Downtown Tawas, MI
Cool paintings on the side of a building
A group of Loopers, having Docktales
Super-neat artwork at Mangoes Tequila Bar, Alpena, MI
Alpena City Hall
Visitors Center, Alpena
"Little Red" Lighthouse at Alpena Harbor
They say that the weather on the Great Lakes can turn bad at the drop of a hat. Whoever "they" are, they are not lying! The unpredicted 6 foot swells that we ran into during a pop-up thunderstorm on Lake Huron prompted us to go to small marina in Port Austin on the Saginaw Bay for shelter for awhile. A couple of hours later, the Bay had calmed significantly, so we headed across to Tawas City. We dont normally travel at night, but our visibility was good and radar and AIS worked well. We arrived around 1130 pm and had assistance tying up from some partying boaters on the dock. Additionally, a small craft advisory was issued for the entire area for Sunday, so it was a good thing we went to the cool little harbor in a neat little town when we did, or we NEVER would have made it across the Bay.
We met up with some other people doing the Great Loop, also known as "Loopers". Of course, everywhere we go, we meet up with Loopers so that makes it a lot of fun. The weather on Monday morning was perfect for cruising, so we made our way up to Alpena, Michigan, yet another fabulous spot! A couple of days ago, we had torn out the flooring on the bridge and the aft deck. A friend who lives in the area let us borrow her car and we went to Home Depot and bought new outdoor carpet. The rest of the week we spent on various boat projects, and teleworking, of course! On Friday, we plan on anchoring out in the cove at Presque Isle- I can't wait!!
Edited to add: Watching the weather is important. We will head to Presque tomorrow (Saturday), as there are 3 ft swells at 3 seconds on Thunder Bay now and storms in the forecast right now. Tomorrow morning looks near-perfect.