Loopers, Lakers and Locals

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Lived July 20 – August 6, 2026

Written July 31 August 10, 2026

We were in Georgian Bay for around three weeks. We often get the question, “Are we loopers?”; as in one of the people doing the Great Loop. Jim coined the phrase, lakers so he tells folks, “No, were lakers.” Although we have basically completed the Great Loop route from Key West to Georgian Bay as we’ve explored over the past six years, our focus and intention is not the Great Loop. We have crossed paths with many loopers and made friends with some. The foreign (US) boats commonly seen here are doing the loop and thus the question. However, we call ourselves lakers as our intention is to explore the Great Lakes.

I usually work to take pics of only our boat. There are actually 8 boats in this picture. There was actually plenty of room for everyone. It is nice when you have it all to yourself. We find that the boats at anchor are quite respectful and quiet.

There are lots of local boats (Canadians) out for a few days or a few weeks as well. There is quite a mix of boats, day runabouts, small cabin cruisers, giant cabin cruisers and sailboats all with varying levels of boating expertise. But, they all have more Great Lakes cruising experience than we do.

I mentioned Mike and Callie a couple posts back. They live in Orillia. We met them along the Trent, met up in Orillia and they came by car to Midland to join us for a few hours. Such nice “locals” and skilled boaters.

Anchorages

This is the land of anchorages. They call Georgian Bay the land of 30,000 islands for a reason. There are tons of islands and tiny snickleways to get into them. One does not even need to go out into the bigger open water. The Bay, a part of Lake Heron on the north end is about 120 miles long and 50 miles wide at it’s widest. I’ve been told Ontario has more shoreline than any other province in Canada. I can believe it.

A particularily challenging piece of the small craft channel. The small craft channel if for those who don’t want to go outside into the “big lake”. It looks plenty wide here, but there are many treacherous rocks under the surface. The channel is well marked but one has to follow the markers carefully, making sure you go between them in the correct order. This particular piece should never be attempted in sloppy weather.

When one looks at charts, it is hard to pick a spot to go as there are so many spots to choose from. There are probably 3 dozen spots that one is supposed to visit, the hot spots. They are quite nice and will be quite crowded with commonly 5 – 10 boats in each. At least the eastern half of Georgian Bay is still relatively close to Toronto and thus many people keep a boat in Georgian Bay. There are also thousands of cottages on this part of Georgian Bay which adds to the boat traffic. Somehow there still seems to be enough space for everyone.

There are pretty anchorages to be had everywhere. You’ll see a couple other boats across Echo Bay.
An anchorage not on the “hot spot” list. Only two other boats, one of which we wre traveling with. It seems quite nice to me!

Cottages

The Canadians call this cottage country. My vision of cottage is a bit different that many that we have seen.

Occasionally you see very modest cottages.
There are somewhat modest cottages with the ubitiquous “cottage boat” and jet ski.
Some still with modest cottages, a boat house, docks and lots of water craft. This cottage is on it’s own island. Islands with nothing costs about $300K. But then you have to bring in all your suppliesby barge to build. Do you want power? Some have electrical power via underwater cables, or use a generator or solar.
There was a tiny cottage here but rather expensive transpo to get to it.
And the size and expense goes up.
And up.
And well, up, to the point where they do NOT fit into the environment at all.

All of them draw water directly from the lake, purify it with UV and drink it.

One more thing about cottagers and (many?) Canadian boaters. The “rules” are to not anchor too close to cottagers as they don’t like boaters. Why? Who knows. One person said they don’t want the graywater from our boats contaminating their water intake for their homes. We’re not THAT close. Others said they don’t like boaters as they wake the cottages, destroying the shoreline and rocking their boats at dock. However, all the cottagers have boats and let me tell you they have no problem waking us while at anchor.

This is one of 4 or 5 boats that threw up a pretty good wake while we were tied to a dock pumping out our poop tank. An instance of “be nice to ME”, but it does not count if I’m doing it.

Hiking

As many of you know, Jim and I are not really water people. Our grounding is on land. Thus, we are always looking for trails to hike. Sometimes this is easy to find, other times, not so much.

Beausoleil National Park is only accessible by water. Although there are a few cottages granfatherd in, there are lovely anchorages, and in some places hiking trails. Some parts have boardwalks for times with sections are a bit swampy (not while we were there)
Other parts have markers in the rocks so you can work your way from one point to the next when it is not so clear. Some of the trails even have docks where you can tie your dinghy to get to shore for the trail.
Some spots have a dinghy dock where boaters can gather for a campfire (we never saw this activity). We did however try to bushwack a bit and quickly came across this Massasaga Rattler. There are signes in many places mentioning them. It did not take us long to find one. He was not terribly aggressive.

We have enjoyed getting ashore and also took a nice bicycle ride along the Parry Sound trail in town. We also did a bit of paddle boarding, kayak style. We have a two person kayak, but alas, Jim was not able to fix the several leaks in it. But, our paddleboards can be adapted to use our kayak seats. So, away we went exploring.

Town Visits

There are not many towns in Georgian Bay and definitely not many of size. More often it is a collection of cottages with a general store in the area to support the many small islands with cottages. Most of the towns don’t have the charm and quaintness of those along the East Coast of the US. They are grittier and harder towns as many are only accessible by water or have their origins in 1800’s logging and mining. They do have their own charms and interest.

We spent 4 days in Parry Sound, longer than we had planned (see below). While there the Festival of the Sound, a month long music festival was happening with some of the best performers in Canada. Events just steps from the marina which made it so convenient. One evening we went to a community concert on the outside deck (local musicians) and then to Bach by Candelight. We were blown away.

Although this Bach concerto was written for two violins, it was arranged for violin and marimba.
Parry Sound also seems to be THE small cruise ship port in Georgian Bay as well as the floatplane hub for tourists flights. We sat in a outside restaurant and watched float planes take off and land for our entire meal, loading, unloading and refueling right in front of us. You can see the little cruise ship in the background. It was only in town the day we arrived.

A Near Disaster

I know many of my friends think Jim and I are crazy for our boating life. To be honest, it is a bit crazy. We have thought that boating in the Great Lakes would be much safer and less dramatic. For us personally, that has been the case. When we think back on our time in the western Caribbean, it is hard for us to imagine we really did it. Kind of gutsy for us in retrospect.

There was one couple (Ann and Michael) we met while on the Trent Severn whom we kept running into (figuratively). Both really nice and fun and they have a cat onboard named Spot who is a Bengal. Us cat people have to stick together! They have quite a bit of boating experience but had never stern tied, nor boated in water as cool/cold at the Great Lakes.

Ann and I trying to figure out how to get to the barrel at the Point au Baril light house while Jim and Michael wait in the dinghy. An aborted attempt. We did not want to head through the bushes and rocks to get there.

First, let me describe a stern tie. This is where you drop your anchor then take a line from the back of your boat (the stern) and attach it to shore to keep your boat from swinging in either direction. It is commonly done to allow more boats into an anchorage (you take up less space if you cannot swing freely on your anchor) or in cases where your boat would hit the shore if it swung around in a narrow channel.

Turns out I don’t have good pics of us stern tied as an example. These yellow lines are tied to the back of Rincon and run to shore and around a tree (not the best, better to have a cleat in the rocks, but not often there to use.) We could have been closer to shore, but we were expecting wind on our bow and did not want to be closer to the rocks even though the water was deep to shore.

Michael and Ann had come into a rather small anchorage with 3 other boats and Michael decided to accomplish the stern tie, he would just swim the line to shore. Often someone will carry the line to shore in a dinghy. Michael is an accomplished swimmer so this should not be a problem. Into the water he goes and starts swimming to shore. The boat is drifting away as is commonly the case after the anchor is set; the boat wants to find it’s place and may move forward towards the anchor. Michael sees this and decided he should come back to the boat. The water is quite cold and he is making no progress towards the boat. His head goes under and he inhales a bunch of water. The shock of very cold water (which it was) can cause this quick inhale of water.

Ann pulls him in as he held onto the line and she yells for help. She held his head above the water but could not bring him onto their dinghy. Michael is not breathing and his heart has stopped which is very common in near drowning incidents. Folks from 3 other boats quickly arrive, one who happens to be an intensive care nurse. They get him out of the water and do CPR for about 3 minutes to revive him.

From our anchorage in Echo Bay, we saw this helicopter go over. Unbeknownst to us, it was going to pick up Michael. Shortly after we saw it, we received a phone call from Ann telling us of what happened. This photo was taken by someone who was on Franklin Island where Michael and Ann were and passed along via Ann to us. Michael was moved by boat to the helicopter nearby. They call these copters “The Orange”.

Emergency boats also arrived and Michael was airlifted to the Parry Sound hospital. There is more to this story but suffice it to say, Michael has fully recovered from his near drowning experience. Michael stayed in the hospital for 4 days. One or two fewer would have likely been fine for his particular situation but an underlying condition was discovered unrelated to his near drowning that slowed down his release.

Ann was happy to have us buddy boat with them for a few days which we did from Parry Sound to Killarney. They are now back in the US (via their boat) and we are continuing at a slower pace.

As we moved to Killarney, Michael picked anchorages for fishing. The fishing turned out to be good for Michael (and us). I liked the sunset. We had this anchorage all to ourselves!
The fishing was good enough that Ann was able to cook up a couple of lovely bass with coucous and I added fresh green beans from the Parry Sound farmers market.

The moral of the story? Things can happen at any time and we never know when they may occur. Be as prepared as your brain and heart think you need to be, do not believe you are invincible, ask for help, and have good luck.

What’s Next?

We missed some places in Georgian Bay as we were moving quickly with Michael and Ann. We considered backtracking to visit some of the places we passed by, but for whatever reason that does not work for us; we keep moving forward. We can visit these places next year if we wish as we plan at least another season up north. Killarney where we parted from Ann and Michael is the gateway to The North Channel, another unique piece of Lake Huron. You’ll have to wait until I get my act together for my next post to hear about this special place. We are moving slooooowly now!

Some final pics I took while in Georgian Bay. Just for fun, or because they were pretty.

I do love a pretty water lilly. They are EVERYWHERE in the little bays up here.
More of those rocks… just waiting to kiss us.
Leaving a washroom.

Comments

Loopers, Lakers and Locals — 1 Comment

  1. The Massasaga Rattler is beautiful.

    Am so glad Michael is ok, pretty scary … I recall a transfer of me from Rinconsito to shore in a tiny square inlet for a cool walk (would have to look up specifics, maybe Crab Cay) that could have gone sideways. My legs are much stronger now that yoga has resumed, BTW. Then there is your story of Tori sliding into the water from the rear deck cover and you going in to retrieve her