North on the Detroit and St. Clair Rivers

Approaching the Ambassador Bridge (between
Detroit and Windsor ON), with smoggy
Detroit in the background

Coming off Lake Erie, we entered the Detroit River, and it was good to be off the open water onto something that gave at least a smittance of protection from wind & waves.  Of course, the down side of this river travel was that we had a 1.5-2.0 mph head current.  Since we only make about 10 mph when everything is going well and the stars and moon are all aligned, it affected our fuel economy and speed by 20%.

The Renaissance Center in downtown
Detroit, which was supposed to
revitalize the entire city.  HA!
GM also moved their headquarters here,
at least the original GM, not the
Government Motors company

 

 

 

South of Detroit, I was surprised to see so many industrial plants (some of which were still in production!).  On both the US as well as the Canadian side, it was just one plant after another for miles.  This place really took a hit when the economy went south.

We stayed at a marina to the north of Detroit on Lake St Clair, where my dad had taken us numerous times.  When Sue & I were last here several years ago, I got the marina information in preparation for our current visit.  We rented a car & went to the cemetery where my parents are buried & took care of their graves.  I was surprised that I remembered how to get there!



At my parents grave sites, north of Detroit

Leaving the marina on Lake St Clair, the marine life
is overtaking the human life!

We departed Lake St. Clair & headed up the St. Clair River to Port Huron MI, which is right at the southern end of Lake Huron.  We fought the current again, as we got a first-hand lesson of what happens when the direction of a strong wind is exactly opposite of the direction of a strong current.  We had 15-20 mph winds directly behind us, with 2.0 mph head current, which created sharp choppy breaking waves the entire 6 hour trip.  Had we not been on the river and had the wind on our stern, we wouldn’t even have been able to travel that day.

So now we’re at a marina in Port Huron, waiting for the weather on the Lake to die down.  The winds on the lake today were 20 mph gusting to 30, with waves up to 6’.  Now, we have been loyal members of US Power Squadrons for more than 10 years, and have religiously taken most of their boating courses, so we’ve learned that when the weather is that bad on open water, ya keep yer butt in port!

We hope to get underway tomorrow at sunrise to make a 3-day dash (at least as much as a “crawler” can dash) to Mackinaw City MI, about 250 miles away.  We’ll have 8-10 hour days, and plan to anchor at night, but we want to take advantage of the weather window.  As we leave this marina and travel the last 3 miles up the St. Clair River, we’ll run into head currents as much as 4 mph.  All the water that flows from Lake Huron down to Lakes Erie and Ontario, all passes through the narrow opening into this river.  As our friends who went through Hurricane Katrina all know, for a given flow of water, as you decrease the cross-sectional area, you increase the velocity. (Am I starting to sound like an engineer again?!?)