Kathy - The weather was rainy, cool, sunny, hot, repeat throughout the day
07/19/2007, St. Ignace, Michigan

Another day has been spent in St. Ignace. It has rained off and on and thunderstorms are predicted for tonight so we thought we might not want to be anchored out. Mike installed the propane detector and I sewed one side of our sun shade for the cockpit. It will zip on to the biminy and tie to the life lines to give us more shade when we need it. We shopped around downtown and walked along the boardwalk which goes right along the lake.

For cruisers who are aware that all public libraries in Michigan have free wireless internet access, and computers anyone can use, and it is good to know the location of the libraries from marinas. The library here is probably about a mile's walk from the marina, a little way up the hill. I believe I paid $10 here to use the internet right from the boat, and it has worked fine for us. We usually have to go up above to get a good connection, but it's more convenient than walking up the hill.

We went to the Mackinaw Grille for dinner tonight and the food was very good. The best part was that on our way, there were otters climbing up the ladder on the end of a dock and playing on the dock. It was fun to watch.

We are planning to leave in the morning for either Government Bay in the Les Cheneauxs or Detour. It's supposed to be a beautiful day .

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Kathy
07/18/2007, St. Ignace, Michigan

We spent a second day in St. Ignace. We did the laundry this morning and fog rolled in and was really thick, so Mike decided to install the new GPS Chart Plotter. He has been working on it all day while I hand him tools. I also had a little time to clean the stove and oven-what fun! Some things really aren't all that different on a boat. It is sunny and hot here now. There has been constant traffic at the gas dock today with sailors from the race fueling up to head home.
Thought I could say a few words about St. Ignace. The marina is fairly new and beautiful. It is easy to get around and their bathrooms and showers are some of the best we've seen. There are hardware stores nearby, plenty of good dining, and a party store. There are also many small shops with all kinds of goodies. They have a nice historic boardwalk that borders Lake Huron much of the time and is a great place for a walk. The grocery store is quite a ways uphill from here and not really very convenient for cruisers. Luckily, Debbie drove me to the grocery store last night to pick up a few things we had forgotten to get on Beaver Island (where there is a wonderful grocery store).

We think it could be a while before we will be able to upload. We will write every day, but we may be out of internet access for some time.

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Mike Another beautiful day
07/17/2007, St. Ignace, Michigan

We left Beaver Island this morning in calm seas. Larry and Carol decided to head south. It was so good to see them and spend some time together. Before long we had a nice SW breeze and got the sails up and the engine off. Grays Passage was about 15 miles due east and we sailed for a couple of hours at 6 knots. Watching for Gray's Light that marks the south east corner of the passage, there was something wrong with the horizon. With the binoculars we could see miles of spinnakers... we seem to have found ourselves a front row seat for the Chicago to Mackinaw Race. Once in the Straits, the wind died. We started the engine when we got down to 2 knots and stayed on the south side of the fleet for the rest of the morning watching the race people trying to make something out of nothing.

We arrived at St. Ignace at about 2:00 pm, pumped out and added 30 gallons of fuel. Lunch seemed to have been forgotten so we wandered across the street for a burger before washing the bugs off the boat.
Davey and Debbie (my sister and brother in-law) are at the cottage and are one their way up for dinner tonight. We may need to beg them to drive us to the store for a few things before we head to the eastern UP where stores are few are far between.

Tomorrow's weather calls for east winds shifting to the north. I think we'll end up at the laundry waiting for the wind shift, I have no idea where well end up but Government Bay is nice and an easy sail from here.

Bye for now.... Mike

Ps...Scott and Dan ..... The snubber works great but we learned in South Manitou that in winds over 30 kts running it low is way better than over the roller.

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