I guess I should have gone on the water Saturday.
I guess I should have gone on the water Saturday.
Well, we sure had plenty of water on that ride 😀
I am going to answer my own question from earlier in the thread regarding progress at McKinley beachm the area that was being reworked this summer. I stopped by today, and though there remain some light barriers, it looks like the work is done. What is AMAZING though is that area now illustrates just how far down Lake Michigan is vs a couple years back. A few years ago, there was a nice lagoon inside the breakwater opening, nice to launch kite or begin foiling before hitting shore break. However, NOW the water barely enters the lagoon, basically stopping right inside breakwater (except when east wind/waves pile up the surf inside. Not going to be quite as nice of a big-wave launch area methinks going forward.
Hey Jeff, I'm afraid you're mistaken mate. The lagoon was deliberately filled in with sand (there were excavators and other machinery there over the summer piling sand into the lagoon), not because of the water level.
That's because a couple of summers back a few people drowned and the lagoon was deemed hazardous... Two teenagers were swimming and got in trouble. An older man (in his 50s, I think) went in to save them. He was able to pull one of them out and went back for the other. Unfortunately, that man and the other teenager both drowned. This was later on in a day where I was kiting earlier (so it was windy and thus the water was pretty choppy for Lake Michigan). Very sad indeed.
I am not sure if they are going to completely fill in that gap with more rocks so that the lake is completely inaccessable from that point, or not. It would be weird to have beach with no access to the water though.
I did use McKinley Beach on Labor Day last month when Bradford was PACKED. McKinley was still closed off but I hopped the fence to set up and it's actually nicer now for kites as there's way more space for set-up and launching. It could be a good option in the future if they don't close off the water access.
This article has more info:
https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/local/milwaukee/2022/05/24/milwaukee-aims-improve-safety-mckinley-beach-16-year-old-drowns/9907154002/
Thanks BBR, that makes more sense. I know the lake was down a bit from where it had been, but down that far was hard to believe!
