Had I known that an insignificant water collision would cause a 4 ½ hour ferry departure delay, I probably would have waited until Friday to make my way to the Beaver Island Music Festival (BIMF). More on that later.
In the style of many other local and regional music festivals, BIMF features days of musical entertainment and on-site camping in the middle of a forest. Except for a water barrel, latrines, and a few food vendors, the quaint downtown five miles away houses the only supplies and amenities to festival goers. The island itself is a 2 hour ferry ride from mainland Michigan. In it's ninth straight year, BIMF draws several hundred music lovers with a passion for camping, the wilderness, and a lights-out time of 4 or 5am allowing plenty of time for intoxicated partying. Music acts range from bluegrass, acoustic classic rock, fuzz box acid blues, to Celtic jams. With lots of tie-dye and Bob Marley posters, BIMF is a hip-hop and heavy-metal free experience catering to a racially monochrome but all-ages audience.
Thursday afternoon, our ferry to Beaver Island from Charlevoix left around 7pm instead of its scheduled 2pm after the ferry driver allegedly hit a smaller craft boat upon pulling away from the dock. According to hearsay, there was no visible damage to either boat, but the ferry driver insisted on calling the Coast Guard to inspect and possibly issue a citation. Of course the nearest Coast Guard representative was in Sault Ste Marie. The commute and inspection ultimately delayed our departure by four hours, an apparently unprecedented delay in the ferry company's 70 year history. For a more factual and official version of this story, follow this link to the Petosky News: http://articles.petoskeynews.com/2011-07-14/minor-collision_29775769
Fortunately our performance times were not until Friday and Saturday evening. Setting up a tent in the dark was a challenge, as was sleeping in a tent for the first time since I was a Boy Scout (yes, I was, for about 1 year), but I survived to tell the tale. To my pleasant surprise, they even have wireless internet in several of the 'quaint' businesses that I described. No commercial franchises to be found, but everything I need to survive for three days is here. More coverage of music from the festival and my first-hand experience with mosquitoes next post.
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| See that little circle in the map? That's where I am. |
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| Emerald Isle Ferry Boat Unloading |
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| En-route to the festival in the back of a flat-bed truck |
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| Beaver Island Sky at Dusk |
