St. Clair, MI

With it being Labor Day on Monday, September 3, we decided to take our time and walk into the little town of Sanilac to have breakfast at what looked to be the only place to eat.  It was a cute little diner named Mary’s where we had a decent breakfast.  It was nowhere near as busy as yesterday’s breakfast spot.  We strolled the main street of town afterwards and went into the local hardware store. The owner was very engaging and proud of the fact that his was the oldest hardware store in the state of Michigan.  It even had several beams and posts that were made of tree trunks!  He proceeded to show us around his large and exceedingly neat and clean store and regaled us with stories about the town’s history.

A lovely lighthouse that appeared to be  no longer operational was located along the shoreline.

We took off on Zendo at 9:40 heading for St. Claire thinking that we would stay in the marina there.  Storms were expected later in the day and there aren’t many places to anchor in the area.  We cruised in warm and sunny weather and calm seas listening to various podcasts.  As the afternoon wore on we cruised off of the lake and onto the St. Clair River which is actually a strait connecting Lake Huron to Lake Erie.  We are clearly entering civilization as we passed more industrial areas and also some impressive shoreline homes.

After going through a low drawbridge, we arrived at 3:00 ahead of the storm which never materialized.  We tied up at the St. Claire Boat Harbor that is located on a small river that feeds into the St. Clair River. This was another marina with a lot of empty slips.

There were some cool Cris Craft boats in the marina and apparently they are built right up the river from here.

We got a ride into town from the marina staff to go to a local brew pub that turned out to be closed.  So we walked along the very nice boardwalk that lined the waterfront and is purported to be the longest fresh water boardwalk in the world. There were several groups of people picnicking on the grassy banks and and enjoying the cool breezes.

After our walk we returned to Zendo and had dinner ( spaghetti with clam sauce and sardines and a salad). While Lynn caught up by phone with her sister Lisa and Stephanie, Jonny got some good advice from our dock mates about Detroit, our next stop.  We will be staying in Detroit for the next week.  Jonny will be flying to Maryland for an MTOA board meeting and our friend Cathy is flying in from Kansas City to spend the weekend with Lynn.