On the Hook - High Cliff State Park

It was decided late in the evening to run over to High Cliff State Park for a night on the hook. For Susan and I it was our first attempt at this. The same for our friends Scott and Jill who accompanied us in their Regal 2760. Our largest barrier to doing in the past is the hassle we have with two dogs requiring the land to do "their business".

When we made the decision after dinner to do it, Scott and I needed to run back my house to grab the dinghy. Susan and I normally do not leave our dinghy on the boat when we are on Lake Winnebago. There is really no real benefit from having a dinghy on this lake, however, getting the dogs to and from land when anchored it was a must. The dinghy ended up working great and everyone used it to entertain the kids as well as getting Scott and his wife back and forth for their ritual morning runs.

We really lucked out with the weather which was the driving factor for doing this, especially so last minute. Scott and I had talked about it during the week, however, I was having difficulty convincing Susan because she did not want to hassle with the dogs. It turned out the night could not have been better for anchoring. There was absolutely no wind that night and throughout the following day it continued to be eerily calm. 

The area is so beautiful, it is the largest natural shoreline on the lake about three miles of uninterrupted natural shoreline. We woke in the morning to cook breakfast for the entire crew as Scott and Jill are not equipped with a generator. Susan and I were more then happy to cook as they took care of dinner on the dock the night before. While Scott took the kids out on the dinghy he was able to get some great shots of our boats tied up.  

We had both a great evening and morning and all agreed to do this more often. The only downside of this trip was Scott and Jill needed to cut the weekend short. They needed to leave early Saturday afternoon to get their oldest to a Girl Scout Camp and to attend a party at Jill's mother's place for Manitowoc county's annual fly-in airshow.

So many boaters are fearful of anchoring out from the horror stories that many tell.  Many include scary nights on the hook from either storms or tide. Scott and I agreed we really have nothing to worry about and should not over complicate things. We do not have extreme tide effects, being an inland lake, and storms were not going to be an issue this particular night. Even having that security, we did use our Drag Queen app on the iPhone. This is actually a great app as you always have your phone near by and it really never gets turned off. At least my never does...