On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 16:21:50 -0600, "KLC Lewis"
wrote:



Yah, Long Beach California was that way too -- like New Zealand, only not as
pretty. Boats stay in the water year round and you can pretty much go
sailing any time you want. Therefore, since there is no sense of urgency
about it, people have a "Manana" attitude. You can always go sailing
tomorrow -- today, there's beer to be drunk!

As for keeping the boat in the water year round here...

It's not all that uncommon for people, at the coldest period of the year, to
DRIVE across Green Bay. Ice gets to be a couple of feet thick. Yes, these
are stupid people, but they still do it.

Enough said. I now understand.

I've seen old movie footage of the Russians laying railway tracks
across some lake in Russia (possibly Lake Baikal) but for me, to even
walk on frozen water in Beijing was initially a rather strange and
novel experience.

We left Turkey for northern Greece at the end of January 2004. We
couldn't understand why we never saw another sailboat until we saw a
Swedish boat when nearing Athens a couple of months later. The weather
was OK if you kept an eye on it but we experienced probably the worst
seas ever in the Northern Aegean - short and steep. Once, we were
anchored in an enclosed bay on the southern coast of Lesbos, had winds
of over 60 knots and raced on deck expecting the mast to have crashed
down only to find great chunks of solid ice from the spreaders on the
cabin top. If I translate that to your cruising area, I suppose I
wouldn't be too far wrong.

Thanks for educating me,
Peter

"Peter Hendra" wrote in message
...
Enough said. I now understand.

I've seen old movie footage of the Russians laying railway tracks
across some lake in Russia (possibly Lake Baikal) but for me, to even
walk on frozen water in Beijing was initially a rather strange and
novel experience.

We left Turkey for northern Greece at the end of January 2004. We
couldn't understand why we never saw another sailboat until we saw a
Swedish boat when nearing Athens a couple of months later. The weather
was OK if you kept an eye on it but we experienced probably the worst
seas ever in the Northern Aegean - short and steep. Once, we were
anchored in an enclosed bay on the southern coast of Lesbos, had winds
of over 60 knots and raced on deck expecting the mast to have crashed
down only to find great chunks of solid ice from the spreaders on the
cabin top. If I translate that to your cruising area, I suppose I
wouldn't be too far wrong.

Thanks for educating me,
Peter

Summers make up for it. We have such wonderful cruising grounds to visit --
several islands are within half a day's sail, along with several nice little
anchorages and ports. I can sail over to Sturgeon Bay and transit the canal
in about 4-5 hours, then sail overnight to the eastern shore of Lake
Michigan, where there are some fantastic little towns to visit like Leland
and Frankfort. Haven't done the "Crossing the Lake" sail yet, but it's in my
plans for this year, Insh'Allah.

Sailing north in Green Bay takes me to Washington Island -- wonderful
Scandanavian architecture, three harbors but two of them are very thin water
and one is very deep. Detroit Harbor on the southern end of Washington
Island is the best of the three (others are Jackson Harbor -- a tiny little
lagoon -- and Washington Harbor, which is 80 feet deep and rocky) but the
channel into the anchorage is very narrow and is bounded by sand/mud at
about 2-3 feet depth.

Further north takes us into either Little Bay de Noc to the west (Escanaba
and Gladstone, Michigan) or Big Bay de Noc further east. BBdN has a super
place to visit -- Fayette, Michigan -- which is an old abandoned steel mill
town which has been turned into a state park. The harbor, "Snailshell
Harbor," is gorgeous. Not huge, but it doesn't get a whole lot of traffic
except around July 4th week.

Can't wait to get sailing again! :-)

On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 17:15:16 -0600, "KLC Lewis"
wrote:

Karin,
Beautiful country. I can't believe how densely populated it is.
Pleasantly zooming around on Google Earth clearly shows the glaciated
landscape. Are harbours such as Franfort free anchoring or do you have
to pay? I refer to the outer harbour as there seem to be many piles
in the inner one.

I had dreamed, many years ago of sailing up the Hudson/Eire canal and
down the Chicago Sanitary canal to the Bay of Mexico. I doubt now that
I'll do it but it is still tempting and I might still head north after
leaving Trinidad. Florida is only two weeks away.

The trouble with cruising is that you take much longer than you
planned as there are so many interesting places to side track to and
who wants to rush things.

cheers
Peter


Summers make up for it. We have such wonderful cruising grounds to visit --
several islands are within half a day's sail, along with several nice little
anchorages and ports. I can sail over to Sturgeon Bay and transit the canal
in about 4-5 hours, then sail overnight to the eastern shore of Lake
Michigan, where there are some fantastic little towns to visit like Leland
and Frankfort. Haven't done the "Crossing the Lake" sail yet, but it's in my
plans for this year, Insh'Allah.

Sailing north in Green Bay takes me to Washington Island -- wonderful
Scandanavian architecture, three harbors but two of them are very thin water
and one is very deep. Detroit Harbor on the southern end of Washington
Island is the best of the three (others are Jackson Harbor -- a tiny little
lagoon -- and Washington Harbor, which is 80 feet deep and rocky) but the
channel into the anchorage is very narrow and is bounded by sand/mud at
about 2-3 feet depth.

Further north takes us into either Little Bay de Noc to the west (Escanaba
and Gladstone, Michigan) or Big Bay de Noc further east. BBdN has a super
place to visit -- Fayette, Michigan -- which is an old abandoned steel mill
town which has been turned into a state park. The harbor, "Snailshell
Harbor," is gorgeous. Not huge, but it doesn't get a whole lot of traffic
except around July 4th week.

Can't wait to get sailing again! :-)

"Peter Hendra" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 17:15:16 -0600, "KLC Lewis"
wrote:

Karin,
Beautiful country. I can't believe how densely populated it is.
Pleasantly zooming around on Google Earth clearly shows the glaciated
landscape. Are harbours such as Franfort free anchoring or do you have
to pay? I refer to the outer harbour as there seem to be many piles
in the inner one.

I had dreamed, many years ago of sailing up the Hudson/Eire canal and
down the Chicago Sanitary canal to the Bay of Mexico. I doubt now that
I'll do it but it is still tempting and I might still head north after
leaving Trinidad. Florida is only two weeks away.

The trouble with cruising is that you take much longer than you
planned as there are so many interesting places to side track to and
who wants to rush things.

cheers
Peter


The outer harbor at Frankfort is free anchorage, deeper to the north side of
the channel, shallower to the south. There are also "Special Anchorages"
designated in the inner harbor, but I've not seen them yet. Most anchorages
in these parts are free, though good holding ground very near towns can be
difficult to find. Most of these have been co-opted with moorings. My
favorite close anchorage, safe in all but north winds, is on Chambers Island
on the north end. Very popular in the summer. Others are the cove on the
south side of Horseshoe Island, and Nicolet Bay just south of it. These are
both just west of the Village of Ephraim, just a dinghy ride away.

On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 19:49:10 +1000, Peter Hendra
wrote:

I had dreamed, many years ago of sailing up the Hudson/Eire canal and
down the Chicago Sanitary canal to the Bay of Mexico. I doubt now that
I'll do it but it is still tempting and I might still head north after
leaving Trinidad. Florida is only two weeks away.

Do you know John and Penny from the Skookum 53 "Seahorse" in Trinidad?

They winter in Trinidad and go back up the Hudson River to Lake
Champlain in the spring. That's a great trip and they are nice folks.
Say hello for me if you run into them, Wayne and Diane from the Grand
Banks 49 trawler.

On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 22:01:48 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 19:49:10 +1000, Peter Hendra
wrote:

I had dreamed, many years ago of sailing up the Hudson/Eire canal and
down the Chicago Sanitary canal to the Bay of Mexico. I doubt now that
I'll do it but it is still tempting and I might still head north after
leaving Trinidad. Florida is only two weeks away.

Do you know John and Penny from the Skookum 53 "Seahorse" in Trinidad?

They winter in Trinidad and go back up the Hudson River to Lake
Champlain in the spring. That's a great trip and they are nice folks.
Say hello for me if you run into them, Wayne and Diane from the Grand
Banks 49 trawler.


Hi Wayne,

There are four major yards here with mostly American boats in them
plus a marina attached to the Cruise In Hotel. I'll ask around and
give your regards should I find them. I am learning to speak with a
slow drawl like a mentally challenged person and mispronounce some of
my words, so they should be able to understand me. I've even learned
to curb my humour as I've discovered that Americans do not readily
understand my Antipodean one which is often based on puns - seemingly
foreign to them.

Actually, for an ex-British colony, this country has many hallmarks of
a US territory partly because Chagaramas was at one time, the largest
American base in the world. Given by the British in exchange for the
lend-lease destroyers etc in 1941, at one time there were about
400,000 servicemen based here as well as at the two military
airfields.

Another reason for the American-ness of the place is that, as I said,
there are so many US citizens here. Prices in catalogues (again -
correct spelling as in "colour" and programme") are often in US. I had
the teak on top of my hatches replaced - quoted in US dollars not TT
ones. Gallons are 3.7 litres, not 4.2 as in the rest of the world,
power is 110 volts, weight is in pounds and ounces - not kilos. Bolts
are not metric (they import Japanese cars so must have problems), and
linear measure is in feet and inches, not the far simpler metre,
centimetre and millimetre where, like the kilo, you just move the
decimal point. AWG is fine, but everywhere else uses cross sectional
area in millimetres - so much easier to calculate loss due to
resistance.

Last week I needed a new copper pipe for my compressor - couldn't get
any metric. I went to buy some wire - $TT 10 on the price ticket -
reasonable I thought for a yard or a metre - then I found that it was
priced by the foot.

At least time is still based upon 24 hours in a day and 365.25 days in
a year. I would spit tacks if the American system had more hours in a
day. I work long enough on this boat as it is already.

Still, most people are very friendly and helpful, are relaxed about
life and behave politely to each other as if they are in continual
holiday mode. I hesitate however to address people in the Australian
manner with "Gidday mate" least it been interpreted as being
suggestive.

cheers
Peter

Peter Hendra wrote:
On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 22:01:48 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 19:49:10 +1000, Peter Hendra
wrote:

I had dreamed, many years ago of sailing up the Hudson/Eire canal
and down the Chicago Sanitary canal to the Bay of Mexico. I doubt
now that I'll do it but it is still tempting and I might still head
north after leaving Trinidad. Florida is only two weeks away.

Do you know John and Penny from the Skookum 53 "Seahorse" in
Trinidad?

They winter in Trinidad and go back up the Hudson River to Lake
Champlain in the spring. That's a great trip and they are nice
folks. Say hello for me if you run into them, Wayne and Diane from
the Grand Banks 49 trawler.


Hi Wayne,

There are four major yards here with mostly American boats in them
plus a marina attached to the Cruise In Hotel. I'll ask around and
give your regards should I find them. I am learning to speak with a
slow drawl like a mentally challenged person and mispronounce some of
my words, so they should be able to understand me. I've even learned
to curb my humour as I've discovered that Americans do not readily
understand my Antipodean one which is often based on puns - seemingly
foreign to them.

Actually, for an ex-British colony, this country has many hallmarks of
a US territory partly because Chagaramas was at one time, the largest
American base in the world. Given by the British in exchange for the
lend-lease destroyers etc in 1941, at one time there were about
400,000 servicemen based here as well as at the two military
airfields.

Another reason for the American-ness of the place is that, as I said,
there are so many US citizens here. Prices in catalogues (again -
correct spelling as in "colour" and programme") are often in US. I had
the teak on top of my hatches replaced - quoted in US dollars not TT
ones. Gallons are 3.7 litres, not 4.2 as in the rest of the world,
power is 110 volts, weight is in pounds and ounces - not kilos. Bolts
are not metric (they import Japanese cars so must have problems), and
linear measure is in feet and inches, not the far simpler metre,
centimetre and millimetre where, like the kilo, you just move the
decimal point. AWG is fine, but everywhere else uses cross sectional
area in millimetres - so much easier to calculate loss due to
resistance.

Last week I needed a new copper pipe for my compressor - couldn't get
any metric. I went to buy some wire - $TT 10 on the price ticket -
reasonable I thought for a yard or a metre - then I found that it was
priced by the foot.

At least time is still based upon 24 hours in a day and 365.25 days in
a year. I would spit tacks if the American system had more hours in a
day. I work long enough on this boat as it is already.

Still, most people are very friendly and helpful, are relaxed about
life and behave politely to each other as if they are in continual
holiday mode. I hesitate however to address people in the Australian
manner with "Gidday mate" least it been interpreted as being
suggestive.

cheers
Peter

A British gallon is 4.55 litres, but we pay about 4 times as much for it
(gas) than our US cousins, so I guess it really doesn't matter!

Dennis.

"Dennis Pogson" wrote in
:

A British gallon is 4.55 litres, but we pay about 4 times as much for it
(gas) than our US cousins, so I guess it really doesn't matter!

Dennis.



Hey! Socialized medicine ISN'T free, ya know, just "price displaced"...(c;

Larry
--
Alltel Axcess TV - 10 minutes of TV
then it dumps you until you click to
get 10 minutes more. It SUCKS!