Schooling up on Lake Superior

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.

Two Hearted Trail Marathon

For years I've been doing a bit of running.  I'm not really very serious but I like to run in order to try to stay more or less in shape.  In particular, when the weather is nice, I like to trail run.  We have some really nice trails in the Pinckney Recreation Area near Dexter.

For the last couple of years I've been kicking about the idea of running a marathon.  Now, please understand that I don't intend making a habit of this.  For one thing, racing long distances requires that you train long distances which means spending a lot of spare time away from family and the Australis.  Second, it's rough on your body, particularly your joints and, so I read, even your heart muscles. Despite these few detractions, I've felt for some time that running one marathon in my life would be a fun, healthy achievement and I reason that if I'm ever going to do it, at 48 years old, now would probably be a pretty good time.

I don't much care for crowds.  In 2013, I ran in the Dexter Ann Arbor half marathon.  It was a fun run but the crowd at the beginning of the race, before everyone spread out, was not my thing and besides, I prefer trail running over road running.  So, I reasoned that if I was going to run a marathon, I should run a trail marathon.

But where?  Searching about online I came across the Two Hearted Trail Marathon which is billed as follows:

Located in the remote, wild northeastern Upper Peninsula of Michigan, the Two Hearted River captured the imagination of Ernest Hemingway in his novel "The Big Two Hearted River." In addition to world class trout fishing this region features one of the most remarkable stretches of shoreline in the entire Lake Superior basin. Runners in the 50K and Marathon will experience this rugged coastline first hand via single track on high bluffs and more intimate shoreline forests. In addition, the race course winds inland along the shores of Culhane Lake and the Little Two Hearted River. The course is 80% single track and 20% dirt forest road or two track. This course has the capacity to transform the way you see nature and the world. half marathon is a challenging loop that takes runners through old growth white pine forest and along the much loved ridge on the southern shore of Clark Lake. All races finish at the Upper Tahquamenon Falls, second highest east of the Mississippi. Camp 33 Brew Pub is located 200 meters from the finish.

How could I resist?!  Towards the end of last year (2015), I started training for the race which will be held in and around the Tahquamenon Falls State Park on June 25th.

Running in this race has indirectly been the catalyst for an upcoming cruise to Lake Superior. Lake Superior has been high on my list of places I wanted to cruise with the Australis before I take her out of the Great Lakes and start working south but I had mentally kicked the can for a Lake Superior cruise down the road some years ahead.  But, with my marathon race registration comfortably setting in my inbox, I started thinking about where I would stay during the race weekend and the thought occurred to me, "Wouldn't it be nice if I could get the Australis up there and stay on her while I was running the race?".  A quick consultation with my friend and sailing buddy, David Kunitz, resulted in him kindly agreeing to deliver her up to Whitefish Bay for me earlier in June, and have her there on the 24th ready for the race.  Wow!  How cool is that?

After the race, I'm planning to take a 3 week vacation to cruise over to Isle Royal National Park and then sail along the NE Canadian shore.



So, now not only do I get to run a marathon along some beautiful wilderness trails, I then get to cruise some of the most pristine and remote wilderness in North America.  I've got a lot of preparation between now and then but this is shaping up to be quite and adventure.

I've been putting in some descent miles on the treadmill and on the trail when the weather permits.  I've been running into some hip bursitis trouble but my dear friend Ingrid Crause, who is an experienced athlete and certified trainer, has been giving me some good training advice and I'm confident that one way or another I'll get my wombly arse into shape enough to finish the race sometime before the sun goes down on the day of June 25th.