Well we finally left Buffalo this morning. We spent a lot more time there than we wanted to because of weather and some repairs to the boat. Fortunately the water was great as we had east winds at our back for the day.
We saw lots of fishing boats out on Lake Erie today. All sizes and they were out about 8 miles fishing for walleye in about 70′ of water. We found that out when we asked in Ashtabula. A lot of the boats were in the 16′ to 18′ range so it was good that the waves were less than 1′.
As we came into Ashtabula harbor/river we can tell that there are a lot of fishing boats here. There is also a counterweighted bascule bridge. The charts said 11′ of clearance but the board on the bridge showed about 6.5′ clearance. Even the fishing boats were waiting for the bridge opening.
We are staying at the Ashtabula Yacht Club. It is primarily a sailboat club but they do accept transients and have reciprocal yacht club privileges that we can take advantage of thru the Great Lakes Cruising Club. The people are real friendly and the gentleman that helped us dock is known as Corvette Tom. He is about 65 years old and drives a fire engine red 2006 Corvette. He gave me a ride to the grocery store. Nice shuttle service.
Ashtabula Harbor is an old time commercial harbor as you enter with lots of places for freighters in the harbor. Lots of train traffic on the east side of the river and we were on the west side. The trains were no issue as there were really no whistles for crossings.
We were able to get one of the members, a retired orthopedic surgeon, to give us a ride to a restaurant for dinner. He was able to fill us in on the menu and told us to order off the specials board because those were the best dishes. He was right and the dinner was great.
We decide to stay only one night because the weather forecast was still good. We thought about sticking around for the Ashtabula Yacht Club Saturday corn roast but Lake Erie was calling.