Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

I slept well last night and got up about 6 a.m. It was cold and dark.  Another passenger was up and we looked at the constellations along with Jupiter sinking into the clouds to the west.  The moon was high overhead like it was the first morning, only a bit thinner, being a day after last quarter.

Since posting the first day’s report I’ve received an email from Jim Newton one of our numbers from Colorado.  He posted images on the Internet and generously allowed us to use them.  I will use some of them because, frankly, it turned out to be a rough day on the bay., and I spent a lot of time eyes locked on the horizon trying, and successfully so, keeping  my breakfast down.

Morning rainbow at Old Mission

As the sun rose we did have another rainbow in the sky.  While there were showers all around, I didn’t feel any rain until we got back on land that afternoon, and that was just spritzing.  In the morning briefing Captain Dave said that the forecast was for small craft warnings.

The Zodiac cruising around

As you can see he was dressed for rough and wet weather.   It soon came time to weigh anchor.

Raising the Anchor. Photo by Jim Newton.

Electric winch?  Nope.  The anchor is raised by this hand winch that’s powered like an old railroad hand car.  One complete up-down cycle raised the anchor  a whole 3 inches, near as I could tell.  I think I recognize my back side on the left with Cheyenne,  Ann is on the right with another passenger, whose name escapes me.  If you recognize yourself add a comment so I can identify you.  Keeping tension on the chain is Matt, while Neil arranges the chain in the box.   That’s quite a workout for me, even though I was taking the first turn, and just taking up the slack.  The range of the up and down motion of the handle was a bit much after a short time.  Quite a few of us took turns with it.

Cheyenne goes over the rail to guide the anchor up. Photo by Jim Newton.

Getting the anchor up, keeping it from scraping the hull,  and lashing it to the rail was quite an undertaking.  Soon we were heading out of the harbor and into East Bay into the brunt of the wind and waves.

Heeling to port in the wind. Photo by Jim Newton

It was a very rough time.  With a north wind, what took an hour to pass the Old Mission Light and sail into Old Mission Harbor, took half the day to get back around the light, tacking against the wind.  Captain Dave said that the boat could only head 60 degrees into the wind.   On top of that the wind seemed to be pushing us back.  We’d start to tack toward the light with it to the port side of the bow, and before long the light had drifted to the starboard side.

Captain Dave at the helm with Cheyenne at his side

While it seemed we were bouncing all over the bay Lulu and Brent were below preparing lunch.

Lulu is dishing up macaroni and cheese for lunch. Photo by Jim Newton

I don’t know how they did it.  Unfortunately my stomach wasn’t up to lunch that day.   I did get some movie snippets.  You will have to download them to view them.. They are standard AVI files.  Here is a panorama (49MB) looking off the port side of the boat.  Here is another showing the deck crew switching the staysails on a tack (59MB) to starboard.  Check back later.  I’ll try to make smaller versions.

Omena ahead. Photo by Jim Newton

Captain Dave put into Omena Harbor as soon as he could in the early afternoon, having pity on us land lubbers.  Tacking this time against a much diminished north wind into the harbor.  Omena is a small town on M22 (not the globular star cluster, but the Michigan highway.)  Sorry, an old astronomer’s joke. We dropped anchor close to the sailboat on the right of the picture.  The large gray building houses Leelanau Cellars Wine tasting Room and a restaurant.  The other building house an art gallery, post office and a general store.  many of us went ashore to wine taste and walk around.

I told you it was a wine tasting place. Photo by Jim Newton.

Time to head back for dinner.

The Manitou at anchor in Omena

Lulu and Brent always fed us well, and breakfasts and dinners were always special.  We all were able to squeeze into the galley for those meals.

Lulu sharing a story before the meal with some passengers.

That night was cloudy too so I gathered those interested to finish  my one power point on the universe and ran another about the black hole in the center of the galaxy.  So far the weather has been exactly as forecast.  If it holds, tomorrow night promises to be clear, with a great day of sailing beforehand.

October 1st.

I got up about 6 a.m. and got on deck.  Orion was shining in the south, with the nearly last quarter moon high above.  Fellow passenger Chris, who is another amateur astronomer from Dayton, Ohio was also up drinking in the winter sky preview.

Daybreak from the deck of the Manitou at 6:56 a.m.

The twilight showed a line of clouds just above the eastern horizon. It looked like the day was going to be great for sailing.  At 7 a.m. Brent of the galley crew brought out coffee and scones.

A passenger looking at the sun through the Questar

Not knowing how long it was going to be brfore we sailed, I brought out the Questar with it’s solar filter and set it up on a bench on the dock.  There was one good sunspot visible.

8 a.m. was breakfast. All 20 plus passengers squeezed into the galley.  Chief cook Lulu fed us some wonderful meals during the trip, including this breakfast.

Captain Dave came aboard before breakfast and after breakfast gave us our morning briefing.  We would cast off at 10 a.m. so some of us could go ashore to get some last minute items.

We had a deck crew of 4 headed by Cheyenne who was also a certified captain.  She captained by earlier 2 hour cruise Labor Day weekend that I was on.  Also in the crew were Neil, who grew up in Suttons Bay, Matt who really looked like a old fashoned deck hand with his beard, and Ann a crewman from a prior year who volunteered for the cruise.

The moon through the rigging

Besides 6 sails, the Manitou has a diesel engine and we motored away from the dock.  After a bit Captain Dave headed the Manitou into the wind to begin the process of raising the sails.  The crew got at least 6 of us passengers lined on either side of the deck forward of the main mast to raise the mainsail.  The Manitou is a gaff-rigged schooner in that its main and fore sails are trapezoidal in shape being stretched between the boom on the bottom and the gaff at the top.  The port line raised the throat of the gaff next to the mast, while the line on the starboard side raised the peak of the gaff.  I was on the port side when the time cane our side shouted to the captain “Ready on the throat!” The other side shouted “Ready on the peak!”  At the signal we hauled away.  As we were raising more and more canvas the task grew harder.  Near the end we end we gave some mighty pulls with commands of 2-6-Heave.

The crew unfurls the staysails

The foresail was easier taking only three on a side and pulling vertically.  The crew then unfurled the three stay sails  attached between the foremast and the bowsprit.

Matt unfurls the topsail

Last to go up was the topsail.  Matt climbed up to set that sail.

The Manitou under full sail (From the Traverse Tall Ship Co. Website)

We headed northward from the southwest shore of the west arm of Grand Traverse bay under a light westerly breeze.  That breeze died just as we tacked to the west to clear the shoals off Power Island.  The map below shows it as Marion Island.  I recall that it was even named Ford Island being once owned by Henry Ford, but I can’t find anything on the Internet about it.

Captain Dave resorted to starting the diesel engine to make up some time.  The wind came up in the early afternoon, but this time from the north which put Omena and Northport out of range for the day.  Also it was becoming overcast.  Lulu fixed us lunch including French onion soup.  It was delicious!

We tacked back and forth in West Bay (the west arm of the Grand Traverse Bay) in order to clear the Old Mission Light and so to enter East Bay and head south with the wind to anchor in Old Mission Harbor.  Along the way we saw rain showers in the distance.  I may be wrong but I’d say they were lake effect showers from the cold air blowing over the warm waters of Lake Michigan.

We're passing Old Mission Light to enter East Bay

Rainbow spotted in the late afternoon

Toward the end of our sail that day we saw a rainbow in the distance.  It was truncated because it was in the distance and the clouds were low.  After we anchored in Old Mission Bay we had dinner and the Zodiac boat was lowered from the davits at the stern of the Manitou to let those who wanted to go ashore.

The Manitou in Old Mission Harbor with the Zodiac returning for more passengers

Old Mission was actually the oldest continuous settlement in the Grand Traverse Bay area, even older than Traverse City.  It was founded in 1839 by the Rev. Dougherty who started a mission there to convert the local Native Americans.  Some of headed to the Old Mission General Store for ice cream.  That place is all decked out as a depression era store.  It is run by a cranky old guy who forbids the taking of photographs inside.  But the Moomers ice cream was worth the visit.  After this we headed back to the dock in the dark, and our warm beds aboard the Manitou..

Map of Grand Traverse Bay from Wiki Mini Atlas