Enjoying a little of Les Cheneaux’s
Today is Ciara Madeline’s gotcha day! We have had her for 9 years now and begin our 10th year on her 75th year! I still pinch myself that somehow, we ended up with such a beautiful boat that is also the oldest boat around. It is pretty rare to stumble upon any boat as old as her (and in such good shape!) and she is a happy boat. Well maintained, very loved and enjoyed all summer. I’m so glad we can give her life and that others enjoy seeing her being used as well. Today while we walked Kona for her morning walk, before we left Cockburn, I was telling Captain how I often think about his late daughter from which Ciara is named. I never knew the person, Ciara; she passed away long before I met him. The day we met he told me about her and then found himself taken aback as he never really talked about her to others, especially people he just met. I could tell that the loss of Ciara was deep. Time doesn’t heal that kind of pain, but I think that when he is behind the wheel and all alone up on deck left with his thoughts that Ciara is with him. The sea has brought a lot of healing and I’m glad we can carry her with us after all this time. There is no better name for this vessel. Happy Gotcha Day Ciara, we love you; we honor your namesake and we are thankful for all the memories we have had on you and the ones to come.
We got a little late of a start this morning as I let everyone sleep in a little. We only had a six-hour ride, so getting going early wasn’t vital. Cory and lifted the anchor with the motor off. As we got to the anchor, we just let the momentum of the boat pop the anchor out of the sand bed. A perfect example to why scope works. If you just put the anchor straight down it will not hold the boat, you need to lay out a ratio of at least 3:1. We always do a minimum of 7:1 (3:1 is really a calm lunch anchor where you don’t intend to stay long or sleep on it).
We crossed over into the United States not long after we left. We waited until we got closer to Detour and better reception before we called into customs. Thankfully we passed through with no issues over the phone and they didn’t ask us any uncomfortable questions about our opinions. The seas were glass and calm and the day was very uneventful. We enjoyed having cell service again and surfed the web a lot underway. We got a little wind and did a little sailing later in the day but not much.
We came into Les Cheneaux Islands around 4pm. We have been here a few times as it is a very protected area that is like a miniature North Channel for America. Lots of homes from large to small dot the shores of the many islands. We dropped anchor in Government Bay which has a nice beach and nature preserve that has hiking and camping. Captain and I took Kona to shore on leash as there were lots of families enjoying the beach with its shallow sandy waters. We took her for a hike and enjoyed the beautiful cedar forest, even though most of it was dead. I call dead cedar forests “Plinko forests” as the trees are densely packed to each other and their branches reach out and remind me of the pins on the Price is Right Plinko board. I wouldn’t want to go off path here, I would get scratched left and right and all over. They give off a neat vibe especially with the forest bed being bald of undergrowth.
We decided to take a long dinghy ride to the town of Cedarville about two and a half miles away. Captain and I had been here once when we helped delivered our friends boat back in 2021 but we had never taken the kids here as the waters are too shallow for Ciara and we didn’t have the range on our small vessel. We were going to go to a place called Cattails as I had read they had unlimited wing night, but when we got there and ordered our drinks I found I was mistaken and wing night was Wednesday. We were all a little bummed and decided we would have a drink and then go to the distillery for dinner instead. The local distillery here had an extensive drink menu. I went boring and got a bottomless Bloody Mary😊 Captain got something called Sailors Delight and also a dark and stormy. The food menu was much more to our liking which is why we actually came here. Cory and I both got French Dip and Captain got pork shank. The house potatoes were out of this world.
While we finished up our drinks Cory went back to the dinghy and got our gas can and carried it up to the gas station to get refilled. He is a great kid and amazing crew. We sat finishing our drinks as we watched him walk by with the tank in hand. Cheers!
It was getting dark as we headed back to Ciara. And 10pm before we got back. We had hoped to have a fire but all of us were beat and wanting to go to bed. We had discussed at dinner if we were going to stay another day or push further down to the lower peninsula of Michigan. We have some high winds coming for the weekend and want to make sure we are in a good spot for that so we decided to get going. Headed to Petoskey (Cory has never been and Captain and I have only been there briefly once) to enjoy hopefully two nights or so tomorrow. It will be about an 11-hour day, so going to bed at 10:30 seemed prudent and so that is what we did.
