Day Six: just the morning. Oops! Another change of plans....

Good grief!  Three to four foot waves!  From the wrong direction!

We were up by 6:30 this morning, and I think we didn't even consider not going, although the hardest part was leaving Chester who caught on right away that we were leaving again, and quietly moped in his gentlemanly way.

On the water by 9 am, we cruised right on down the canal with only a mild headwind.  The waves started getting mixed up as we neared the breakwater and there on the west beach were our friends, Kate Alvord and Stephanie Mills.  

We stopped and had a lovely reunion before bundling up and pushing off again into the surf.  The day was grey, grey and gloomy but we stayed on course right toward the McLain lighthouse.  

I was not quite prepared for the size of the seas beyond the breakwater.  I didn't freeze--Terry always has feared that I'd freeze in fear like the first time we kayaked together--but I gotta say, I was scared.  Libby and Terry kept encouraging me, but I secretly think they were a little stunned themselves.  Anyhow, what could we do?  Bouncing and rolling we very slowly made some headway along the McLain shoreline, with my cold hands frozen on the paddle.

Fiinally we could see a point way off in the distance through the mist.  McGunns Creek!  The Ekstroms!  lunch!  Yeay,  

More later.....

Yup, Pete and Carol Ekstrom fed us a number one premium lunch of hot homemade vegetable chili and egg salad sandwiches.  Carol laid out our beverage choices and I foolishly chose a beer, thinking I needed the nutrition.  By the end of lunch, when I anticipated looking out the window to calm and smooth seas, maybe a bit of sunshine, I was tired, but game.  Then I saw that if anything, the wind and waves had picked up, still against us,  and the day was still grey and gloomy.   The beer kicked in, and I put my foot down--I was not going back out there.

The Ekstroms, bless their hearts, brought us home, where we are now with Chester again, with a fire in the wood stove and our wet suits hung to dry.   We went only eight miles today, but it felt like twenty.  Tomorrow we plan to get back in the kayaks just west of the Calumet Waterworks Park by 8am, hoping to get to Eagle River by evening.  Let us know if you plan to join us.  482 6827

Here are some photos taken by Pete Ekstrom as we approached from McLains, off in the distance.

  
I know, those don't look like three-foot waves.  But they sure looked bigger from inside the boat!  

Onward!

First day: all the way around the point!

The Bon Voyage party at the Harbor Haus was wonderful--I think heart-warming might be the word--with so many encouraging friends.  We stayed overnight with Joe Kirkish, and there was a crashing thunderstorm in the night and it was still raining when we got up and took off for Copper Harbor where we met Erika Vye and Steve Brimm at the Pines so Terry could have his pre-trip pancakes.

Inside Joe's house, sorry it's so dark.

Evan McDonald joined us as we got to packing our boats and we finally got a late start, but it wasn't raining!

A passerby took this picture of us as we headed out, across Copper Harbort and straight into a dense fog bank that hid the entire east end of the harbor, including the light house..  We followed Evan's compass reading.  We were three kayaks:  Erika and Steve iin a tandem so that Steve could take photos, Evan in his single, and we in our tandem.

The fog was intense for most of the way to Horseshoe Harbor where the sun burst through.

(An aside here:  I'm not a very good photographer and getting pics from my little waterproof camera to the ipad has proven not easy.   Moreover we had a world-class photographer along with us.  Steve has some shots that I think he'll share and so do others.  I'll get them on here later.)

Our next stop was right before turning the corner at the point, near a cabin belonging to a friend of Steve's.  There we had lunch.  

One thing about the tip of the Keweenaw is that it isn't really a tip.  It's more like a very blunt finger; meaning that the confused waves that happen at the end of the peninsula lasted for about a mile.  They weren't too bad although mostly from the east, the exact opposite that we were expecting, having tuned in to NOAA.  

So then we headed back west, past High Rock, looking for Keystone Bay, our next stop, rolling along on some glassy swells.  That's Keystone, below.

Erika was telling us about the Keweenaw Fault and we could see places where the basalt met the sandstone.  Once we reached the lovely Keystone Beach we had to decide whether to camp or go on.  It was 4:00pm and we had seven or eight miles to go to Gina's and we were tired.  BUT conditions looked good, we figured we had plenty of sunlight.  Back into the boats we climbed.

Now is where things started to get dicey.  I found that I had phone signal with my little tracfone so I called Gina Nicholas to tell her we were on our way to her place but realizing that the landing might be sketchy there.  Gina was sitting on the tarmac at Chicago O''hare trying to get home, and so we were having a time of it trying to figure out where we were gonna take out,, when the wind hit us suddenly out of the west--a good stiff headwind.   Moreover the setting sun was right in our eyes and we didn't know exacttly where Giina's landing was. 

We passed under Bare Bluff, another artifact of the Keweenaw Fault, and were paddling to beat the band, peering along the shore where finally we spotted her, a figure standing in the water among the boulders beckoning us in.  What a relief!

Well it was 9pm before we enjoyed the delicious supper that Bonnie Hay had prepared for us  including a killer quinoa/millet tabouli, fresh green beans and roasted chicken.  And wine!  And fresh soft beds!  Yeay!

Here's the thimbleberries in front of Gina's house.

Having breakfast--and great coffee--in the sunlight.

 Gina and her son Nick helping us launch this morning, again into a west  wind.

Sorry this blog is too long.  I'll try to keep it shorter next time.  It's just such an adventure that I just can't help but think that you all  want to know about EVERY single moment.

The first day was the longest at around 22 miles.  We're hoping for shorter days from now on.

Onward!