Tuesday, July 4, 2023

Day 2 - Trip to Frankfort

We were up around 8:30 for breakfast… bacon, eggs and toast.  After showers and cleaning up the kitchen, we were ready to head out.  We try not to leave too early as most marinas wont allow you to check in until closer to noon; however, waves tend to build throughout the day so we don’t want to leave later than necessary either.   So at 10:05am, we left the slip and headed out for Lake Michigan.  We were so surprised to see how calm the lake was… super calm.  Definitely under single foot chop.  Very smooth for the ride.  The temps were 71* with a SSW wind.  We headed north for the 54 mi trip to Frankfort.


If you are familiar with the shape of Lake Michigan in this area, you know that there is a point just north of Ludington and then the land juts in until Point Betsie which is just north of Frankfort.  So in order to save time, we headed straight across rather than following the shoreline.  The trip took 1 hr 40 mins and the waves did pick up to 2-3’ as we left the protection of the point, but still a very comfortable ride.


We tied off in slip 32 of the Jacobson Marina right around 12:15pm.   As the guys finished the lines, I got a start on lunch and had taco salad ready before 1pm. 

Over lunch Scott and I made a plan for the remainder of our week, mapping out our itinerary as best as we could.  Then I started making phone calls to line up the marinas…. And would you believe it - we now have a reservation for every night of our trip!  YAY!  Here’s the new plan:

Tuesday - Frankfort; Wednesday - Leland; Thursday - Frankfort; Friday - Manistee; Saturday - Pentwater

We are both pretty excited about the new plan… we wont make it as far north as we had originally hoped but we will get to try two new destinations and feel like its a good use of the time.

Hey, here’s a crazy coincidence.  A few weekends ago, a man dressed as a pirate came to see us… explaining he owned the same boat as us and he wanted to connect.  So we aren’t here in Frankfort for even 15 minutes, and up walks the same guy (no pirate outfit today).  He and a number of boats from our marina are here on a rendezvous.  The guy in the slip next to us here in Frankfort is just down the row from us in Grand Haven.  What a small world!

After lunch, we headed out on a walk through town and out to the beach… ending with ANOTHER visit to Kilwins.  Its a running joke when we are boating that Tyler will immediately look up the Kilwins location as soon as we arrive.  He LOVES their chocolate shakes… so lucky for him, many Michigan boating destinations feature a location.  

Then we headed back to the boat to relax, cool down and enjoy some free time.  Scott worked on cleaning the boat, I updated the blog, Tyler played some video games and Sammy wrote more of her book.  Seriously a pretty perfect way to finish the afternoon.

 

I’ve been looking for options for groceries and am coming up short.  So, I found a delivery option from Family Fare and placed the order for delivery at 5:45p, forgetting it was a holiday.  So, the delivery was postponed repeatedly until someone finally picked it up the order.  The groceries didn’t arrive until around 8:30pm.

Since I was waiting for the groceries we decided to do takeout from Dinghy’s Restaurant and Bar.  The boys ran to the pick up (and found a cool gallery on the way).  The food was delicious… Ribs, Chicken, Pulled Pork and Mac N Cheese - yum!

We finished the evening resting on the back of the boat and then playing a round of Ticket to Ride (congrats to Scott on the win).  Then we headed up to the bow of the boat and snuggled in for our second round of fireworks.  Since we did the display in Grand Haven on Saturday night.

It was a great fireworks show.  The city shoots off the pier so it was a bit farther than what we are used to… but still a great way to end the day!