50 mile days

We've completed our journey down the east coast of Lake Michigan and are currently in Michigan City, Indiana, with plans to head for Chicago. The Lake gave us one more day of big waves that were not predicted at all, but we've had three perfect cruising days since then with sunny, hot, humid, and calm weather. We stopped in three more Michigan Harbors: Ludington, Muskegon, and South Haven. All of the towns have breakwaters with cute little lights leading to the harbor ...

... and they all have beautiful sand beaches.

We've been leaving early and encountered a bit of fog on some days, so we are grateful for our broadband radar that lets us monitor other nearby watercraft.

South Haven was a particularly favorite stop. The town is built around a narrow creek that is absolutely crammed with marinas and restaurants. We were fortunate to get a slip.
Looper friends Tom and Diann (Noah Genda) were docked right next to us. We hadn't seen them since NYC, so it was really great to see them again and get caught up. We had a good fish dinner in a local restaurant and enjoyed walking around this fun little town.

We had another long day of cruising ahead of us, so we left early. The South Haven Light was still on ...

... and got to see this lovely sunrise.

We are no longer traveling with Jack and Nan (Eschaton) as they are taking their time completing the Lake Michigan route and we are getting just a bit in a hurry to get home. Spending a night in the Chicago Harbor is about the only "must see" that we have left on our Looper Wish List. The Chicago shoreline has accomodations for 5000 boats, spread over 7 marinas and 1000 mooring balls. A quick review of their website http://www.chicagoharbors.info/ however, and we learned that only about 10% of them are for transients and are usually reserved far in advance, especially over the many festival weekends in Chicago. We are on a waiting list for a slip, but have a confirmed reservation for two nights on a mooring ball.

The marina we are in tonight is also pretty big, 600 slips. Just look at how long this dock is ...

We're sitting in the AC, listening to the Twins (alone in first place, at least for a day) and thinking we'll be home by mid-September, which will require us to keep moving at a pretty good pace.