8/2/18: There was a threat of thunderstorms today, so it sounded like nobody else was going to be leaving Little Current. It was only a 40% chance of scattered thunderstorms. We’ve seen this forecast so many times, and it has never materialized, so we decided to go ahead and move along. The Benjamin Islands are only about 20 miles from Little Current, so we didn’t need to hop out of bed very early to get going. And if you get to an anchoring spot too early, the people who were there the night before haven’t finished breakfast and moved on yet. So we had coffee, then walked up to the grocery store for a few items. We found stairs and a trail that took us right up to the store this time! That was way closer than walking up the road.
There was a great view of Little Current harbor from up there. Island Girl is on the bottom left (yellow arrow). SeaJamm and Phanthom are on the wall right above her in the picture.
After our grocery run, we walked over to SeaJamm to see what their plans were and to say “See you later”. Alan made us laugh. He said he felt quite accomplished for today already… he figured out what day it is. 😁 That probably sounds funny to y’all, but it’s really true. Without our phones telling us, we would have no idea what day of the week it was, or what the date was. Alan said they didn’t really have a specific plan for the North Channel, so they were working on figuring something out. They make us laugh every time we see them!
We pulled away from the dock around 11:00, and headed west. It took us a little over 2 hours to get to the Benjamins. We had a westerly wind today, so it was blowing in our face. We did put our fuzzies on for a little while in the cool breeze. The spot that Kurt recommended was right above the ‘o’ in South Benjamin Island- I put a yellow star there. It is a nice little cove in the southern end of the big cove between north & south Benjamin. But we were surprised that this area really wasn’t overly protected from the westerly winds. I put a yellow arrow way over on the left in the picture – the wind blows right over those rocks. Aside from that, the little cove was PACKED with go-fast boats all anchored and tied to shore together. The bigger cove had boats at anchor, swinging in the wind. There really wasn’t a spot for us, and it was too windy for our comfort to try to get in with all the other boats. We decided to go find a different spot with more wind protection. My plan B was to go to Croker Island. It looked like a good spot on the map – a small nook tucked inside the southern end of the island. It looked like it would be protected from most winds except the north. (By the way – look at this picture. This cracks me up. The Google map satellite pictures of this area of the world are co-mingled and patched together between winter pictures and summer pictures. In this one, the top is summer, and the bottom is frozen winter!)
As we approached and peeked into the little cove, there were several boats already at anchor. Most of them had their bow anchored out, and then their stern tied to a tree. There were just 2 or 3 sailboats that were swinging free in the middle. We puttered in and looked closer for a spot in between other boats. It was nice and calm and sheltered here from anything but a north wind, which was not in the forecast. We would fit nicely right in the curve of the cove, between a power boat and a sail boat that were stern tied. It looked like plenty of water depth to get near enough to shore to tie a 100’ line from our stern to a tree on shore.
So, as Captain was turning us around and getting us into position, I went down and got Stuart ready. This included undoing both ratcheted straps, which I usually have a hard time with because I don’t have very strong hands. Then getting the lanyard attached to Stuart’s motor so that it will start and stay running. (That’s the one thing that Kenny almost always forgets to grab before he gets into Stuart.) Then I got two 100’ lines and tied them together in case 100’ wasn’t long enough, and got those into Stuart, with one end tied to Island Girl and the other end tied to the seat in Stuart. There! Stuart was ready to launch, which Kenny can do by himself. This only took about 5 minutes because I am Speedy Gonzales, and by this time, we were in position. Next – I went up to the the bow and got the anchor ready to deploy. On Captain’s signal, I let the anchor down as he backed us closer to shore. It grabbed right away – yay! The water was about 20’ deep. At about 60’ of chain out, we stopped and held position. I went up to the helm, and he launched Stuart and headed to shore. I kept Island Girl in place, with a bit of pull on the anchor, as he took the line and tied it to a tree. TA-DA! We were set! All in all, from the time I started getting Stuart ready to the time we were all tied to shore was probably no more than 15 minutes. We are a good team and we’re getting good at this! And it is all just extra slick with an easy to launch dinghy!
This really was a fabulous spot!
Speaking of ‘easy-to-launch” dinghy – here is what we have for Stuart’s cradle. It is called TrickDavit. We are not affiliated with this company in any way – just sharing what we have that is so quick and easy. We searched for something that could be fast and easy, so that we could use the dinghy anytime without it being a big hassle.
The arms are mounted right on the outside edge of the swim step. The arms pivot, so that when Stuart is in the cradle, they form a V shape under his hull, and we strap him down with two ratchet straps.
To launch him, we just take off the straps, (tie his bow rope off to Island Girl so that he doesn’t go for a joy ride by himself), and lift the side closest to Island Girl. The arms pivot out and flop he goes into the water, sliding right off of the hard plastic arms and rollers. I don’t have a good close-up of them, but this picture kind of shows the arms out, with Kenny sitting on the swim step.
To put him back into place, we line him up with the arms, Kenny pulls up on the handle near his motor, and I pull on the rope near his bow. We both give a big heave-ho!, and he slides back up the arms. The arms pivot back and hold Stuart’s hull level on the swimstep. Then we strap him down and we’re ready to roll! It is very easy! One person can launch him, but it does take two people to get him back on board.
Back to the story: After we got settled in, I got out the wiener dog hose and washed down the Girl. I swabbed the deck from the fly bridge to the bow to the gunwhals. She had dirt, bugs, spiders, spider webs, and spider poop everywhere! Do you have any idea how to get spider poop off? That stuff is awful! It stains the white gel coat. I told you that spiders are evil! I was a sweatball, so we both finally got into the water for a cool down. The water temperature was around 72 degrees, and it felt pretty darn good! I even got down one of the floaties and lounged around in the water for awhile. Ahhh! The sun was out and the air temperature was in the low 70’s. So much for thunderstorms today. At least if they happened, it wasn’t where we were!
After dinner, we went for a sunset tootle out into the big cove in Stuart. Here’s our Girl in her nice cozy spot!
And a selfie goofball and a captain out being a little dingy in a dinghy.
The sunset was beautiful. We decided we would stay another day and night here. It is so pretty, calm, and protected, and we are in such a great spot in the cove! When we got back to the boat, I sent SeaJamm a note and invited them to come join us. We could get them in and rafted up on our starboard side, no problem. That would be way fun!
YAY! I got a note back from Sherry – she said they would come find us in the morning! We turned on the anchor light, and slept nice and easy in our calm protected cove.