Trip Report

For anyone who cares, Callum, Doug and I went up to the Straits of Mackinac to kayak under the bridge during the bridge walk this weekend. We got a late start leaving Lansing and between stops and getting ready, it was nearly 8pm before we go on the water for an hour and a half paddle. If you can do math and know a bit about seasons, you can figure out that that put us on Round Island about 45 minutes after sunset (mistake 1).

I really don’t like setting up camp after sunset. In the future, I think if we realize this kind of thing is going to happen, we should just nix the trip instead of doing everything an hour plus behind on a schedule that was tight to begin with.

Anyway… we did it. It was kind of a pain finding the camp site from the water in the dark, but I’m good like that so we found it and set up camp. We ate right in the middle of our tent circle (mistake 2). About the time we were getting done with dinner, racoons had started making their presence known, so we decided to start hanging food and stuff (mistake 3 – too hasty with the hanging).

We attempted to go to bed. They were sniffing all around the tents, which was annoying at the least. They eventually got over to the lines. We heard them over there and around the boats and decide we should check things out some. We ended up concluding that we should empty the boats and hang most everything that we weren’t sleeping on. Stuff hung – check. Sleep again – check.

The stringing was fine for PFD’s, clothes, etc. But they were more determined for the food. Somehow one tightrope walked out to my food back and took my bread – nothing else though. We heard this and got up… We didn’t do much though, since the bread was gone. Attempt to sleep #3.

Hear them over there again, messing with our shit. I went over and saw my food bag swinging slightly, so I knew they were still able to get at it somehow. Maybe they couldn’t have ripped it open, but I wasn’t interested in finding out. I got some additional rope from D and hung the bag properly from a vertical line and higher. After this, they still tried, but failed to get at it. It is still a mistery to me why they were only after my food, since it was, as far as I could tell, better sealed than the rest. We finally got some sleep.

Sometime fairly early in the above mix I whacked one of the ‘coons good with my paddle, so they were kind of afraid of us after that, but that didn’t stop them from trying to get into the food whenever we tried to sleep. The getting of my bread did seem to draw them away from the tents, which was helpful for our sleeping situation. The didn’t cause any damage to any stuff as far as I can tell, so that’s a plus.

So… next morning, we got up at 9 (mistake 4). I had set an alarm for 8, which would have been later than we’d have liked anyway, but I wanted sleep. At 8 I wanted more sleep, so I turned it off. Apparently no one else bothered with an alarm anyway.

We got on the water about 10 for the hour and half paddle over to the bridge. People are let on the bridge until 11, we were getting there at about 11:30. Yeah, that means we missed the bulk of the foot traffic.

Upon getting close to the Northern kason, we were cut off by the Sheriff. We told him what we were doing and he said we had to keep moving (no loitering I guess) and that we had to stay 1/4 mile from the bridge just like everyone else. At the half way point, D wanted to cross under – since we saw other boats doing that. C and I vetoed that, since we had been told not to and weren’t interested in getting our shit busted up by the Coast Guard cruisers. As it turns out, anyone going under the bridge was required to have an escort – something we could have listened to and requested if I had had my radio on me.

We crossed South to about the Southern kason before turning back. The original plan was to go all the way to shore, but that just wasn’t in the cards for today.

It was about 2 – 2:30 when we got off the water. We unloaded, me quickly (my efficiency was enviable to say the least), them slowly. I had time to take a shower and read 20 pages before helping load up the other boats. Once the process was complete, we headed to Truck Stop to get pasties which were wonderful as always.

Overall, the trip was still enjoyable. Fighting raccoons was fun with the exception of the lack of sleep it caused. If we had just been camping on the island for a few nights and could have slept as long as we wanted, this wouldn’t have been an issue. We didn’t get to see the mob on the bridge, which I guess was not so cool. Now that I know about the restrictions during the walk though, I wouldn’t be inclined to go back for the Mackinac crossing over Labor Day again. Any other day you can kayak right under the bridge screw around by the towers etc.

Lessons learned:
1. Hang food 5 ft or more with a vertical rope.
2. Never eat at the tents, regardless of perceived threat.
3. Make an itinerary with times for the trip, and stick to it. If you’re going to arrive after dark, don’t even bother departing.

In added news, I was riding in back for the trip and read about 2/3 of the first of the Left Behind series which I am thoroughly enjoying so far.