North Channel Water Levels

[Dave the Canuck]

Heading to the channel in a few weeks. Has anyone been there this year who can comment on the water levels? Specifically thinking of the approach to Spanish and, if it's honkin', the passage from the Collins Inlet to Beaverstone?

[Svan]

I was up there a few weeks ago in Gore Bay, and the locals were telling me that with all the snow over winter and recent rain that the levels were up a lot from last year. http://www.waterlevels.gc.ca/c&a/Bulletin.pdf shows it might be above datum for this year :/

No information on your specific asks though, just hung around the Benjamins and it was great.

[scottb]

Lake Huron / Michigan are 20 mm below this time last year. What everyone remembers is this past Fall whent he levels tanked to all-time record lows. Fortunately snow and lots of rain have brought them up and are currently above chart datum.

GLWLD - Great Lakes Water Level Dashboard

Haven't been through Collins Inlet in a few years, so don't specifcally know current conditions. May want to check in Killarney first before entering Collins, if you're going West to East.

[continuouswave]

We visited Spanish in 2012. The channel was very shallow. The depthsounder showed only 1.5-feet of water below the keel of our shallow draft 22-foot power boat--the sounder is about 1.5-feet below water line, so maybe 3-feet of water in that channel.

We also transited the shallow channel at the end of Collins Inlet into Beaverstone Bay. There was barely 3-feet under our keel there, i.e. about 4.5-feet indicated on sounder.

Both would be a challenge in a deep draft sailboat. Besides, Spanish is not much of a destination.