Chapter 12: Hammond, Indiana

On August 20, we left beautiful St. Joseph Marina in southern Michigan for a 60-mile ride to Hammond, Indiana. The first hour was great. The next three hours were rough with waves and wind (though not as bad as July 20 thank heaven). Captain Bill and our boat Maggie did fantastic getting us safely to the very large Hammond marina – hundreds of boats! This stop brought our total nautical miles to 832 and completed our trek around Michigan.
At St. Joseph, we met a delightful Scottish couple (Vicki and John Lewis) doing the loop in an awesome Monk boat. We were smitten by their lovely accents and they liked our Irish flag. We were assigned the dock slip right next to them so we enjoyed an afternoon drink on our boat then dinner on their boat. The best part was listening to Scottish music with John playing his guitar, and Vicki accompanying him with whistles. It was sweet! We shared stories, tales of our lives, and laughed for hours. The next day, John and Vicki were off to Chicago and we began several days goofing off, including casino evening and fancy dinner, scooter ride to Symphony in the Park (of course, it rained on the last mile back to the boat), then Chicago White Sox baseball game where Bridgett legit caught a foul ball! Bill‘s good friend and former boss Roger Wood paid us a visit for breakfast and drove us all to the baseball game – we so enjoyed his company! After a day of boat chores and grocery shopping, we hopped on an Uber for a ride to Chicago. If you have never been there or are planning a trip, be sure to schedule a ferry boat for the architectural tour. Simply awesome! Next adventure? “Goodbye”spastic Great Lakes (for now), and “hello” Illinois inland rivers!Read more