Al and Sheri's Excellent Adventure 2010: Killarney and beyond with a new crew member

Killarney to Mill Lake

Mill Lake to the Bustards

The Bustards to Byng Inlet

We arrived in Killarney on Friday morning and docked for the night at the newly refurbished Sportsman's Inn. They have done a fabulous job with the facility and have a very nice marina staff. Our friend Gary arrived around 7 PM after a grueling 20 hour trek from Seattle. He missed his original connection from Chicago because of a questionable medical emergency on the leg from San Francisco. We met up again with some new friends from Indiana on their 45 Tiara who have stayed with us for several days. We had a nice dinner in the bar in the marina. After a quiet morning and left for our first stop in Mill Lake off the very scenic Collins Inlet just outside of Killarney. Our trip after that took us to the Bustard Island group where we anchored in a very nice but crowded cove again with our friends on the Tiara. On Monday morning we left for Byng Inlet and followed the small craft route in the rain. Sheri and I bypassed this section of the route last year due to windy conditions and went outside in Georgian Bay. We found the small craft passage to be fairly straightforward but a little work with the poor visibility caused by the rain. There were a few VERY narrow passages along the way that required a little puckering to get through. One of them named Rogers Gut was actually blasted out to make it deep enough to pass through. It was only about 60 feet wide and about 300 feet long. Another area called Cunningham Passage required a couple of 90 degree turns in a very short distance in order to stay clear of the MANY rocks that populate the east side of Georgian Bay. Three hours later we arrived in the quaint harbor of Byng Inlet at Wright's Marina. We will be dining tonight at the also quaint Little Britt Inn where we ate last year.

Photos from the trip down follow.