The day after we got back from Mackinac Island we gathered up some snacks and basic sleeping supplies and headed up to Port Huron with the intent to bring the boat down to Lake Erie and park it at Toledo Beach for a few days until we needed to leave to join our boat clubs summer cruise. We are the cruising fleet captains this year so it would be bad form to miss it :). Guess this will be the first shake down cruise to ensure everything seems good with the boat before heading out for the two week cruise we are planning next week.
We piled everyone in the truck with a fair amount of stuff loaded up the boat and decided to head out. Unfortunately Port Huron is about 2hrs from our house but luckily Annabelle had other plans the next day and was willing to drive the car home and come pick us up the next day. Right after she left I realized I forgot to give her the keys for the truck. When I called to tell her to come back for the car keys she was a couple miles away and decided she might not be able to find us again and didn't want to turn back. You have to love fancy cars with keyless ignitions these days that will let you start the car and walk away from it. Anyway this was probably her longest drive on her own to date with the added excitement of getting to drive though Detroit during rush hour in a car she could not turn off as it would not start again without a key she did not have. I was pretty proud of her for successfully accomplishing this on her own and making it home safely.
After Annabelle was off we called the bridge to request an opening and shoved off the wall we had been tied up on for the last few days since buying the boat. This was my first experience at trying to hold the boat in place on a river with a current pushing us from behind while we waited for the bridge to open. Needless to say this did not go very well and there were a lot of small boats constantly heading out that did not need to the bridge to open. Every time I gave the boat power in reverse it would only back to starboard, I ended up pretty close to the wall and some other boats. With all the traffic I was a bit worried about turning around and kept being pushed closer to the draw bridge. Lucky at the last moment (honestly it might have been past the last moment) the bridge started opening and we were able to make it through without having to figure out how to turn the boat around in this crazy little river. We headed over to the fuel dock again with lots of little boats zipping in and out added 100 gallons of fuel and headed out towards Lake St Clair. The kids explored the boat a bit and quickly realized that boating was not all that exciting and settled in. We decided to stay at Metro Beach that night and were one of about 4 boats in there that night. Docking seemed to go pretty well considering it was my first time with this boat and it seemed we would have lots of room to back out easily in the morning. By the time we got there everyone was hungry and hot. We made a light dinner, headed over to find some ice cream, and explore the park a bit. Over all it turned out to be a really nice first day. Everyone slept well and it seemed that we made a good choice picking this boat for our Great Loop adventure.
We got up early the next morning to head out to Toledo Beach marina. The girls were still sleeping when we left and we had to wake them up so they could see Detroit on our way by. We got another really nice day. The current gave us a lot of extra speed and I think everyone enjoyed the ride. We ended up making it to Toledo Beach in about 5-6hrs which was much much quicker then we expected. Everything went smoothly with the boats systems and seemed to work as expected other than the propane tank which appeared to be low or empty. We had planned for something like that and it just meant we got to eat sandwiches instead of pasta for dinner. Remarkably I don't think I have anything to fix before we head out for our extended cruise in a few days!
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