Tower of History, Museum Ship and a Huge Ship in the Locks

Today, Tuesday July, 31, is the mid-point of our summer travel season.  We generally travel six months during the summer, and then spend the winter in Tucson, Arizona.  We tour as much as we have energy for, and we always leave an area not totally explored, so we have something to return for.

Monday we had a short day of touring, because of the van having a repair appointment at the local Ford Garage.  The heater now functions in all modes, A/C and heat/defrost.

The Tower of History is a concrete structure with a height of 210ft, and has three observation decks, and all provide a spectacular view.

The tall picture distorts the actual dimensions of the structure, but it does show that it is a long way up.  The views of the waterway were great, and we got to see a freighter ship entering the locks.

To show the size of these monster boats, The white pilothouse is larger than most buildings in town as seen above the trees, as it slips into the locks.  From this viewpoint we could see the Museum Ship, Valley Camp, that is to be our next stop.  The old freighter is smaller than the now operating ships, but it was huge in its day.

A wide view of the Museum Ship, taken from the parking lot, and from on top of the pilothouse.  This ship had the pilothouse in the front of the ship and the engine room was in the rear structure, the newer big ships have the pilothouse structure in the rear of the ship.

The Museum exhibits were mostly around the old cargo hold and covered two levels.  The exhibits covered everything maritime, from antique tools used to construct wooden boats to lighthouse styles, and the ships lost on the waters of the Great Lakes.  There was a little too much to absorb in just one visit.

The crews quarters were a little sparse, and the captain is the only one who didn’t have to share a room, that I could find.  Some rooms had been painted since the ship was put in service, and the natural wood being darker, looks a little nicer than the paint.

The wheel to steer the ship in the pilot house, and a gauge panel in the engine room.

The engine room, and the three cylinder engine with exposed crankshaft, and connecting rods.  The engine worked on steam from a boiler fired by burning coal, and the sign says that it was fed by hand.  The working conditions were poor at best, the temperature would get up to 120-130 degrees.  The mechanism to raise and lower the anchor is shown in the wide picture with the portholes open.  each link of the chain weighs 23 pounds.  The anchors were located under the pilothouse.

After we dropped the van off at the Ford dealers, Anne-Marie and I walked downtown to find a restaurant for lunch.  We were treated to another huge ship navigating the locks, and this is the largest one yet for us.  The white pilothouse is 6 or 7 stories tall on top of the deck of the ship, and the ship looked to be nearly a quarter mile long.  We walked by some Canadian geese, and these are as used to people as the ones at the marina in Hood River, Oregon.

Today is a travel day for us, and we are heading South, and I will let Anne-Marie choose the route and stopping point.  I haven’t even looked at a map to plan todays travels, but it might be fun to tour a town or two on Lake Huron, on our way South

Studebakers Restaurant

We’ve seen a few interesting old cars and trailers in town, since we have arrived.

We had lunch at this restaurant here in Sault Ste Marie, Sunday.  The interior walls were covered with license plates from all over North America, in addition to old Studebaker memorabilia and pictures.

This Plymouth was parked next to a busy street, and it has a for sale sign on it.  The highlights listed on the sign were V8, auto, power steering , power brakes, and more.  The only thing old is the body, and it is set up to be a dragster.  This is one of those vehicles that look quite intriguing from a distance, but have almost too many problems to be really interested.

This RV in the park across the street from us looks to be a no frills setup.  There is a changing tent, the trailer opens up in the back for access to the kitchen.  The one ton truck with dual tires is setup to pull a fifth wheel trailer, and the little trailer could fit into the bed of the truck.

We got home and found another Airstream parked next to ours.  Bill and Eva are from Virginia, and are on a two month road trip, and plan to travel West to Yellowstone Park this year.

Soo Locks Boat Tours

The weather has been nice, and we haven’t needed the A/C since we got into the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.  The cool nights have allowed the trailer to cool down to the low 60s at night, we haven’t had that for about a month.  The Van has an appointment at the Ford Dealer to get the front heater working after the Rapid City, South Dakota McKie Ford Dealer fixed the A/C.  This should be the last of fixing stuff, by my count, this is the third time into the shop, and inconveniences usually happen in three’s.

Yesterday Anne-Marie and I took a tour of the Sault Ste Marie water way with the Soo Locks Boat Tours.  Sault is a French word, pronounced "Soo", and means a rapid in the river.

A wide picture of our Tour Boat, from the bow looking North to Canada.

This tub boat is in a floating dry dock, and the tall control tower is from a separate boat parked alongside.  A view of our RV Park from the water, our trailer is under the trees.

This is a Power Plant built in 1902 by the Edison Electric Company, and it is still in operation.  The cement tower is the Tower of History, and the large boat at dock is the Museum Ship, named Valley Camp, and we plan to visit both today.

Our tour boat entered the Sault Ste Marie Locks from downstream, and the upstream doors don’t have a completely tight seal.  After the lock is filled and the tour boat has risen.

A steel mill in this wide picture, and Anne-Marie on the right side of the picture.  The tour guide said that this large complex employ’s 4200 workers, and it is wide and expansive, with large piles of coal, Iron and limestone (I think).  This Industrial operation is at least 2 miles long, and the closer we got to it the dirtier it looked to us.  We could hear things banging, clacking and hissing, as the operations went on, and there was a tall chimney with a torch/fire on the top, and the flame varied from barely visible to about the size of our trailer.  It just looks like a dirty and hard job to work in a place such as that, I am fortunate that my career only had the occasional dirty task, and not an ongoing one in a plant such as this one.

Our tour boat first went upstream through the US locks, and then down stream through the Canadian Locks, with the Canadian downstream locks opening here.  A Museum about Bush Planes on the Canadian shore.  We are finding reasons to return again, and see places that we are missing during this visit.

A tug company next to the Bushplane Museum.  Think of a tug boat as a tow truck of the waterway, and they have small ones for the little jobs, and really big ones for helping the big ships.  Getting close to the home dock and the end of the trip.

The large Coast Guard Boat that I had pictured a few days ago had moved, and during our trip a large ocean going ship entered the locks, traveling upstream.

Today we have another hard day of touring, before we take the van to the Ford Dealer, and if the problem can be fixed today, we will be heading South tomorrow.

A Layover Day

The RV Park that we are set up at, has no sewer hookups, and we checked out the other one, and it also has no sewer lines to the RV parking sites.  This means that we get to use the parks showers every day.   I looked at the showers and they are very well done and very clean, but it is still an adjustment for Anne-Marie and I to leave the trailer to take a shower.

Yesterday, Anne-Marie and I didn’t even leave the RV Park, it was just a hang around day, watching the Olympics on Canadian TV, doing stuff on the computer, and walking around the park.  It seems like it has been over a week since we had a day of resting up, travel days drain me by the time we arrive and get utilities set up, and our touring days have been jam packed with numbing activities.  It was kind of relaxing to not have a schedule pushing us for the day.  The TV here in Sault Ste Marie is off of the air, no cable in this or the other RV park, and the only channels are from the Canadian Sault Ste Marie, across the water.  The Olympics focus on the Canadian teams, but do include the US results, and the local programing has a different twist on humor with the comedy sitcoms. 

This is a view of our trailer, with Canada across the water.  This is a quiet park setting, there is a road a few hundred feet behind us, and the big boats toot their big deep sounding horns once in a while, but I seem to not hear or pay attention. 

Friday Afternoon, we went to the border crossing, so I could ask if our Oregon Drivers Licenses alone would allow us to pass over and back the US/Canada border, and the word is “No”, we will also need our birth certificate in hand.  This isn’t a problem for us as we are carrying  all of that kind of ID with us, but it is normally in the trailer, so if we choose to cross, we might do a dry run without the trailer in tow, just to see what the system is.  The folks at the Customs Border Crossing, seem to be a real serious bunch, as they all had a gun on their hip.

Today, and all rested up, I am looking forward to doing a lot of the tourist stuff, around town.

Sault Ste Marie , Michigan

We arrived here on Friday, and we seem to have escaped the heat of the mid western states.  When we left Traverse City, Michigan, the weather was cold and rainy, and it was so cool that we needed to have the heater turned on to defrost, but we found that the heater has no heat.  We had the van worked on clear back when we were in Wall, South Dakota, and at the time the engine was repaired, we had the A/C worked on also.  The A/C didn’t have enough of a charge in it, and would not keep the van cool even on the highest settings, and I had it recharged in Urbana, Illinois, and it works really good now.  We have an appointment with the local Ford Dealer on Monday to see why the heater has no heat now, and it probably had no heat at all when the van was delivered to us, but it was hot already outside, and we never tested it.  I called the Ford Dealer in Rapid City South Dakota, and one of the reasons could be a vacuum line not attached correctly, I looked, but I can’t recognize where that line is.

This is one of the inconveniences of being on  the road and leaving the town where the work was done at, and another problem arises, and then you have to pay a different garage to repair what would have been a warranty repair in the first place.

We have at least three tours that we want to do here in Sault Ste Marie, The Tower of History, A Museum Ship named Valley Camp, and to do the Soo Locks Boat Tour.  One of the Soo Locks Boat Tours boats just out back of the RV Park.  The RV Park has a row of spaces that back up to the water.  All land across the water is Canada.

The U.S. Coast Guard has a huge ship docked just 1/4 mile from here. 

The RV Park also has two docks in a sheltered slip for the resident of the park.  Canada across the Water.

Grand Island Tour Lake Superior

Thursday afternoon, after the Glass Bottom Shipwreck Tours, Anne-Marie and I went on the Grand Island Bus Tour.  This tour was about the history and geology of the large island, it’s 4 miles wide and 7 miles long, and has been in private ownership until the 1990s. 

This is the building where it starts, boat rentals, bicycles, or a pontoon boat to transport your own bikes.  We road in this boat to and from the island.

This sign was one of the first official signs, for us to see on the island.

This boat was built around 1907 out of oak, and has a inboard motor.  The boat served a resort on the island till about 1956.

Our guide telling us about the restored 1845 cabin, the timbers close to the ground were too rotted, and were replaced.  When the cabin was used by the resort as a rental, the interior was paneled with wood, the forest service removed the paneling, and found peeling paint on the original timbers.  Under the paint is graffiti from the 1800s, and they are allowing the paint to peel naturally.

We walked into the old Cemetery, and found headstones from the mid 1800s.

This is a power system transformer vault, that has been put into service as a food locker for campers.  Bears have tried to open the locker, and there are scratches on the top.  The tree shows bear claw marks, and its poke holes from the bear climbing it.  They guess that there are only 6 or so bears on the island.

Pictured Rock National Lakeshore in the far background.

Our guide explaining about the archeological dig.  Everywhere that they have dug, neat stuff has been found, stone tools, spear and arrow points, and the like.

Anne-Marie and I took a scenic walk through the woods, and the trail seemed to take us from one viewpoint to another, this is a wide picture of the brilliant green moss that was all along the trail.

Dinner time was late for us, after 7 PM, and we ate at the Dogpatch Restaurant.

Friday we pulled the trailer to Sault Ste Marie, Michigan, and we are parked at a RV Park on the water of the Locks

Glass Bottom Shipwreck Tours, Lake Superior

Anne-Marie-Marie and I Pulled the Airstream to Munising Michigan.  The RV Park was booked up for the weekend, but could allow us to stay for two nights.  We drove over 300 miles to get here, and the weather was cool, and wet, and we were too beat to be able to do any updating.  I again was tired, the computer was tired, and I tried to make it work better, and I failed.  The last two days I have been working to unfix the computer, so I could make updates.  With only one whole day to explore this area rich with history, we did two boat rides, and one bus tour.  This is how we started the day on the waters of Lake Superior.

Our Home.  This is the RV Park at the Wandering Wheels Campground.  There is a Festival Here this weekend in Munising, and there is just no space after tonight.

The Glass Bottom Shipwreck Tours was our first activity of the day.   The weather was warming up and getting better as the day progressed, and we had seats on the top open deck, and it was windy but not cold.

This is the Captain at the wheel, and her First Mate.  These two did a wonderful job of narration throughout the trip.

The shipwrecks were across the water, close to Grand Island.  The first wreck that we arrived at could be viewed over the side of the tour boat.  The number of passengers was too large for all of us to view at the same time, so we were divided into two groups, the lower deck viewed first, while the upper deck folks looked over the side.  The view from the lower deck was incredible.  The viewing windows were at the bottom of wells, and the glass was at the bottom, the light is natural light.  The Captain maneuvered  the boat back and forth, to allow all to view the entire vessel.

Another view of the shallowest vessel.  The faintest picture is of a deeper ship, and it has no upper deck, this is looking at the inside of the ribs.

This lighthouse is the first on the Grand Island, 1868.  There was only one keeper, and he worked here for 40 years, and the lighthouse was decommissioned in 1913.

We are moving the trailer today to Sault St Marie, Michigan, to rest up and tour the Locks.