The Last Leg

The results of Mom's cat scan weren't good. The tumor had not responded to the latest round of chemo, and her options came down to a more aggressive, more toxic chemo, or acceptance that life is ending and to go under hospice care. As her quality of life at this point was terrible, Mom chose the latter and we all supported her decision. We moved her to my sister's house where she had a beautiful view of the woods, and where we could all take turns staying with her.

With Mom in Hospice, and Joey starting school in a week, finishing the trip around Michigan's tip was not practical. We loaded Station Omega on a truck, and her last leg was across the state.

My Mom passed away a few weeks ago. When she passed, she was
surrounded by her four kids, a couple of good dogs and her extended family.

Station Omega is now in a cradle on the shore of Lake Macatawa, awaiting winterization. Joey is a freshman at Holland High. We're reading the help wanted ads and dreaming of sailing Lake Michigan next spring.

086 Deg 11' W
42 Deg 46' N

Shore Leave

We started looking for a place to tie up Station Omega for a few weeks while we tended to family. The marina run by Michigan Department of Natural Resources in Port Sanilac was more than willing to work with us, but they were full over the weekend with their annual port festival. The DNR Marina at Lexington could accommodate us over the weekend, but limited stays to one week. So, we left Sarnia Yacht Club the next day and sailed to Lexington for the weekend.

The weather was great and we sailed just inside of the shipping channel all the way to the harbor entrance. That entrance is badly shoaled and it is wise to contact the marina by VHF for instructions before attempting to enter in a deep draft boat. Lexington is a resort area with a touristy downtown a block or two from the marina. Restaurants, grocery shopping, coffee shops, T-shirt impresarios, and ice cream are all within an easy walk. Of course, we took advantage of all that ...

Sunday, we headed up to Port Sanilac. The port festival was winding down and we were able to get a great slip. We spent Monday making sure she was securely moored, we hoisted the dinghy on deck, cleaned her up, got a rental car from our friends at Enterprise, loaded the car and headed for Detroit to pick up my youngest son, Joey. We arrived at our new home in Holland just after midnight and collapsed.

The house was full of boxes and furniture, and the yard was overgrown. Between running Mom around and visiting family, we worked on getting our new home set up. Mom's now finished with her first of five sets of chemo, she's had a series of blood infusions, and her pain is being managed to where she is able to take care of herself. Yesterday, she had a CT scan to determine how effective this chemo has been, and we should know more on Thursday.

Joey has decided to live with us, and he'll start his freshman year at Holland High on September 6, and we're delighted. We're starting the annual back-to-school ritual of clothes buying, getting registered ...

The first day of school gives us a hard end date we didn't have before, and Station Omega is on the wrong coast. So, once Joey is registered for school, and assuming Mom's stable, we'll head over to Port Sanilac and sail her around the tip of the mit. Should have enough time ...

If not, we'll park her, and sail her on weekends till its time to pull her for the winter.

A Hiatus from our Sabbatical?

We got underway from Algonac this morning and continued up the St Claire River towards Port Huron/Sarnia. We passed tugs, freighters, a Canadian warship and lots of big power cruisers who churned the river into a maelstrom.

The weather was perfect. The first day of a high pressure system kind of clear, blue skies, puffy clouds, northwest winds kinda day. Cool enough when clouds obscured the sun to want a sweatshirt, and warm enough when the sun came out to take it off. Perfect.

The Bluewater bridge connects Port Huron, MI and Point Edward, Ont. right at the mouth of Lake Huron. Currents at this point can be as fast as our boat will go and local
knowledge is to hug the Canadian side where the currents are slightly less. We passed under the bridge at a whopping 2.3 knots! Not one, but two freighters also picked this time to head out into the lake, and overtook us as we went under the bridge.

Our lips may have been a bit pursed at this point.

We swung around to the east and ducked into Green's Cove for a berth at Sarnia Yacht Club. That approach is a bit tricky with a narrow entrance, rip currents and shoaling.

Our lips might have been a bit pursed ...

The other day we got a call that my ex's mom is undergoing heart tests, and we need to bring my youngest son out. Today, doctors did a cat-scan on my mom and found that a tumor that had been previously treated was back. So, we're going to take a hiatus from our sabbatical, park the boat in a Michigan port, bring Joey out and spend a few weeks in Holland taking care of Mom.

082 Deg 25' W
43 Deg 00' N

Opa!

The fuel pump arrived as promised, we got it installed, the
engine fired right up and ran like a champ. We still didn't
know if it would it run reliably, but we'd eliminated most
other variables ...

It was still ungodly hot and humid. To deliver us from it,
cousin Sue and Jay took us to Detroit's Greek Town for
dinner. A colorful district to be sure. The local
specialty seems to be a flaming cheese appetizer delivered
to the table with a hearty "Opa!" The food was excellent, as
was the conversation.

We got back in time to batten down the hatches before an
all-night drenching rain. That was followed, finally, by
coolness! Blessed cool air. Sweater cool. Almost long
pants cool.

Almost.

It rained well into the morning. Just before noon we fired
up the diesel and headed out the channel to Lake St Claire.
Skies were overcast, winds were out of the west at 10-18
knots, and we sailed a close reach across the lake.

The winds shifted slowly to the north and the sun came out
as we reached St Clair River's south channel. We crossed
all our fingers and toes, fired up the diesel, struck sail,
and headed into the channel. The engine purred like a
kitten, and we motored for several hours through the river
delta the locals call "the flats." Wind and current was on
our nose reducing our speed over ground to 4 knots, and
commercial traffic kept us on our toes. We pulled into
Algonac, MI around 7:00.

Algonac Harbor Club is on the grounds that once was Chris
Craft. It's an excellent facility with showers, pool, hot
tub, restaurant, bar and round-the-clock security. Two
marine supply stores are within walking distance. We
reprovisioned at a big grocery store two blocks away, ate
dinner aboard as the sun set, and then partook of the hot
tub and showers.

Great day, eh?

Tomorrow, Port Huron.
42 deg 37 N
082 deg 33 W

Up the River w/o a Paddle

Friday morning we weighed anchor and headed north. We were
looking forward to seeing old college buddies and family in the Detroit area, and debating whether to stop at the marinas just short of Lake St Claire, or to continue to someplace on St Claire shores or Clinton River.

There was little commercial traffic, but lots of power boats
churning up the river. As advertised, the current reduced our best speed over the ground to ~4 knots. We were heading up Fighting Island Channel as a freighter began to overtake us.

That's when our engine began to die.

Felt like it was starving for fuel, there was no room to starboard to get out of the way, and it was too late to cross in front of the freighter, so Mary stood by to drop anchor, and I babied the engine till we could pull into a safe area to the north of Fighting Island.

We dropped anchor and I went below to investigate. We had plenty of fuel, and the last time this happened, I just had to change the fuel filter. So, I did that, fired up the engine and headed up river. Except it didn't help. We turned south and headed for LaSalle on the east side of Fighting Island where there were several marinas and repair facilities.

St Claire Marine took us in and put some good folks right on our problem. We pulled a fuel sample, checked all the fittings, bled the system and took her for a test drive. She was strong and steady! The marina owner said he didn't liked the way our fuel pump was working, and that I should at least have a spare onboard.

He let us stay there for the night and we had the place to ourselves. As the marina had no shower or bathroom
facilities, we decided to try out our cockpit shower and found it to be considerably better than nothin!

The next morning we cleaned up the boat and headed for Detroit. We steamed past iron mills, cement silos and great
commercial wharfs, right up to the Ambassador Bridge. We had been told that this was where we would experience the swiftest current, and they weren't lying! We were down under 4 knots till we were past the bridge. At this point we had downtown Detroit on our port side and Windsor on our starboard. Both have continuous seawalls, and boat wakes turned it into a bathtub! We were looking forward to getting past all that as we headed up the east side of Belle Isle.

That's when our engine died ... again! [@#$*&^%!]

We babied it up around the island and pulled into Kean's Marina where we could get diesel, pump out holding tank, get showers, do laundry and get technical help! Great marina with very reasonable rates. Don't walk out the gates though ... We take the dinghy to the next door restaurant!

College buddies came from far and wide to see us. Adm Lowbeam came in hot from the seat of government. He and the Chaplain met us at the docks and whisked us off to the home of the Ensign. SGM Russ Howard was there along with several of their friends. Patty and Carl put out a great spread in their garden patio. Lies were told, promises made, intimate secrets revealed ...

The next day, Cousin Sue whisked us off to the beautiful
home she and her husband, Jay, built. Cousin John and his wife Debbie showed up and we feasted on a great BBQ.

Meanwhile, thunderstorms passed through with no relief from the heat. We ordered a new fuel pump which we hope will fix our power loss problems. With time on our hands, we did laundry, fixed several boat gremlins and performed administrata.

God willing, we'll be heading upriver tomorrow. Probably two days to Lake Huron, then 6-8 days to Mackinac Island, stopping along the Michigan Coast ...

42 Deg 21' N
082 Deg 58' W