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August 1, 2012  Day 82      Pare Island, Ontario     Total miles to date:  1547.6

We left our anchorage at 7:20 am with Our Time, saying a quiet good bye to the other boaters who must have been sleeping.  We ventured back out in the Georgian Bay with an anchorage in Echo Bay as our goal today.  We were traveling in a narrow small boat channel although the bay is quite large.  There are so many boulders that lined our path, and so many tiny islands with a house on each one (it seemed that way!), it made navigating interesting.  We go so slow at about 7 knots/hour and get waked by all the smaller boats who must think we are bored with our speed – so they provide a diversion for us.

Henry's Fish Restaurant

Another of our goals today was to eat at the well-known Henry’s Fish Restaurant on Frying Pan Island. (We don’t make up these names!)  They have docking space for about 40 boats plus docking space for the float planes that land and take off frequently.  We decided to stop there for lunch and Our Time decided to go find an anchorage and then take their dinghy back there for dinner. We had a large lunch which we decided would be our main meal of the day. We met a very nice couple who have a cottage nearby and arrived by sailboat. They spend their winters in the Abacos, so who knows – we may see then next February!

Lunch at Henry's Fish Restaurant

After lunch and taking pictures, we left to go find an anchorage for ourselves.  By this time it was 2:30 and many of the places we had identified were already taken. By 4:30, we finally dropped anchor by Pare Island, a very quiet isolated area about three miles from Our Time.  We were greeted by a mink swimming by and later heard the cry of a loon several times.

Rising moon at our anchorage
near Pare Island

We had a light dinner, planned our route, and read – does this all sound familiar? Tomorrow will be another anchorage along the way.