Days 26, August 25
A lot has happened since my last posting. We began negotiating for a rental car to carry us from Sault Ste Marie to Houlton on the 25th of August and it appeared that we were going to have to make a heroic trip across Whitefish Bay to arrive on time. At first, the lady told us that we needed to be at her establishment by 3:00PM to get the car. If that were the case, we would have to get under way by around 6:00 in the morning and have an uneventful trip for the 42 mile crossing. The last time we talked to her she told us that we would have to be there by 11:00. That meant that we would need to leave by 4:00 and to complicate the situation, as we went to bed, the area of the Upper Peninsula where we were was being painted with thunderstorms and fairly high waves.
I went to bed at about 8:00 and was awake at 12:45 and couldn’t go back to sleep. Finally, at 1:45, I got up and started the coffee. We headed out to the big waters at 2:15. The storms were gone but the lake was still quite rough, however, the waves were coming directly into our face so the boat ride, although wet was not particularly uncomfortable. Navigation at night is no different than in the daylight in the open water. The one difference is that ships find small boats hard to see and if the pilot of the big craft is not paying attention to his RADAR it is not unheard of that they run over small boats. Since I was moving in the main shipping channel for Sault Ste Marie and there were ships about, it was a bit of concern. We do have a sophisticated radio that warns us when big ships area near and if they are on a collision course.
At one point around 4:00, I saw the lights of a ship probably 8 miles behind us and when I checked him out on our GPS/Radio, His course was directly for us and he was traveling at twice our speed. When he was 4 miles behind us, I called him and asked if had seen us on RADAR and he said that he had. As he got closer, I became confused by his lighting. One end of the ship had bright lights all over it and the other had on 1 light showing. I interpreted that to mean that the bright lights were his bow and the single was his stern. As he got very close, I decided to put more distance between our courses and turned away from him, however, I misinterpreted his lights and actually turned in front of him. As he continued to bear down on us, I realized my mistake, spun the boat around and after he had safely passed, about 40 yards from us, I called him on the radio and apologized for my mistake. He replied, “No Problem.” But I could tell that he had drastically changed course trying to avoid me. I had known the lighting scheme of ships but the middle of the night and fatigue I’m sure played into my serious mistake.
We arrived at the Canadian Soo lock at about 9:30 and were passed through quite quickly. These locks are significantly smaller and are the ones that the cooperating lockmasters want small pleasure boats to use. The two people operating the lock, a middle age man and a very young (probably early 20’s) lady were very helpful and friendly.
On the other side of the lock, we had a short trip to the marina where we planned to leave the boat. Upon arrival, we explained our time dilemma to the dock employee and he said that we could do the settling up stuff after we pick up the car. We called a cab and he finally arrived at 10:50. We told him of our dilemma and he said, “no problem.” He called the rental company and told them that we were on our way and all turned out well.
We were both quite tired when we finally began our 264 mile trek back to Houghton. We switched drivers several times and finally arrived at Mike Sullivan’s home to pick up the truck at about 7:00. Unfortunately, Mike had to be away when we got there so we were unable to again express in person our appreciation for all that he did for us. We headed for Houghton and found a motel and got the last room that they had. (And I truly believe that to be a fact!) The young lady quoted the fare at $125.00. I said that I thought that was a bit high and she said that she could make it $115.00. I hesitated and said, “Uh, no.” Then she asked what I was expecting and I said, “between $90.00 and $100.00” and she replied, “I can do $90.00.” So we had a luxurious room with a real bed for to rest our worn bodies. We found a nice restaurant, had dinner, and went back for 10 hours of sleep.
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