September 11, 2021: A small craft advisory keeps us safely docked at Harrisburg with a bunch of other Loopers.
I woke up around 5:30 AM and read quietly at the table on my iPad until Paul started to stir at about 6:30. Then I made my coffee. I always try to wait until at least one other person is awake before making my coffee since the machine is so darn loud. It’s like always making sure I have coffee ground and ready to go at my house when I have an overnight guest — no one wants to be wakened by a coffee grinder at 5 AM. The same goes for this coffee maker.
Morning Stuff
I had some cereal with the last of the blueberries — after picking out the soft ones — and a banana. Paul wound up making a whole package of sausage patties with some eggs and it didn’t take much arm twisting for me to have two of those patties long after my cereal was finished.
Although it didn’t look bad out when I woke up — or even as late as 8 or 9 AM — there was a small craft advisory for our area of Lake Huron until 7 PM that evening. When I mentioned to the harbormaster that it didn’t look bad, she assured me that it was always worse out on the lake than it looked from inside the marina. Later in the day, the wind definitely picked up, although it remained mostly sunny and rather nice throughout the day.
A look down the dock. There were 5 Loopers parked here. The boat with the red cockpit cover is not Nano; it’s an old (but in great condition) Criss Craft Roamer that was parked next to us.
After breakfast, I headed over to the boater lounge to work on the blog post for Day 32 and to add a few things to the posts for Day 30 and Day 31. I honestly had nothing else to do. I’d done my laundry and had visited pretty much every shop in town the day before.
But I did have an idea for lunch; they had loaner bikes there and there was a brewery/smokehouse restaurant about 1.4 miles away. A little too far for a walk, but certainly within range for a bike ride. As I was finishing up the previous day’s blog post, I texted Paul and Dianne to see if they wanted to bike over there with me. Paul was game. So as soon as the post was published, I packed up my computer stuff and went back to Nano to meet with him.
The Loopers
Here are some of the Loopers at Harrisburg on September 11 as seen on the Nebo app. Nebo automatically tracks boats with the Nebo tracker installed; AGLCA members show the Looper logo for their boat.
Before I dive into that story, let me take a moment to talk a little about the Loopers who had gathered at Harrisville and were stuck there with us, waiting out the weather. There were at least four Loopers there and I got a chance to speak a little to most of them.
As far as doing the Great Loop is concerned, we were running about a month behind the vast majority of Loopers. In more than one guide I’ve read, the recommendations say to get to Chicago by Labor Day. Labor Day had come and gone while we were still on Michigan’s “thumb” and we didn’t expect to reach Chicago until October. So we hadn’t seen many Loopers on the trip at all.
But there was a sort of convergence of us at Harrisville.
There was Safe Haven (2008 Mainship 400), a big boat with a guy doing the Loop solo. (I admit that I envied him for having all that space to himself and for not having to make decisions by committee.) He had a fat tire bicycle for ground transportation and was off on his bike more than he was home on his boat. He told me he was almost done with the loop. I asked him what he was going to do when he was finished. “Do it again!” he told me. He lives on his boat year-round; it’s his only home. I could think of worse ways to live.
Eric’s boat, Safe Haven, is his full-time home. When he finishes the Loop later this month, he plans to do it again. He’s going solo.
Northern Lights (1996 Cherubini Independence 45) and Conflict of Interest (Chris Craft 427), two very large boats that were traveling together from (I believe) Ohio. (That’s where Northern Lights is based; I didn’t get a chance to see the stern on Conflict of Interest because it parked bow in.) We had seen at least one of these boats back at Port Huron the previous week. Their owners get around town on two wheeled electric scooters.
There was another boat there that was not on Nebo and, for the life of me, I can’t remember its name. The two folks on board were doing the loop — or at least part of it — and where going in the opposite direction we were.
There weren’t many boats at Harrisville, but at least a third of the transients were Loopers.
Looking at Nebo now (September 12 at 6:15 PM), I can see Safe Haven still under way all the way up by Mackinaw Island with Northern Lights and Conflict of interest parked side by side at Rogers City. I can also see Looper logos for a bunch of other boats ahead of us and a handful behind us. I’m hoping we get to meet up with some of these people and have longer talks about their trips.
Biking to Lunch
I met Paul at around 12:30 PM and we each grabbed one of the loaner bikes the marina makes available to boaters. They have two kinds of bikes: a bunch of kind of crappy ones locked to the bike rack and two nicer ones that were donated to the marina by some boaters earlier in the year. It’s these two unlocked bikes that we were urged to take.
We got off to a rough start; the marina is at the bottom of a hill and the first part of the ride is up that hill. I still can’t believe I managed to pedal up it — I’m really accustomed to my electic assist bike, which makes pedaling up hill a lot easier. But then we were on a very pleasant, flat, tree-lined street, getting our bike legs (so to speak). A few turns put us on a main road with a generous shoulder perfect for bikers.
We were at the restaurant, Alcona Brew Haus, in about 15 minutes. We stowed the bikes in a narrow space between the back of the building and a little cargo trailer parked there — we had no locks for them — and went inside.
We were told we couldn’t eat outside because they were short staffed and we wouldn’t get good service. So we took a table in a mostly empty dining room. I ordered smoked meatloaf, which was probably not the best choice, although I liked it enough. Paul had a pizza and wound up taking more than half back with him. The food was good and I’d go there again if I ever came back to Harrisville.
On the way back, we stopped at a hardware store to buy some brass quick connects to make dealing with water fill ups a little easier. It was nice having our own means of transportation. (I would never do this trip on my own without either a bike or one of those electric scooters.)
Relaxing in the Afternoon
I spent most of the afternoon reading. Although I read some more serious fiction earlier in the trip — I really enjoyed Dream Girl by Laura Lippman — I’ve been working my way through some whodunit fiction by Ngaio Marsh. I’d read a bunch of these years ago and decided to try to read them all in order. My library has them available as ebooks, so I can borrow them and read them on my iPad. It’s extremely convenient when traveling and I can read with or without light. Since both my roomie Dianne and Capt Paul wear eye masks while sleeping — personally, when I open my eyes, I want to see — a little light from my iPad doesn’t bother them if I’m up in the middle of the night and want to read myself back to sleep.
Around 4 PM, I grabbed that bike again and rode up to an “ice cream” shop on the main road. I sat on a bench in the shade outside the place, thoroughly enjoying my frozen treat, which probably didn’t include an ounce of real cream in it.
I grabbed a seat up on the bow, using one of the big round fenders as a backrest, and read for a while longer. By the time I came in, the sun was sinking low on the horizon. Dianne had already gone to bed; Capt Paul was reading at the table but went to bed a while later. It was just about dark outside when I turned in for the night.
