Merry saves the Day
18 July 2011 | Leland
Wiley; weather bad and then ok
I thought that Merry and I had a clear understanding that we would sail from Frankfort to an open anchorage at South Manitou Island, after a stop at the huge Sleeping Bear Dune. The first part came off. We passed the famous lighthouse at Point Betsie. The wind was out of the south at 14 mph, and the waves 3 feet or so, as we reached the great dune. We anchored, putting our new 37 lb Bruce anchor down, even though we had never used it before, and since our boat has no windlass, I was not sure that we would ever get it up again. The water temp was 74, and I was able to use mask and fins to see that the anchor was entirely buried in the sand. I convinced Merry that it was so rough, that we should wear our wetsuits when I rowed us ashore in Dimples, our 8 ft dingy. We were able to run the dingy ashore through the surf without too much of a problem. We walked down the beach and found a trail that led up into the dunes. The dunes were full of unique and beautiful wild flowers; we took pictures which we hope to post. We finally got to the high point where we could look down at our little boat. We made our way back down to the beach to discover that the wind and waves increased. We attempted to launch or dinghy but it took waves over the bow resulting in 4 inches of water in it. Merry shouted for me to get in and start rowing. We kept getting thrown into the beach. Merry gave a mighty push on the transom, and did a nose dive into the dinghy her posterior pointed to the sky and her face in the floorboard. We finally got to our boat and were able to set sail.