St.Clair, Detroit,and the mishap with the mast

It's been an interesting week, which feels like longer. Since I last wrote, we sailed to Goderich and spent a couple of days with Mike's dad and step mom, which was great. We had our first overnight guests aboard Meggie, and although it was a touch cramped we managed just fine. After Goderich we said goodbye and made our way to Bayfield, which is a fantastic little town! All the women who read this must go. We spent a couple of days there, just relaxing and enjoying the lovely town with the most amazing sunsets. From there we made our way to Sarnia. We were fortunate enough to be able to anchor in the St.Clair river, and enjoy the company of our hosts Mike and Monie Holman.
We were then joined by the rest of the fam and had a great weekend. Jason and Tera had a full weekend planned with showers and golf games etc...but we were able to spend some time together which was awesome,

and we even managed to create a new game called shot gun lawn bowling......enough said.
After we said our sad goodbyes to the Holman's it was south to St. Clair lake and then into the Detroit river. We had a fantastic sail across the lake amongst the "lakers"(who always let you know they're coming with 5 loud blasts on their horn) and a lovely cruise down the river passing the city of Detroit.


We spent the evening just outside of the city and were so happy to meet our new friend Ron. Great guy...and so welcoming and hospitable. Then to our surprise we ran into a boat that we had heard of that was doing the same route as Meggie back when we were in Tobermory. "Living the dream" is owned by Vicky and Mark Carey, and like us have been planning this trip forever. So up we go and stand on their dock until finally Mark appeared wondering what the hell these people wanted at 9:00 in the morning. That aside, we hit it off and spent the day with the Carey family including Mark's brother and his wife.

We had a great day, only to be followed by a not so great day...if you refer to the picture of Mike up the mast with a hole where the spreader should be, you'll know what I mean. We were leaving a dock in the Detroit river, and we had used these things called whips that keep your boat off the dock as we were on an outside dock. So, we're still not sure exactly how it happened, but the rear whip got caught up in the shrouds and ended up getting caught on the end of the port spreader on the mizzen mast...we looked at eachother in horror and then at the spreader and all we heard was C R A C K....I looked at Mike and he went white, and I began to panic as I looked at the spreader just hanging off the mast. We wheeled around and came back to the doomed dock and Mike was up the mast immediately. We were very lucky...the spreader didn't even crack anywhere and the screws didn't twist inside the mast...the main damaged was a major dent and a bent spreader tang. We were immediately surrounded by people wanting to help...first thing was first...we needed some douglas fir. Once that was found, Mike went to work chipping out a section of his brand new masts and putting a replacement piece in. We epoxyed it in, straightened the tang, applied a coat of varnish and in the morning put the spreader back on, and then we were off. (I almost put us aground about 5 minutes after we left the dock the second time, but I caught myself...I would have never lived that one down). So...that was the mishap with the mast, but you all know Mike and he did an awesome job and had the repair done in one day and everything is fine.
So now, Erie here we come.
Until next time...
Kylie and Mike