So everybody got themselves to Sarnia and we got stowed, provisioned and ready. Friday morning we cleared in using the CBP ROAM App (really easy, a great improvement over the old clearance procedures). We got an assigned tie-up on the outside of a four-boat raft right next to the main stage with all the live entertainment.

The Bayview-Mackinac Race is the culmination of a week of parties, midways and events that involves the whole town of Port Huron. We had some good beer, some great food and had a fine time.

Saturday morning dawned bright and windless and a couple of us headed off to the pre-race weather briefing while the rest got some breakie. We broke up the raft about 9:15 and headed out for the course.... picture almost 200 boats all trying to get down a narrow river through 2 lift bridges at the same time, total chaos! The banks of both sides were lined with people cheering, one group of older women were holding up mark cards like diving judges, on the other bank was a full pipe band.... As we made the slow trip up under the Bluewater Bridge (there's at least a 3-4 knot current against us) we passed close to the Canadian shore, again lined with people and we received hearty cheers for our large Canadian, Ontarian and Manitoban ensigns flying from the backstay.

We reached the start are and there was no wind.
At all.

We went through several postponements before finally starting about an hour after our scheduled time... The whole fleet had that problem. We endured two days of little to know wind where our boat speed averaged 2 knots.

I'll let the rest of the story be told by watch captain Steve Masson in an article published in the Highland Yacht Club newsletter:

Bayview Mackinaw - 2018

Over the past few years, I have had the opportunity to do some longer distance racing on a boat out of QCYC (Queen City). This included some Susan Hood races in early June (Brrrrr) and Lake Ontario 300's - Scotch Bonnet. It is nice to learn the longer distance stuff from friends who have the added safety equipment and experience, before I try it on my own boat and crew.

The boat is Dragonfly -- an Ericson 30 Mark 2. As the owner has moved to Winnipeg, he has decided to sail the boat up to Thunder Bay to keep the boat close (relatively) for summer cruising, and while transiting to Superior, take in the Bayview Mack.

He left QCYC on May 22nd and cruised up the Welland, Lake Erie and Detroit river to arrive at Bayview Yacht Club in Port Huron. This was a race that my dad, Peter Masson, did with his older brother ... back in the day. So it was a great opportunity for me share a little in that experience 60 years later.

The race started on July 14th, 194 boats, with 15 in our fleet. The start was largely a drift-fest that was delayed by numerous postponements. The low speed, and fluky winds continued on and off for 2 days. We did have one crazy squall on Monday morning. We made it to Presque Isle Point (at the north east corner of Michigan) by Monday evening. That was when things became very interesting.

The beautiful sunset (red sky?) turned rather nasty within about 40 min. The wind really began to pick up (40km) and we found ourselves in in 5 - 6 ft waves. We shortened sail, putting up a very small jib, and furling it in 1⁄2 way, reefed the main down about 4ft. We were really pounding into it, with the forecast indicating that this was on for
the next 48 hrs. This is not the way one would want to spend the next 36 hrs (estimated) to get to Mack Island. It was then that we heard on VHF 16 about a 41 ft boat sinking, another dismasted, and the boat we were chasing had lost their steering cables. We looked at each other, and decided that it would be better to help the nearby boat, and live to race another day. It didn't go quite the way we would have wanted, but a great adventure all the same.
--- Stephen Masson