Day 351: Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Port to Port: Thessalon to De Tour, Michigan USA
Underway: 6:56 am Motor Off: 1:03 pm Miles Traveled: 24 Stayed At: Marina
Mile 114 to Mile 138: Today was a short but exciting day. We left Canada and re-entered the US at 9:16 am. It’s nice to be home after 40+ days exploring the beautiful waterways of southern Canada. Our crossing over to Drummond Island was uneventful. (We found out later that we missed a radio call from some friends – Ron and Lynne on Northern Spirit – we first met way back at Green Turtle Marina in Kentucky. They tried hailing us but we must have been monitoring a different channel at the time. They have finished their Loop and are returning home. We will have to catch up online later). We arrived at Drummond Island and easily checked through customs – they just asked if we had anything from Canada to declare, which we didn’t, so we were good to go. We were really excited when we went to buy ice – $2 for a 10 lb bag – woohoo!
After we were both cleared to enter the US, we headed off for De Tour, Michigan. The municipal marina was brand new and very nice. Big, wide floating docks, a covered area to have docktails and picnics, amazing bathrooms and reasonable prices. What a great stop before we cross the bay for Macinac Island tomorrow. Plus most of our friends from Kingston came cruising in in the afternoon and Spiritus was still here having waited for a better weather day to cross the open bay. Time for a party or two. By the time all the boats converged here they filled up 12 or more slips – one of their busiest days of the summer season for transients.
I spent some time talking to Stan who is exploring the North Channel in his 19’ West Potter Percephonie. He had some interesting ideas on how to make a small boat more liveable and efficient. It’s amazing how much room you gain by just adding three more feet of length – Aurora is a 22’ boat. Scott, from one of the transient boats that came in today, stopped by to say hi after hearing we lived on Lake Minnetonka. He raced sailboats a lot on the lake for a long time. What is even more amazing is that he went to the same high school I went to – Mound Westonka – and was a good friend of my brother Gary. We even had some of the same teachers. What are the odds of meeting in a random marina in the middle of nowhere? We had a great time trading stories and talking about life on the water. He and his wife Donna are heading back the way we came from by way of the Great Lakes. They are going to winter in the Caribbean somewhere on their sailboat Saltine.
We spent so much time chatting and visiting we didn’t get anything else done. (Luckily most of our boat projects are already done). We finally broke away with Linda and Jane to make a quick grocery store run and get a little walking in. We all found something to bring to docktails too. Docktails was a blast. There were 18 people again and we knew 16 of them. We really enjoy our little reunions. We are going to miss this a lot when our Loop is over.
We joined Eddy and Linda and wandered down to a bar restaurant for pizza and hamburgers. I played Linda in shuffle board (and won just barely). We played some old babyboomer music on the jukebox and just enjoyed hanging out together. After a long, busy day, we were exhausted and called it a day – the US Quiddler Championship will just have to wait until the next time we get together.
PS: Happy Birthday from Aurora, Kay