Good Karma Adventures: Beaver Island Anchor Out

It was this blue... honest!

We loaded up and left on Thursday morning early.

Weather was good, water flat like a mill pond, not too much wind. Quite a change from the cold wind of our two days in Petosky.

Maeo reading during this relaxing trip

Captain Kermit and Paul Bates

Our target was Beaver Island. We skipped this place on the last trip. That time we had such bad weather for a week in Mackinaw City that we did not want to be distracted from our target of Petosky.

Passing a ferry to Beaver Island

This time we took advantage of the flat (albeit cold) weather and headed out for a short 30 mile trip to test our anchoring skills. We need to know if the equipment works otherwise we have to make repairs in Mackinaw City. It works! We arrived around mid-day.

Entering Beaver Island Harbor

Beaver Island is about 13 miles long and about 3 miles wide with a nice protected harbor on the east side. It is serviced by ferries from Leland and a few other places.

Kermit worked the controls at the helm and Paul and I went out on the bow to drop the anchor. We have two switches at the helm to operate the windlass - one to move the anchor up and the other to move it down. We opened the cover, unlatched the safety latch and got out of the way while we pressed the down button. Sure enough, there it goes. We have chain at the beginning then 1" line. The idea is that the anchor bites into the bottom, the chain is heavy and lays on the bottom, then the line pulls tight holding the boat in place. We waited a few minutes to be sure the anchor was caught, then we took down the dinghy to go to town.

Paul adding air to the dinghy

The last time we operated the dinghy was in Grand Haven on Spring Lake. Paul observed we could have more air in the pontoons so he added some now.

Freeing the dinghy on this boat is much easier than on the old Good Karma. Kermit attaches a bridle to the crane, moves the crane to lift the dinghy then moves the dinghy over the side into the wate. Then he climbs in, unlatches the bridle, and moves the crane back into its hidy hole. Then we all climbed in and went to the land. We left the dinghy at the far north end of town. This gave us about a mile walk each way, just fine for a nice afternoon.

This is not a tourist island. Locals have been here for generations. There are no resorts just summer cottages for rent. The St. James Boat Shop specializes in boats, buckets, and other specialty wood products made out of cherry cut exclusively on Beaver Island. These canoes pictures that about 300 hours of labor. They are truly works of art. I am not sure how much the canoes cost but that paddle board pictured here sells for $400. That is art. Can you imagine how wonderful it would feel to paddle on that work of art?

This is a quote about the proprietor from his website: (Stop by the St. James Boat Shop, too, where Bill Freese builds wood-strip canoes and kayaks across from the marina. Thin as a pole with a gray grizzled beard, he and his black lab, Bear Dog, wile away the hours in solitude, sawing, sanding, varnishing. Beaver Island, he says, "is as good a place as any to hide from the world.")

We can attest to the hiding part. A person could anchor in the bay and spend weeks just hiding from the world in this quiet place. We lucked out to find that this first complex of shops (and I say that very loosely) includes the McDonough Market and Deli. This is one of the best grocery stores we've encountered so far and the prices weren't bad either. Maeo and I went back at the end of the day to make some purchases. You know you are in a special place when in this dusty one street little nothing of a place the people who live there care so much about their town that they have fancy specialty cookware for sale in the deli, the same stuff they sell in Charlevoix and Petosky, the land of Kilwens.

Beaver Island has a cool history. Of course there were the native Americans from the Odawa tribe then the fur traders but then something different happened. A fellow name James Strang from New York adopted the Mormon faith with Joseph Smith. He moved to Beaver Island from Wisconsin and proclaimed himself king of Beaver Island. He had 4 wives including one who disguised herself as Strang's nephew for some reason. He took over the island for 8 years from 1848 to 1956 until two disgruntled followers assasinated him. The feds came in from Charlevoix, arrested the murders then convicted them. The penalty was about $2 and time served. Evidently no one liked Mr. Strang.

After the Mormons left the Irish came in. Beaver Island still has a strong Irish flavor. Lumber and fishing were the main sources of income. Now much of the island is deserted except for the town and some summer homes. The brochures said if you hike around you will run across deserted homes and cars, signs of a more prosperous time. Today construction is the big industry in town as newcomers build summer homes in search of peace and quiet.