Page 72 - USA ROAD TRIP SUMMER of 2000

product, rolled sheet steel, into its hold for shipment to some

other Lake port. There were no people evident. All the machines
appeared to be working on their own volition. The furnace stacks

had an extremely dark, rusty, ominous color with monstrous

pipes, columns, and valves protruding from all angles. The whole
plant looked like a set from a Spielberg movie with this being the

place some miscreant would be sent for penal servitude on a
lifeless planet. I was amazed at it all.

We reentered the lower river through the Canadian locks. The

whole tour took 2 hours and was well worth the price of
admission.

Off to the USA. We crossed the bridge, spoke momentarily to the
customs official and drove to Paradise. It’s a tiny town along the

western edge of Whitefish Bay on Lake Superior. The St. Mary’s
River has its origin in this Bay and all shipping between Lake Huron

and Lake Superior must pass through the Bay to, or from the river
and the locks.

As a ship leaves St. Mary’s River and enters Lake Superior into the
Bay, it must navigate up and around a point of land that sticks out

into the Bay called Whitefish Point. From that Point westward for
80 miles is what is called, “The Graveyard of Ships”. The

narrowness of the Bay with resultant congestion of ships and
subsequent collisions, the nearness of the shoals, its exposure into

the Northwest, furious, November storms, and the occasional
dense fogs have led to over 550 shipwrecks in this area in the past

400 years.

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