungry…ahh!! Food!!

Well, we decided (it being very hot) that a frappe would be great…and we found just the place to have it…and Waz thought food might also be a good idea. We ordered and shared a BLT (chicken) with pickles. Excellent. So was the caramel Frappe!

 

We loved the window advertising!

 

 

Filled up, we trod the pavement to the aforementioned supermarket.

We decided to go for it, when we provisioning. Not knowing what USA customs is going to deprive us of, at the border, we stocked up as we would normally. Lots of fruit and veg...and cream!

 

 His nibs with the cooler and one heavy bag, and I brought up the rear with three bags. It was HOT out there!

 The hill down to the waterfront, in Little Current

 Almost there!

 

At least the hardest part of the journey was all down hill!

We decided to invite Connie and Joe for dessert…I felt we should share the love of the Sultana Lemon cake with them. I had told Connie about it another time…and the Date/Ginger cake J They were to arrive for dessert at 7.30pm.

Putting away all the goodies is the worst part of shopping, isn’t it? Takes more time than choosing the food. Lots of fresh berries…yum, and tonight we will have fresh asparagus with our white fish.

 

The air was warm, so we all sat up on the fly deck for dessert, and enjoyed the company and conversation until around 10pm, when they departed. They are waiting in Little Current for Batteries…hopefully tomorrow morning! (Monday).

The moon rose (I didn’t get photos!) large and clear….there is also an expected meteor shower, but the only meteors we saw last night were the fireworks, over the hill. We smelled the smoke from them for a while afterwards, so we knew the direction of the wind!

We had gone to bed without a definite plan for Sunday. We needed to make a decision about the movements for the next week in the morning, there not being enough information available, late evening. A couple of options, but the stormy weather coming our way would dictate the actions.

The morning forecast told us that we would need to make a move towards Drummond Island and US Customs a bit sooner than we would have liked. There just aren’t enough places to hunker down for a week while bad weather passes, and the rest of the week looks like it is stormy with high winds, gusting as high as 40 knots according to Joe, who informed us of this when we went to take our leave of them.

There wasn’t a rush to leave, so we did our normal routine things and took the power and water off just before taking the lines off. The bow line was the last, as the current took us port…no neighbor to bang into!  He had gone by the afternoon yesterday.

Our course for the day was westward across the North Channel and finally at 2.30-ish, into Vidal Bay. We are about 35 miles from Drummond Island. We could have pushed on, but another night out was desirable all the time the weather is holding.

 On the way out of Little Current

 Lots of little islands out here, on the way to Vidal Bay

 It was a long 4 hour trip through the North Channel, which was socked in with fog at one stage. You couldn't see the line between water and sky....not in this photo, but you can see the water was dead calm. Lovely....except for the ghastly flies...gazillions of the bloody things. We put the screens up, but they have died in their millions, on the back deck and fly deck.

 FOG!

 A light house kind of thing  on shore. The foliage has changed again...

 We came in the right hand channel to anchor.

 

We are parked in about 13 feet of water in Clay (we think) so we are hopeful that we will hold fast for the night. We thought we were the only ones in the bay, but just spied a smaller craft further around…plenty of space for both of us, and we can barely see their boat.

We put the mesh screens up as we slowed to anchor…for the past hour we had been struggling with the sticky little flies and sand fly type insects that won’t leave you alone..grrrrr. They are everywhere! In fact, we have deserted the upstairs in favor of the salon, for now. Plenty of flies on the screens in here too!

We had a few narrows and shallows today, but all easily negotiated. The most of the trip was out in the middle of the channel with nothing to look at…apart from the fog that came in at one stage, and the other boats criss-crossing the bay. We were waked by a couple of faster boats, but marveled at how few were out there. The foliage has changed again, and there appear to be more trees and the rocks are now to be found on the beaches….large rocks, that is! Some of the Islands have houses, bit far fewer than in Georgian Bay, it seems.

It is time to put some food together, so I will go and panko crust the Tilapia fillets I have thawing, and toss the asparagus in some blue cheese butter, and cook that in the pan. I might even get enthused about shredding the sweet potato (a potential throw-out at the border) for spaghetti….very colorfulJ  (it was all delish!)

We had dessert for lunch today…well, you do, don’t you? Cake with fresh raspberries and blueberries and Cream…of course. Waz also ate a cold bockwurst sausage. Such is food on the run…oh, and with a cup of tea, of course!

So here we are talking about food again…well, what better topic?

Tonight looks uneventful. Tomorrow we are pushing onwards to Drummond Island where we will check into the USA, and then make our way to the new marina at Detour Island to hunker down for the storm. Thundershowers are forecast for tomorrow afternoon/evening. We plan to be well sorted by then, all going well.

 

We took our showers off the back while the sun still had some warmth to it, around 8pm. With our cups of coffee we sat out on the cockpit deck and enjoyed the cool….well, I did.

 

 

Waz was too busy thrashing around killing large flies. Hmm…nothing peaceful about THAT! He resisted my attempts to get him to sit quietly and enjoy the solitude…for one more day. He is currently poring over the West Marine Catalog….looks like we will be taking more shares in that company in the not too distant future. Anti-foul is on our minds, right now, and where we might like to take our baby out of the water for a proper bottom job. We have to be able to live-aboard out of the water. We have a pretty good idea of where we will do that, actually…after Christmas on the way to somewhere…and I wont say where right nowJ

I have been sitting on the step down to the duck board taking photos of the waning light on the water. It makes some great abstract art. I’m thinking of having an exhibition…maybe…of marine inspired art. Well, actually it’s abstract photos taken while on the Loop. Some of them are fantastic, if I say so myself.

Who knows, I might even get enthused enough to paint some of them. Now there’s something to look forward to J

I’m off to edit the photos. By that I mean, throw out the ones that don’t meet my critical eye. I usually take a dozen of any given subject, so I have plenty to choose from. More is better, in this instance.

It has been another glorious day. We were commenting this afternoon, about how fortunate we have been with the weather, since entering Canada…but for a few days of rain/storm activity. Nothing to complain about, that’s for sure.

I just have to mention here, that we have seen so few planes flying overhead…apart from the float planes that is…plenty of them. This comment comes after Waz pointed out two vapor trails, this evening.

The other thing that is significant, is that we will be back to American soil, as it were, tomorrow and hopefully we will have cell phone coverage again. Having been in Canada for exactly one month tomorrow, we have done well without cell phones, but not enjoyed being without internet for most of the trip. By that I mean SECURE internet. Most of the public facilities we stay at or visit, have unprotected WiFi. This makes doing any business transactions a bit tricky. We have used the offices of CEO at various places, where they have the secure connections to do our banking and other.

As I said…I’m off to look at photos.

Talk to you tomorrow!