The Loop

Big Trip and Big Nerves All moved onto the boat in June 2022. When we first cut our lines in Georgian Bay  and pointed Sea Clef...

Fenelon Falls to Orillia, ON Misty Maiden running beside us on still waters After a peaceful night’s rest, we cast off at 8:30 AM, with...

Hastings to Peterborough, ON We pulled away from the dock and slowly made our way toward Misty Maiden . They were having trouble starting...

Belleville to Trenton, ON @ Trent Port Marina It was a peaceful morning at the marina, with the docks unusually lacking in activity. It...

Little Falls to Sylvan Beach, NY Catching up to Misty Maiden and others It was a rainy morning, and Heather, our First Mate, decided to...

New Baltimore to Scotia, NY Leaving New Baltimore (Photo by Kathie Tardie) We had planned an early start, aiming to be underway from New...

Montrose, NY to Kingston, NY We waited for the tide to rise a bit before leaving Courtlandt Yacht Club, as the water in the marina was...

Atlantic City, NJ to Staten Island, New York   Our 16th and LAST State! We were up at 5:00 AM, checked the weather, and decided it was...

Annapolis, MD to Chesapeak City, MD @ Chesapeake Inn, Restaurant & Marina We arrived at the fuel dock right before it opened at 8:00 AM...

Norfolk, VA to Dyer Creek We started our day at the pump out dock just before opening and the dock hand showed up right away. While we...

Elizabeth City, NC to Dismal Swamp Canal Visitors Center We were excited to see the Dismal Swamp but the radar showed rain in the area,...

Sneads Ferry, NC to Oriental, NC After our earlier false start today due to shredding our impeller, we were away by 11:40 AM. You can...

We have gotten a kick out of some of the place names on our Great Loop. The first was one of Heather’s favourite stops at Paducah,...

Kilkenny to Savannah, GA There are a lot of songs written about these areas where we were privileged to travel. Our last blog borrowed...

St Augustine, FL to Fernandina Beach, FL We were away from St Augustine around 7:00 AM as we were expecting a long day on the water. We...

Titusville, FL to Hammock Beach Marina We were really looking forward to leaving our last marina in Titusville, with two sunken boats,...

Stuart to Fort Pierce, Florida We took our time before leaving in the morning from Stuart. We were waiting for the tides to be in our...

A Posse from Nassau It was a one nautical mile ride today, officially our shortest travel day yet on our Great Loop! Our time at Atlantis...

Nassau Our last blog ended in a rocky-rolly anchorage in Highbourne Cay. We were trying to decide if we could go deeper into the...

Norman's Cay We had been in Shroud Cay for a couple of days in two different anchorages, the first of which had been quite rough. We had...

Staniel Cay In our last blog, we were anchored in Big Major and had been exploring Staniel Cay. There are a number of places to stay in...

Cambridge Cay We had an early start today thinking we were leaving Warderick Wells at 7:00 AM. Heather had based the departure time on...

Shroud Cay We had a relaxed morning while we waited for high tide and we were away from Highborne Cay around 9:00 AM. Our run was mostly...

We had a beautiful and comfortable night on anchor at Rose Island with a nice breeze blowing through the boat and a gentle roll. We were...

We were up and underway from Chub Cay just after sunrise. The water conditions were not too bad and at speed, the waves were hitting us...

It was Monday morning and we had been in Bimini, Bahamas for six days due to weather. Several boats left in rather windy conditions the...

When we woke in Miami that morning, we thought we were heading for an anchorage to wait for a possible crossing the next day. However, we...

While the Bahamas is not officially part of the Great Loop, most Canadians end up going to the Bahamas because it's winter, so it's too...

For this leg of our journey, we are accompanied by our friends, Catherine and Kirk. The plan for the next few days was to transit the...

We were finally leaving Sarasota, Florida and the Anna Maria Island area where Sea Clef had been for over a month! We did a water fill...

Happy New Year! We had a wonderful time at home for the holidays with our family and friends. We brought lots of things back with us for...

We felt very refreshed after a good and peaceful rest. It was restful just knowing that we had conquered the Gulf of Mexico. We spent the...

We woke in Apalachicola after a rough night, still struggling with COVID, but Karen and Rob said that it was a good day to head to...

Travelling south from Demopolis, Alabama does not seem that different from our travels just before arriving in Demopolis, but there are...

Safe Harbor Aqua Yacht in Iuka, Mississippi was our last marina stop before we ventured into the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway, nicknamed...

We had a fabulous week in Chattanooga! We rented a car so we could make the most of our time. We stayed right downtown on the "Bluff"...

We decided to do the side trip to Chattanooga, Tennessee for a few reasons. It was the home port for our good Looper friends Maggie and...

We have a few more stops before we are officially on our Chattanooga side trip. This blog takes us downbound on the Tennessee River from...

We were getting ready to leave Green Turtle Bay Marina in Grand Rivers, Kentucky, when we finally saw a green turtle in front of our...

Paducah to Grand Rivers, Kentucky This blog covers our trip from Paducah to Grand Rivers. We also decided to do a quick side trip to...

Our last blog left us on the Kentucky side of the Ohio River, just below the Olmsted Lock. We were about 15 miles into our travels up the...

Photo Credit: Selah Way This blog takes us down the Mississippi River from the confluence at the Illinois River to where the Ohio River flows into the Mississippi, where we turned up stream. It's funny how you can worry for months about boating on the Mississippi, and then it can be over in just five travel days. The concerns are the barge traffic, taking the right cut off, and dealing with currents and eddies. The largest tow we saw was five barges wide by six long - HUGE! T

Cam at the confluence of the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers This blog takes us from where we left off in Peoria Heights to Grafton, Illinois, which marks the end of the Illinois River and the start of the Mississippi. It took us only eight days to get from Chicago to Grafton! We cover four back to back travel days from Peoria Heights to Quiver Island, Quiver Island to Beardstown, Beardstown to Hardin, and Hardin to Grafton, all in Illinois. Peoria Heights to Quiver Island Ki

Photo Credit: Karen Kaufman Off Leash This blog marks a huge transition in our trip thus far. We have always boated in the Great Lakes but we said good bye to Lake Michigan and started our journey through the inland river system which would take us from Chicago, Illinois to Mobile, Alabama. Travelling on the rivers is a lot of back to back travel days so in this section we will cover four days including Chicago to Wilmington, Wilmington to Ottawa, Ottawa to Henry and Henry to

We had a great crossing of Lake Michigan (see our crossing video ). There were some swells, but we only started seeing waves when we approached the harbour. What a beautiful day! Sadly, with all newsworthy tragic moments in time, we will always remember that we crossed Lake Michigan to Chicago the day that Queen Elizabeth II passed away. When we were getting close to Chicago, Heather started smelling a burnt-like smell. She was sniffing around the boat down below frantically.

This blog documents the last of our time on the eastern shores of Lake Michigan including Saugatuck, South Haven, and Saint Joseph. At this point, we were trying to make a scheduled date in Saint Joseph because we were renting a car to go home from there for a wedding. In boating, wind and waves should control your travel timing for your destinations, but sometimes life happens. That meant we only had time for a day each at Saugatuck and South Haven. Saugatuck The entrance to

For our next chunk of Lake Michigan we stayed at Lake Muskegon for three days and Grand Haven for two days and there was lots to do at both locations. Lake Muskegon We had perfect conditions for our run to Lake Muskegon. We ended up anchoring with Looper boats, Will 'n Joy and Stay Cool, near a cruise ship! The cruise ship was empty and we learned that they would be starting a cruise in a couple of days. They actually left after dark the first night and we were happy to see

At this point in our travels, it is time to conquer Lake Michigan. Having spent most of our boating years on Lake Huron and Georgian Bay, we figured that this would be similar. We were wrong! First of all, Lake Michigan is huge and the water seems to rough up most afternoons. We also learned that we must get a swell forecast as well as the usual wind and wave forecast as Lake Michigan can have swells and waves coming from different directions which can make for a very uncomfo

We didn't know much about Leland before we arrived. We knew there were historic fishing shanties and that it was hard to get a reservation at the marina...but we managed to get one! What a surprise! This was such a pretty little town and we fell in love with it instantly! They have done a fantastic job preserving their heritage and waterfront. Right near the marina there is a section of town called Fishtown full of a bunch of old fish shanties. While the authenticity of the s

On our approach to Mackinac Island, and again on our horse drawn wagon ride on the island, we caught glimpses of the Mackinac Bridge. Finally, we got to go under it! The bridge is significant for a couple of reasons: One was obvious because it is so huge! It is the longest suspension bridge with two towers in the Western Hemisphere. It spans between St. Ignace and Mackinaw City. The second is that it marks the transition from Lake Huron to Lake Michigan which means a new body