Great Lakes Sailing

8/13/08

Sault Ste. Marie, MI

After the last of the blueberry pancakes had been consumed, we got underway towards "The Soo". Once again, we flew our spinnaker for the 5th time in 7 days until we encountered a large upbound freighter making his way towards Whitefish Point. When the AIS reported closest point of approach at 30 yards, Deanna picked up the mike and worked out a passing arrangement which basically involved us gybing and ultimately dousing the kite. The wind turned even lighter until we reached Gros Cap Light and then turned fairly strong out of the west. We continued up the channel under sail while the kids steered and we navigated. A coast guard cutter came up behind us and then called us on the VHF, advised us of their intention to pass on our port and then wished us a good day. Since we were already well to the right hand side of the channel and were watching the cutter closely, we believe that they might have seen the kids operating the boat themselves and were just checking to see if the was actually an adult on board.

Locking down proved to be quite an adventure as we shared the lock with one of the Soo lock tour boats and a large powerboat. The lockmaster gave us very specific instructions to allow the tour boat to enter the lock first despite the fact that we had to wait almost 20 minutes for his arrival. Upon exiting the lock, a squall line came through complete with 24 kt winds and rain but it all passed within 5 minutes or so after arriving at the Kemp Marina.