When people ask us how many can sleep in our boat, we always say there is room for two and Sue. As in past years, this cruise includes a ten day vacation for our best crew, Sue Beres. She will arrive by car on Wednesday. We spend two days in Long Point Cove, fishing, swimming and dinking about awaiting her arrival.

We pick Sue up in Spanish, a little town on Hwy 17 about midway in the North Channel. The marina features a beautiful boaters' lounge and a steep climb up a scafford-type stairway for a view of the Spanish marshes and the islands beyond. After a stop for ice cream (Farquarhar's of course) at the Lucky Snack Shop, we head out through Little Detroit passage into the McBean Channel. It is a lovely late afternoon motor sail with few other boats in sight.

We anchor in another favorite anchorage in east Hotham, just beyond the milk-buoyed rocky channel. We are one of three boats in the anchorage.

The next day we hoist anchor for Sturgeon Cove, with a stopover at Bedford Island to see if the small mouth bass are biting. Unfortunately, they are not. I see a dozen swimming around my lure, but can't get a one to bite!! The sail to Sturgeon is the best of the trip yet, downwind on flat water. We see five boats ahead of us doing the Z dance through the entrance to the Cove, and end up being one of ten at anchor. With southeast winds 15-20 knots predicted, this is a perfectly protected anchorage. It is a hot afternoon in the Cove, so Bill and I jump in for a refreshing swim.

We are fortunate to meet up with Clark, on Seabbatical 1, a Bavaria 38. Clark has spent the past seven winters single-handing in the Bahamas and offered a ton of advice for our pending visit there.

Rain is predicted for the next day, so the clouds in the west give us another spectacular sunset.