David Z. Norton out on Lake St. Claire

STEPHEN B ROMAN sitting at the cement Dock(Thanks Jeff! One of my MANY story editors..:o) )

The river was pretty quite on the way down to Windsor. We got to Ojibway just in time for dinner. It seemed funny to me we were heading down the river and Ojibway was right there. I reconize it now by the lights along the dock.

But then Anders was turning the ship toward the other side of the river. I told him "hey the docks over there ya know.. ;o)" I knew he'ld enjoy that. ha ha So after he docked the ship I asked him why he had turned around versus just "driving up" to the dock. Its those currents again. I learn more everytime I come here. They said we could be here as long as 24 hours but were done much sooner than that.

The ship turning in the river..now THIS IS FUN!

At Ojibway Salt , notice the ice just forming beyond the load rig.

View from the wheelhouse out on the Detroit River

Effects of the cold wind that is picking up. More ice forming and stronger currents.

Sea Smoke on the river as this salty passes.

Big pile of Salt going on the Ship!

We left Ojibway on December 19th around 11:30am, we went up the river just a ways to turn around. Anders pointed out this tug that was getting weighted down with ice that was forming because the wind and waves were making it build up on the back of the tug! It was pretty far away so I'm afraid my zoom wouldn't quite Zoom enough! While the ship was still being loaded and they were trimming. Anders called frequently for water levels in the river. With this strong west wind it wouldn't be long before there was really low water. When we went down "exclamation point alley" Anders really slowed the ship down, I can't remember what he calls it but its so the ships butt doesn't sit down in the water too far.!! At one point I noticed we only had 3'7" of water underneath us! Amazing that the ship can move in low water like that!

                     

Sparkling water in "exclamation point alley"!

out fixing the "ooops!!"

Once we were out on the lake everything was fine. Anders did go back up to the wheelhouse to check things out when we got to southeast shoals. The weather forecast wasn't the greatest so he needed to see what was up. We were taking on freezing spray which is not a good thing. (But it did look really cool..:o)

Course when he was up there it was dark, and he turned the searchlights on so to see what the water was doing. The wave would hit the ship and fly up over it. Then you could see it immediatly turn to ice crystals. So because of this he took the ship along the north shore of Lake Erie. Their were 4 other ships anchored in the bay up there waiting for the weather to clear. Anders said we'ld be fine though and of course he was right. The ship rocked a bit but sleeping was oh so great!!!

When we woke up this is what we saw...Sea Smoke every where!

When we got to Port Colborne it was a sun shinny day, but ice was forming in the harbor.

Looks like broken glass. It was about 1:30 in the afternoon. The Lockmaster told Anders he was going to have to tie up above Lock 8 to wait for traffic. We ended up waiting there for 1 1/2 hours...ugh! Once we went through Lock 8, we had to tie up again below the lock, this time we waited 2 hours! So much for a quick canal again!

Finally we were able to move along through the canal.

Frozen Harbor!

Big Pile of Salt, this won't last long!!

Waiting .....

Cuyahoga heading out onto Lake Erie

All decked out for Christmas! Anders said we were too...the Algolake had a green and red light....

Ho Ho Ho!!! (There were tons of decorations down in the galley though...they looked Great!)

Hmmm looks a bit cold to me!!

I notice that anytime we pass an Algoma Ship the crews all come out to greet one another.

One big Family...

Yep it wasn't long before we were in the dark again...I think it was 3am when we finally got to the piers...15 hours...was I tired???

We got to sleep pretty quick but that dang phone next to the bed buzzed an hour and a half later for Anders to take the ship into Tornonto. Now I might have been tired but I'ld never been here before and it was pretty cool.

The city was beautiful all lit up at night. We went into the harbor meanwhile Anders was trying to get ahold of the Cherry Street Bridge Operator. He had called him in advance to let him know when he'ld be there since the bridge does not have someone there unless they know a ship is coming. You sort of have to call to make a reservation...:o) Anders had told him we'ld be there at 5:30 , well it wasn't quite 5:30 but it was close enough and nope he wasn't answering the radio. My only image was okay we make the turn into that ship Channel and the bridge is still down...hmmm then what? Okay we'll no thats not my problem and obviously Anders was not the least bit worried about it. Finally the operator answered back and Anders told him he was ready for the bridge. So we started making the turn into the channel. It was basically a 90 degree turn which was pretty neat. Once I saw the bridge I thought, oh my gosh I'm glad I"m not doing this!! Not much room between the ship and the walls of the bridge. There was a mate on each side of the ship spotting for Anders, sounds like we've got a bit over 2' on each side....now I know Anders was quite happy with that but, geez when you are 75' wide 2' isn't too awful much!! But of course there wasn't a problem at all, we got in there, found the spot on the dock to unload the salt and went to BED!!!!

The Algobay, Anders told me that he was a 3rd mate on this ship when it came out brand new.

Big pile of salt! There were trucks getting loaded from the moment we got there.

We woke up later on in the day to find that the channel had frozen like solid while we were sleeping.

Normally I guess ships head further into the channel to turn around in the "turning basin" but seeing the ice which was worse heading that way, Anders made the desision to back the ship out through the bridge. Oh my, I thought, but who else to do it, if not Anders. So he got the ship out in the middle of the channel and told the bridge operator what he was doing and we proceeded to back out through the bridge.

The Cherry Street Bridge...okay so does it LOOK like we'ld fit through there???!!!

Getting close yet. There was some guy on the bridge taking pictures. I don't think they'ld seen anyone back through there before. Infact later on when we got out onto the lake we heard some guys talking on the radio about Anders. "yeah the Captain on that ship is known for backing through bridges" Anders point is that it saved us over 1 1/2 hours of time backing instead of going up to turn around, thats not including the time it would take to get through the ice. He doesn't think its a big deal at all. I thought it was pretty neat though.

Watching the ship clear the bridge.

Backing out.

Bye Toronto!!

OOPS!!!!

The Canadian Leader

The Canadian Navigator

We stayed up crossing Lake Ontario this time since we had a good sleep while in Toronto. We met the pilot boat heading into Port Weller Piers. Still find it weird that Anders has been to about every port on the Lakes and does alot of the Seaway. But I guess all the Salties and Tankers have to have Pilots. The Pilot boat was going out on the Lake to take the Pilot off who had done the Canal and put on another pilot to continue on the trip for the Salty coming out of the Lock ahead of us.

Meeting the Salty heading towards Lock one.

There she goes!

Oh yeah!! The Cliff hanger!! its the other half of the Jean Parisienne!!

I think I might have another picture later on too. Shes getting a new front end. Lots of banging and other noises going on as we pass by here! We had a fairly quick trip through the canal. No delays to speak of. Although we did have to stop "to get gas"and to get some fresh drinking water. I think I had already dozed off in my chair three times by then though! I think it was 2am by the time we started out to the lake again. There was ice starting to form inside the canal below lock 8. We weren't really surprised though I don't think its been over 10 degrees since I've been here and can't imagine what it is with the wind chill because there have been gales like everyday! We slept most of the trip across Lake Erie ,by the time we got to South East Shoals there was a thin coating of ice on the lake not much more than an inch think though probably and it broke up pretty easy like glass.

Saw the Algocen on her last trip down Lake Erie.

Zoomed in

Another ship passing in front of us..wow does it ever look cold out there!