Great Lakes Cruising Club
In preparation for the Australis' big trip to Lake Superior in late June I've been enjoying reading up on what to expect. I'm a member of the Great Lakes Cruising Club. This is a wonderful resource in that they have many hundreds of "Harbor Reports" which are reports on all of the many ports, coves and anchorages throughout the Great Lakes. The reports are prepared by volunteers and there is certainly some variance in the quality of various reports but, generally speaking, they are extreamly helpful and packed with local knowledge.
In addition to the Harbor Reports that members have written and provided to the club are a series of webinars provided by the Great Lakes Cruising Club School. This is all still run by the GLCC. This year they have held a series of webinars which run for about 1 hour each. A lecturer walks you through an online PowerPoint presentation of their experiences on the lakes. The clubs annual gathering is in Duluth, MN, on Lake Superior this year (2016) and so their school focus has been on Lake Superior (happily for me).
The webinars I've viewed today include:
- Introduction to Cruising Lake Superior
- Cruising Lake Superior's Canadian Shores
- Cruising Lake Superior's South Shore
- Wilderness Cruising Lake Superior's Isle Royale
The webinars cost $15 each for members but they did a package deal for all of the Lake Superior series and, while not dead cheap, really do offer some good information that you cant get out of a book.
Superior Way
The next source of information for me has been Bonnie Dahl's excellent book Superior Way. This book is pretty much legendary with anybody cruising, or planning to cruise, Lake Superior. It provides a detailed look at just about every one of the hundreds of anchorages and ports all along the 2980 miles of shoreline! The book is in it's 4th (and last?) edition. It's full of good information showing just where shoals are and where one can anchor in all weathers.
Navionics
The next planning tool is a charting software program by Navionics. Navionics uses vector charts that can be accessed over many different platforms. I have both an app on my Android phone and also an app (Navionics HD) on my Windows 10 PC. I purchased charts for USA and Canada about a year ago and am able to download detailed charts onto either platform.
I have used these charts extensively. It was really useful last year when I went down to the Dry Tortugas. I was able to view where I was on my smartphone while I was right on the helm. In this case, I've been having fun working through the various routes and projected itinerary working out how far I can plan to travel each day and where I might like to go. It's very early days yet and the trip keeps changing day by day but finally, I hope to hone into a trip that will work for the most folks and provide the best experience for the most people.
Richardsons Lake Superior Chartbook and Cruising Guide
Richardsons chartbooks are the bibles of the Great Lakes. I have them for lakes Erie, Huron and Michigan. I haven't yet bought this book for Lake Superior but I soon will. Electronic charts are great but there still isn't anything quite like being able to set a chart on your lap and stab a point and say, that's where we are. If the power goes down, the GPS breaks, it's good to know that I'll still have the paper chart as the basis of my navigation.
Google Docs
I've been using Google Docs, both the Calendar function and the spreadsheet function to allow me to work out itineraries and maintenance "To Do" lists which I can readily share with other crewmembers.
In the example shown here, I have color coded the days into three seperate legs of the cruise. These include the Southern Shore (Orange), Isle Royal (yellow) and NE Shore (green). I use the spreadsheet to monitor how may miles we will need to travel each day and how many hours, on average, of sailing.
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