Leland MI
August 17 - 19, 2019
Our last night at Beaver Island was a little rough. Winds blew from the south overnight causing incoming waves to hit the hull and rock the boat. Bo decided he had enough around 3:20am and thought the entire crew needed to be awake to enjoy the experience. Sue to the rescue. She was able to calm Bo down as they spent the remainder of the night cuddled on the couch.
The weather forecast for August 17 was not great, but good enough for our 54-mile trip to Leland Mi. We needed to get to our next harbor before another weather front arrived. Most of the trip was across open water until we got close to the Michigan’s shoreline west of Traverse Bay. We encountered a couple lake freighters but saw very few recreational craft (another sign that it was a marginal weather day).
As we approached the Michigan shore, we could see the high bluffs to the east and North Manitou Island to the west. We arrived at Leland Harbor at 1:45pm, took on fuel, and did a pump out before moving to our slip. We made a short trip into town for diner and got to experience a fantastic sunset from the boat.
Leland is a very small town located on the river that drains Lake Leelanau into Lake Michigan. Leland is known for its Historic Fishtown – one of the last working and thriving fishing districts on the Great Lakes. Native Americans first lived and fished from this site. European settlers began arriving in the 1850s and created the current fishing village. Fishtown was, and is still, comprised of weathered fishing shanties, smokehouses, overhanging docks lined with fish tugs, charter fishing boats, and the Manitou Island Transit ferry.
Leland is a small town so hitting the local grocery was a short trip. The weather was cloudy with light rain in the morning of August 18 but turned partly sunny and very windy in the afternoon. Kids were surfing off the beach just north of the marina. The wind generated large waves that were crashing against the marina break-wall and causing a pretty large swell inside the marina as well. The boats in the marina were bobbing up and down, sail halyards were clanking against the sailboat masts and our boat at the end of the pier was rocking with the waves and banging against the dock. Bo was not happy.
The wind calmed later in the day. The forecast for August 19th looked good, so we laid out our course and prepared to make our way to Frankfort, MI in the morning.