Lac La Belle to Big Bay Harbor

Day 19, August 18

We got up early and pushed to get underway as soon as possible.  We had set up the Dink for the trip the night before and got everything laid out so that we started the motor at 7:30  and were on our way to Big or.  This is to be about a 40 mile trip all across open water bypassing the Keweenaw Bay.  The weather forecast looked to be quite favorable for the trip.

Rain Coming as we leave Lac La Belle

Not long after we left our little secure cove and got out into the middle of Lac La Belle, it began to rain!  Luckily, it was a gentle rain but one that required me to put on my full rain gear.  It was also quite cold so I was dressed with a pair of jeans, long sleeve shirt and a light windbreaker.  With my Frogg Togg rain suit I was quite toasty even though it was raining.

Canal out of Lac La Belle

Out in the main lake, we were motoring on a course of 169 degrees for Big Bay in fairly calm waters.  There was a breeze that was moving faster than we were so I raised the sails and soon we were traveling along at 7 mph.  The further we got from land, the larger the waves got until they were running consistently between 3 and 4 feet.  At first we were heading into these guys, but as the day progressed, the wind shifted to the west and this caused the waves to smack us in the side and at times, cause the boat to rock quite violently  And that is what we did for 7 hours.  By the time we got to Big Bay Harbor, we were both quite tired.

Big Bay Harbor is a well protected little inlet in the back side of Big Bay.  The marina has no finger docks so the only place for transients and seasonal boaters to tie up is along the wall.  When we got there a total of one commercial fisherman and 8 boat boats taking up what appeared to be all of the space except the gas dock.  We dropped our anchor in the middle of the harbor and took Dink to the dock to see about getting permission at least use a shower even though we had to anchor.  There is no one who mans this marine.  One needs to call a nearby park to have the dock master on call come sign you in.  The young man was quite responsive and was there in about 10 minutes after my call.  I needed gas so he waited  while I took the Dink back to Panache, pulled up the anchor and motored over to the fuel dock.  The wind was blowing quit strongly at the side of the boat as we pulled in, but landed with no problem.  As I was tying up, a 40 foot cruised pulled up to the dock directly behind me.  Between the two of us, we took all of the available space that was left on the wall which included the fuel dock.  The kid on the dock said that we could stay at the fuel dock for the night so we made the boat fast.  I took on 5 gallons of fuel.



Thunder Bay Restaurant in Bag Bay, MI



We spent some time talking to the young couple on the 40 footer.  They were from Houghton and were meeting some friends on a similar boat who were from Canada.  These folks had been here before so they were familiar with the town of Big Bay and suggested that we eat at the Thunder Bay Restaurant.  It was a neat old building that had been built as a warehouse by members of the lumber industry.  Sometime later, Henry Ford bought it and fixed it up into a hotel.  Later, a film crew built a bar onto the original building and that was a setting for the film “Anatomy of a Murder.”

After a fine dinner, we walked down to a local party supply store and bought ice and a few supplies like bread and snack foods.  We then had about a mile walk back to the boat and by the time we got there, we both agreed that we were tired.  An interesting thing happened to both of us.  Since we had been on a rolling boat virtually all day, we found that the ground seemed to be rolling as we walked to town and back.  I promise you that it had nothing to do with the beer that I had with my spicy sausage sandwich.

Back at the boat we secured the boat for the night, both took showers and called it a night. 

Lac La Belle Bear Belly Restaruant

As I was typing this posting, I remembered an interesting conversation we had yesterday with the owner of the Bear Belly Restaurant.  He is an avid bear hunter and he has an interesting technique of “salting” an area to draw bears in.  He procures (buys?) hundreds of pounds of overrun Granola products from one of the big manufacturers located in the area.  He also gets drums of maraschino cherries that are not perfect.  He then goes into the forest and digs a hole, pours these mixtures in, and then covers the pit with logs that only a bear can move.  The logs keep smaller animals like raccoons from getting into the bait.  He places a motion activated camera near the site and records the activities.  He says that the bears go “simple” over this stuff.  They even eat the dirt that is flavored by the juices.  This then answers the questions that I had as to where he got the mounted animals in his restaurant.