Saturday July 13: Tobermory

 Our destination when we left Lion's Head on Friday was Wingfield Basin. The point is just barely visible in the picture right and the anchorage is just around this corner.

It was about 20 miles from Lion's Head so a pretty short travel day again with light winds from the east. Nice travel day.

Georgian Bay on this side is really deep - today we passed over the deepest spot: over 500 feet! Nothing like shallow Lake Erie for sure.


The water is quite deep right up until you are pretty close to shore. I still kept a respectful distance anyway .....

The cliffs of the Niagara Escarpment continue to line the shore. It's really truly amazing.

I don't think we have ever had so many pictures of rocks since Steve and the kids went to Monument Valley in the early 80's! But every turn just brings something so seemingly different than the one before.

Our anchorage at Wingfield Basin was as nice as we expected. By the end of the evening, there were 5 sailboats and another cruiser in the basin with us.

The afternoon was spend kayaking and just lazing around :-) No work today!

Evening and sunset brought out the colors on cliffs nearby and the stars were really amazing. Still not up to the standard of the night on Lake Powell when we were with my brother Tom and my Mom in 1998 but nonetheless it was quite the show and included the Milky Way.

Steve spotted a beaver hut in the bay when he was kayaking - confirmed by the presence of the beaver the next morning swimming near the boat! Fun to see.

This morning we were up early and read to move on. It was another 20 miles to Tobermory - and another crazy cliff day along the shoreline.

I think we actually traveled 30 miles just because we followed the shoreline instead of just taking the straight route to Tobermory! We just couldn't stop taking pictures :-)

Finally! We arrived in Tobermory - Guppy is circled in red in the picture at left. We are right 'downtown' in an area that draws folks looking for dive trips, glass bottom boat rides or go-fast rides to Flower Pot Island (which we will cruise by when we leave and head for the North Channel).

Rather like Put-In-Bay on Lake Erie on a busy weekend!

A good stop: filled up with fuel, emptied the holding tank, filled the water tank, did laundry and still there was time to visit the Visitor Center at the Provincial Park! It had a movie .... I was totally in :-)

The movie wasn't the best but it gave a nice overview of the park. Steve and I were both thinking it might have more about the geography of the region but still it was worth while - and they had senior rates :-)

There were several beavers that were just made for posing with so we took advantage of that! I thought the cooking beaver was especially appropriate for Steve!

And the last stop was at the observation platform which was near the Visitor Center. It was pretty good - not quite high enough to really give a good view of the surrounding area but not too bad.

The island near Tobermory were pretty visible and if it had been too much higher I wouldn't have climbed up it :-)

Tomorrow? Looks like we'll head northwest toward the North Channel or at least the northern end of Georgian Bay. Weather is supposed to be quite nice for the 60 mile trip.