Great Lakes Continued – Lake Michigan
Hey everyone. I’m concluding my time on these greatest lakes so here is what I’ve been up to on the last but not least, Lake Michigan.
I came into Lake Michigan from Mackinaw City, MI as the sun was rising, passing under the magnificent Mackinac Bridge, and directly into a northwest headwind and >1m waves – yay! I didn’t get to admire the bridge because the lake, other boaters, and an approaching laker were keeping me kinda busy. A had to keep this heading for the next 15 nautical miles before I could start to work my way west-south-west and toward my destination, Harbor Springs, MI. I got some protection from Beaver Island and the lake settled down to become make just a bumpy ride. I had to miss Beaver Island, but many boaters were talking about visiting the island home of King James Strang, the only king ever to reign within the USA. He made himself king of course after he lost the Mormon leadership and brought some followers to the island in 1847. The people eventually dispatched the king, the island became home to a fishing industry (the Irish again), and that too is long gone. Harbor Springs to the south was a nice refuge after a long morning. It is a very lovely harbor town and clearly rather affluent.
I left early the next day for Traverse City, MI because the wind and the waves were slow and low. It was a smooth passage that included a bit of fishing off Charlevoix and its massive St. Mary’s Cement plant. Fishing in MI seems to be more about playing chicken with other boats; maybe it is something to keep them busy when there are no bites? Grand Traverse Bay has amazing bathymetry. Depths can be 120m (400’) and within 100m it is 9m (30’) with a long string of these variations of deep valleys and shallow humps. By noon it was very calm as I approached Traverse City. I was bathing when a swarm of boats emerged from the city harbors heading my way. Things got noisy and busy which is the only explanation I can offer for the odd appearance of four swans paddling in the middle of the bay; perhaps an escape from the boat traffic, wakes, and noise.
Traverse City, MI lives up to its reputation as one of the USA’s best summer tourist locations. It calls itself the cherry capital of the world and there is no shortage of all things cherry around the city, which is great for me because I love cherries! Some 500,000 people flock here annually for the National Cherry Festival, which relied on lots of cherry imports this year because the season was a few weeks late. There is even cherry wine tasting with quite a collection of ‘flavours’ – who knew. The local climate also supports about 10 wineries. There is a brewery, distillery, or pub on every other corner and countless restaurants and fancy shops all within easy walking distance of the downtown. It is a fun town which will keep you busy as long as wish to stay and your pockets are deep. I had several very enjoyable days at dock waiting for my next crew member. Kelly Munkittrick came onboard for a second leg. He must like crewing because this day he travelled by train, plane, and automobile to join me.
My principal reason for visiting Traverse City was the Boardman River. This is one of North America’s great dam removal and river restoration stories. Three dams have been removed and a very elaborate river re-creation has been completed. We met with Frank Dituri who works for Traverse City briefly in the evening in between clearing downed tree limbs across the City (his job after a big storm) and a Council meeting that night. The next morning he picked us up at 7AM and toured us up the river to see all the dam removal sites and the new river and its valley. The work here is outstanding, and you wouldn’t know it was dams and head ponds just a few years ago. Now it is a paddler’s, fisher’s, biker’s, and birder’s dream at the edge of the city. Frank along with the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians and >100 dedicated river people made this happen. There was lots of engineering, but it was fun to hear him describe how they dismissed the science advice from a well-known fluvial geomorphologist like me and used rods jammed into the uncovered, head-pond sediments to hear the ‘clink’ of gravel to tell them where the river used to flow and that is where they excavated the old-new river. He clearly loves this river! The river has one last fishway located in the city to repair to complete the restoration. The river winds through the city where there has been an excellent revitalization of the banks with paths and docks filled with walkers, paddlers, kids fishing, and a couple of trout. The Boardman River Restoration is an example of how we can overcome our mistakes and re-wild a river, so if your community has an unhappy river, check out the Boardman and call Frank, he loves to talk about it!
We left later that day and arrived in Leland, MI mid-afternoon (another bumpy ride). Leland is also known as Fishtown. I had planned to meet with Amanda Holmes from the Fishtown Preservation Society, but an important board meeting left us to explore the little town and historic waterfront on our own. The Society has a visitor center on the dock, so check that out if you are there. The village was nice, but it is small (and therefore crowded in the summer). We stayed overnight and headed out early for Manistee, MI.
Leaving Leland and turning south we had a heading of 180 degrees which meant I was truly southbound now. We were planning to harbor-jump down the east coast because the weather favoured short runs down this side of the lake. Manistee is accessed by a river with break-walls at the lake and multiple marinas lining the banks that cater to many fishers, which we felt and heard leave like a hum of hornets rocking the boat the next morning at zero-dark-hour. The most interesting thing about this town was the massive laker Manitowoc that had been upstream and was traversing the small river to reach the lake. It is amazing to watch these captains navigate these narrow channels barely wide enough for three WWs. It was delivering limestone somewhere, but it also discharged 48,000 gallons of diesel into the river – a nasty byproduct of our industrial rivers. It usually carries coal for a power generating station upriver. There is still a collection of coal plants along the Great Lakes shorelines and across this basin. There is even a coal-driven ferry on Lake Michigan, the S.S. Badger. I heard dockside that the owner would like to convert to electric, if it was financially feasible. Electric boats are here but still only at small scales. Burning coal is a major polluter of water, air, and soil as the Town of Waukegan, IL we’d pass later knows far too well. I’ll address our persistent love of coal later.
The weather changed, something I track all day out here, and we decided to make a run for the western shore and Wisconsin in the morning. We left in the dark with those fishing boats. Arriving to the breakwaters, we were met by the swells from the previous days as they built in the long shallows of this shoreline and were funneled by the breakwaters into a >2m roller coaster. Added to this rocking and rolling in the dark were the fishers racing past us to join the gauntlet of earlier fishers lining the 100’ deep contour. More than 50 boats, all smaller than WW, were already bobbing heavily as they trolled and dodged each other in the dark. It was fishers’ rush hour! We maneuvered our way through these while working the heavy wind and waves. The rising sun with the boats behind us was welcomed. That ride was very bouncy with >1m waves and a NW wind on our starboard bow keeping us at the helm and moving at just 10 knots for the next few hours. We had to keep that heading, but it was luckily the most direct route across the lake. Our plan worked out and about halfway across the wind and waves were subsiding and we could turn southwest and head down the shores of Wisconsin en route to Port Washington, WI.
Port Washington is also a very fun town. It is very boater oriented with a great marina next to the downtown. Short walks got you awesome deep-fried cheese curds – who knew they existed, 200+ types of beer, and fun, friendly people everywhere like our favourite the Singing Salmon (maybe because the beer was $2), where barkeeps Mary and Anne gamed us at a local bar dice game which had new rules with every throw. We were storm-stayed for two nights which also gave us laundry and shower time. It is great town and a highly recommended stop for travellers.
We continued south to Chicago. I’m still here waiting for my truck ride (another upcoming story). Chicago by water is unique and it deserves its own story – stay tuned.
Until next time, Allen
