Day 343 - Little Current — Captain Father John

Miles cruised 23, fuel purchased $0, slip fee $65, daily high temperature 76°f

Sunday in Killarney, Canada was a lot of fun. After lunch at Herbert’s fish restaurant we went swimming in the pool at the Killarney Mountain Lodge (KML) Marina. They have a solar heating system on the roof next to the pool. The water in the pool was the perfect temperature. The gloomy morning transformed into a sunny and windy afternoon. We met several of the locals from Little Current that sailed over on Friday but were waiting for better weather (less wind on the nose) to sail back on Monday. The channel through Killarney looks like a narrow river. The rose granite cliffs shine in the sunlight just a hundred yards away.

The new management at the KML purchased dozens of red Adirondack chairs and placed them all over the property including our dock. It is a magical setting to sit on the waters edge and watch the myriad of different boats pass by.

Monday morning in Killarney was bright and sunny. I bought two large sticky buns for breakfast at the coffee shop on the end of our dock. It could not be more convenient unless they delivered to the boat.

A professional photographer is also taking photos of the red chairs.

I listened to Roy Eaton on the Cruisers Net at 9:00 am. When I called in our location and mentioned we were Loopers, Roy said his spies had already informed him that we were from Chicago and had been on the Loop for 343 days. I mentioned that his spy might be Bruce on Enchanted Summers which is the boat next to us in the marina. Roy said he never reveals his sources. He is a good journalist.

This is the spy’s boat – Enchanted Summers

We will sit in on Roy’s broadcast on Tuesday. Wednesday will be his last broadcast for the season. He operates the Cruisers Net for the months of July and August only. Roy hosts an annual Cruisers Net rendezvous in Florida each winter. Many of the North Channel cruisers are snow birds as are we.

We cast off from the Killarney Mountain Lodge Marina at 11:00 am with the intent of making the Little Current swing bridge opening at 1:00 pm. The bridge only opens once per hour on the hour. You do not want to be late for that one.

We saw one other Looper boat in Killarney as we departed this morning. It was Catan the boat named after Monopoly type game from Germany. We met them in the locks in the Trent Waterway. We did not see them. We only saw their boat. I guess we are no longer dead last among the Loopers in the North Channel.

Sometimes Little Current has lots of current and can come from either the east or the west. There is a special bouy in the channel that shows the direction of the current and the speed. That is useful information while docking.

We arrived at the Little Current Marina on Manitoulin Island at 1:15 pm and tied up on the end of dock B14. We are the only boat on B dock. It is already lonely here and it is still August for a few more days.

I went for a dingy ride for about 45 minutes. When I returned, Priscilla mentioned we were visited by Canadian customs to view our passports. From what I see we are the only US boat in the marina. That was the easiest decision that customs officer had to make all week. Let’s see now, who should I inspect today?

Bonus photo – there is no limitation to getting a good selfie.

We will spend two days in Little Current and then cruise 17 miles to Mudge Bay and visit Bridal Falls.

Carl (Chef) Wooden – quote of the day.

“What I mean by that is that the point of life, as I see it, is not to write books or scale mountains or sail oceans, but to achieve happiness, and preferably an unselfish happiness.”

Bernard Cornwell

Bernard Cornwell, OBE (born 23 February 1944) is an English author of historical novels and a history of the Waterloo Campaign. He is best known for his novels about Napoleonic Wars rifleman Richard Sharpe. Cornwell has written historical novels primarily of English history in five series and one series of contemporary thriller novels. A feature of his historical novels is an end note on how the novel matches or differs from history, for the re-telling, and what you might see at the modern site of the battles described in the novel. One series of historical novels is set in the American Civil War. He wrote a nonfiction book on the battle of Waterloo, in addition to the fictional story of the famous battle in the Sharpe Series. Two of the historical novel series have been adapted for television; the Sharpe television series by ITV and The Last Kingdom by BBC. He lives in the US with his wife. He alternates between Cape Cod, Massachusetts and Charleston, South Carolina.