Day 39 - A detour on our way to the Benjamins
Now that we have arrived in the heart of the North Channel I enjoyed sleeping in without an alarm. Nonetheless I was up around 7am with the sun warming the V-berth. Captain took Kona and I to shore to show us the path he had cleared to the other side of Turnbull. We had hiked over here last year and found it to be this wonderful secluded rock beach with views of the start of the Whalesback channel. We spent some time soaking up the morning sun on the rocks and remembering why we love it up here so much.
The kids made breakfast burritos and around noon we decided it was time to weigh anchor and head the three hours east to the Benjamin Islands.
Once clear of our anchorage we spent the morning in between full sail and motor sailing. The wind was light and we were in no big hurry to get anywhere. I spent the day sitting up deck in the shade of the main sail watching the world go by at 3-4 knots at a time. Little islands everywhere, the small mountains to the mainland Canada to our north and the barrior islands of the channel to our south. I made a virgin Bloody Mary to enjoy the shade and view with.
We saw a sail boat coming in our direction around 1pm and I shot a picture of the pretty sailboat from a distance. He was the first boat we had seen all day. He ended up doing an about face and ended up heading the same direction as us. Of course, for Captain, that meant it was now a race! Did I mention low wind? It was a very slow race! Eventually this beautiful sailboat sailed closer and closer to us. Close enough that Richard yelled over “Hey, you guys want some beer?” Sure enough the answer was yes! I scurred down and grabbed three New Glarus (WI only) beer. I put them in our bucket and we attached the bucket to our boat hook. Their captain did a great job of coasting up near enough that we could hand beer over our port side while underway. That was an instant bond. The gentlemen were grateful for the beer and handed us back their last can in exchange. We spent the next hour cruising right alongside them talking back and forth. That has never happened before. As we were cruising along with them, they invited us to their “camp” on Arid Island. “Camp” around here is used for the little summer cottages that dot the coast line here and there. Sort of like the North Channel version of North woods cabins in Wisconsin. These camps are completely self-sufficient and off grid. We were cruising by Arid island anyhow so we took them up on their invitation. Dax introduced himself and said his mother ashore would be tickled to have such a beautiful sailboat moored outside the camp with his boat. Both boats gently glided through the passages between islands and soon enough in front of us was a old Methodist church camp. An honest to goodness CAMP! The family had bought it fifty years ago. They had two mooring balls, one for their sailboat, and another one for guests! Today we got to be the guests! We picked up the ball and went to shore with our new friends. We were greeted by Dax’s mother, Monica and dad, Jim (I sure hope I remember those correctly!) as well as Dax’s wife Jenny. They had a mini marina with a run about boat and a sea plane! They welcomed us ashore with open arms and a charcuterie board that made mine look small. I had brought a bottle of Wisconsin ashore but never even thought to pack some good WI cheese to share! Bert and Cory had stayed on Ciara to take a quick swim and would meet us later down at the beach. Kona made friends with their two dogs on shore and was feral and happy. Dani got a tour of the sea plane and a baseball camp to keep. Monica took us in to the main lodge of the old camp. An industrial kitchen and large social room greeted us. Large windows overlooking the channel without a neighbor in sight. No roads. The only way on is by your own boat or float plane. Instead of having friends with pick up trucks they have friends with a barge who help bring heavy or large equipment to the camp. Dotted around the property were a half dozen small cabins. Everyone ate and participated together, but everyone had their own private cabin. Monica then took us over to the beach house with a large screen in porch where we enjoyed drinks and the views. Monica’s heritage is Finnish and in true Finnish style they had a sauna set up at the beach house, all hot and ready for us! Cory and Bert had met us at the beach and were the first to have the real experience of getting nice and hot and then cooling off in the lake. I was wearing my sailing dress (the same dress I have been apparently wearing for more days then I’d like to count) and Captain in a cotton t-shirt and shorts. We hadn’t thought about bringing a change of clothes to shore. Somehow this didn’t stop us. Monica took us into the sauna and taught us all the Finnish words to go with the ritual. Most of which I have already forgotten. We got super-hot and then we chased Monica down the beach and dunked ourselves in Lake Huron. It was magnificent! Did I mention Monica is 80 years old!?! She didn’t look or act a day over 70 and I thoroughly enjoyed chasing her down the beach as we ran into the water like school kids. We repeated this process four times! Each time she gave us more soap and hair care to basically give ourselves a full bath. Both captain and I felt like we had the best spa day of our life. Our skin was so soft. We felt clean for the first time in in awhile and everything about our bodies was relaxed. Bert had discovered that their beach had a bit of a clam issue and had taken to clearing the beach for them all afternoon, collecting a trash bag of feet cutting muscles off their beach. It was nice to do them a favor.
The family spent the whole afternoon rolling out the red carpet for us. I was in love with them and the camp. Captain really needs to find me a camp now. I told him if he finds me a camp, he can get a sea plane! We tried to be as gracious as we could for such a treat of an afternoon.
We had to say our goodbyes around 6:30pm. We had about 1.5 hours left to go before we reached our intended destination. Soon after we dropped the mooring ball I played my conch to shore to signal goodbye. Dax had gone back to his boat and we did one more fly by as he handed us left over cheese that Dani loved and I handed him some Ciara Madeline stickers as we passed by.
Little Detroit passage was only a few minutes away. This is an extremely narrow cut in the north channel. Lots of history here from the First Nations to the logging days. We have to do a Security call on the VHF to let any boat traffic know we were coming through. There is only enough room for one boat at a time here. I had visions of the fist nations ambushing the British here, it is easy to see how they won that battle.
We rounded into the Benjamins around 8:30 at night. This is one of the most popular anchorages in the North channel for a good reason. Large granite rocks make the scenery stunning and the shore hikes really fun. No issues with securing the boat and I played Taps and Last Post before Captain and I settled into our dinner of Cincinnati chili which I had cooked underway. One set of boaters came by to say hi for the evening and we called it quits before midnight. We will spend a full day here tomorrow to enjoy. I hear rumors the blueberries are late this year so the pancakes we were hoping for might be delayed as well.
