Tuesday, 6/09 Wingfield Basin
to Barclay Island
As predicted, the wind died
way down but there was fog. We pulled the anchor at 8:00 and was it ever a
mess! As we pulled it in, Carol stood on the bow spraying the mud off the chain
with our washdown hose. We had mud everywhere! Yuk.
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| Jim swabbing the deck after the anchoring mess |
The bay was flat and foggy so
we set the course for our 4 hour run to the islands of Georgian Bay.
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| Our entrance to the islands |
In the Georgian Bay,
there are well over 30,000 islands as well as lots of rocks. As there are only
a few entrances to the land of the islands, we took GREAT care as we moved from
the open water into our chosen entrance to the islands. Though deep, many of
the channels are reallllly narrow with unforgiving rocks and boulders on each
side!
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| The lighthouse marking the tight entrance to the islands |
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| Approaching our first "pinch point" |
Our first serious “pinch point”
required Carol’s watchful eye to make sure we made the dog leg through the
narrow passage and around the rocks at the light house. It was about 50 feet
deep with boulders within 20 feet of either side of the boat that we couldn’t
see! Sweaty palms time!!
It is definitely a team
effort navigating the Georgian Bay islands. Their “marker buoys” are oftentimes
just a painted fence pole sticking out of the water marking a boulder –
ughhh. To help us get through, Carol
watches the updated paper charts and watches for the “buoys” while Jim confirms
her observations on his older e-charts and drives the boat.
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| Carol navigating through the islands |
On the way across Georgian
Bay, Jim broke a chunk of a tooth so, based on our cruising guide, we decided
to go to Pointe au Baril to see if we could find a dentist. There were supposed
to be 3 pretty good sized marinas there so we figured it was a good place to
try. Well, as luck would have it, none of them could support a boat any bigger
than about 30 feet – Samba is 54 feet! Also, none of them answer their radios –
ughhh. We pulled up fairly close to the government dock to talk to the dock
hands who informed us that we would have to turn around and go somewhere else –
so we did.
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| Our anchorage at Barclay Island |
Fortunately, the night
before, Jim had found a possible anchorage for us on Barclay Island so we headed for it, hoping
for the best.
Barclay turned out to be a very
pretty anchorage in a small, protected bay. There was 1 cottage that we could
see. Otherwise, it was just us! Woo Hoo!
Now that we know what the 30,000 islands are like, we spent the rest of the evening looking at charts and planning our next move as there was some pretty serious weather moving into our area on Wednesday! Notice the view out our window. Hardly 100’ away is the spectacular rocky shore – wow.
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| The view out the window as we plotted the next day's route to escape the coming storm. |
