Crustacean Travels

 Leaving Manistee Municipal Marina, we headed back out the channel and past the break wall and lighthouse to head a bit southwest in Lake Michigan.  We even saw deer on the dunes on our way out.  It’s a beautiful day with calm seas and light winds.  Everyone seems to be out enjoying the water today.  We have the company of several sailboats, lots of fishing boats and a few cruisers like us. The coast of Michigan continues to be sand dunes as we travel along about one mile off shore in 40-50 feet of water.    After about two hours we cruise around Big Sable Points and it’s Lighthouse. Here we turn more southerly to our next port of Ludington.  On the way we pass a dammed Lake Hamilton and Ludington State Park. At the south end of Ludington State Park  it is quite evident the park ends as the dunes now sport lots of homes, some very large. Soon after we head between the breakwaters and past the channel lighthouse into Ludington.  There is ...

 We weighed anchor on a sunny 50 degree morning.  So we put on our sweatshirts and drove from below as we left Frankfort. Going through Frankfort’s channel and breakwater we encountered a few intrepid fisherman and further along as we cleared the breakwater there must have been over a hundred fishing boats.  Almost like playing bumper cars, but with boats.  Had to negotiate a path between them as the fishing boats were all trolling fishing lines behind them.  We were still seeing fishermen 4 miles south of Frankfort.  These guys sure take their fishing tournaments seriously! The shoreline that we pass heading south are still sand dunes bluffs some as tall as 200 feet. As we travel, we pass the small town of Arcadia and Portage Lake, each situated on an inland lake which is connected to Lake Michigan by a dredged channel.  Interesting to note that the dredged channels were originally small rivers connecting the inland lakes to Lake Michigan. As we passe...