Mackinac City to Cheboygan

Now we are on our own for quite a while.  After fueling and pumping out at Petoskey,  we headed to Mackinac City--about a 52 mile run.  Lake Michigan was still behaving with less than one foot waves,  though the temperature was a bit cooler.  Along the way we passed several freighters.  With AIS on the new radio we are able to check the ship's name, speed and destination.  Very cool.
 Looper friends, John and Mary Morgan,  had contacted us a week ago to say they were going to be at their cottage at Mackinac the first three weeks in June.  So we made plans to stay at their marina, Mackinac City Marina, and meet up with them.

This freighter was headed to Chicago

The lighthouse marking Gray's Reef--a shallow passage near Mackinac

We had last seen the Mackinac Bridge on Labor Day 2012 when we walked it with my sister, Pat, and husband, Jim.  It was a thrill to see it come into view from the opposite direction.

Approaching the Mackinac Bridge

Shortly after leaving Petoskey we received a phone call from looper friends Fred and Julaine Eddy aboard Borias. We had last seen them at Little Current, Ontario in August 2012.   They had read our blog and realized we were heading to Mackinac.  At the time they were 45 miles away from Mackinac heading northwest and we were 45 miles away heading northeast.  We arrived at Mackinac a few minutes after they arrived and decided to stay at the marina they had chosen--Straits State Marina--next door to Mackinac City Marina.  This marina is only a few years old and has all floating docks.  We had a good visit with them that evening.  They left the following morning as their grandson who was traveling with them for the week was departing in Charlevoix the next day.  Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture while they were here!

Straits State Marina, as you can see, not crowded!!

Saturday, John and Mary aboard Passport returned from Mackinac Island and called to invite us to a potluck dinner at their marina.  We had last seen them in Virginia, May 2012, after going through the Dismal Swamp  together.  Before dinner, we joined them aboard the Mary Frances, a gold loop boat belonging to another John and Mary Leatherman who completed the loop last year.  After dinner we all went to the Morgan's turn of the century cottage which started out as John's grandmother's cottage in the 1920's.  It is west of Mackinac City right on Lake Michigan with a great view of the bridge.  Great fun to catch up and swap loop stories.

John and Mary Leatherman (Mary Frances)

John and Mary Morgan  (Passport)

View from the Morgan's cottage

Tom and I both now have his cold,  so we are a hacking duo.  As a result we spent most of Sunday at the boat inside doing small chores and resting.  Our only outing was to a nearby mini-golf course for a challenge. I won't mention the score!

Notice the arrogant winning grin!

Labor Day last year we met some boaters from the Duncan Bay Boat Club in Cheboygan, Michigan.  They told us about their boat club and urged us to visit if we were in the area.   We decided to give it a try and headed there on Wednesday, June 19^th.  

This family of swans greeted us as we entered Duncan Bay

The members were certainly correct in their assessment.  The harbor is very protected and the facilities were first class.  We even had cable hook-up dockside.  As you can see, the interior of the clubhouse was beautiful.   A good sized swimming pool with a deck area was outside the clubhouse. 

                

 

 Beautiful clubhouse at Duncan Bay Boat Club

Thursday evening Tom was watching the news and heard that the space station was going directly over us.  So we hopped on the front deck and had a great view of it as it passed overhead looking like a very bright, fast moving planet.   The following Monday we enjoyed the super moon.  Quite a show up there in the sky

!While at Duncan Bay, Deb Swindlehurst aboard Foray came by to say hello.  Their boat had been the one right next to us in Carabelle as we waited for the Gulf crossing last December.   Charlie and Linda Thomas, gold loopers aboard Freedom’s Turn and the members who had invited us to their club’s potluck at St. Ignace last year, returned to their boat later in the week.

As we all know, sometimes life interferes with our plans and such happened to us in Cheboygan.   Tom’s right eye started giving him some trouble.  He was taking medication for  a  staff infection that had developed prior to leaving on the trip,  but now there seemed to be more problems.  So after a text to his doctor, a Friday, June 21^st , appointment was set in Farmington.  This required a rental car which could reasonably be obtained only in Petoskey.  Problem was that we were in Cheboygan.  So Thursday morning we took the county service van from Cheboygan to Petoskey—a 45 mile trip that took 2 and ½ hours!  Besides taking care of Tom’s eye and catching up with friends and finding necessary items at home that we thought we had with us on the boat,  the trip introduced us to Wolf’s Marine in Benton Harbor.   This is an amazing store that takes up an entire city block.  We found a replacement oar for the one I lost out of the dinghy last summer and a depth gauge that is no longer manufactured.  We had been told repeatedly that neither item would ever be found and we should give up the search.  Tom was delighted because using this depth gauge he did not need to change transducers, and I was thrilled to find the oar so I no longer have to hear about losing the old one!!!  

We arrived back at the boat on Monday evening late.  Tuesday, a mechanic replaced the back cabin air conditioner, Tom changed out the house batteries and installed a new charging system, and I returned the rental car and once again rode the county van back to Cheboygan.  With everything ship shape, we departed Cheboygan Wednesday morning to begin our journey to Superior.