July 30, 2009, Thursday:
We awoke this morning with mosquitoes wing to wing on the RV windows and screens. The good news was they were on the outside! Daisy and I escaped and took a long walk, and when we returned, we closed up the RV and headed to the Katetogama Lake Visitor Center. We decided that we would not spend a 2nd night in the Woodenfrog Campground and managed to get one cup of coffee down before leaving. I went into the Visitor Center to make sure we were on the list and to pay the bill, but no problem. The tour was scheduled to leave at 11:00am, but suddenly the skies darkened, and the rains came. The tour boat was another pontoon boat, and the Captain had some reservations as to whether we should go. He couched his concerns by saying we wouldn’t want to go if we couldn’t see anything. Good point, but being a sailing curmudgeon, I watched as he had the Rangers get radar information from a local site. It showed the storm cell moving south and lo and behold, by the 10:45am, the skies had started to clear. With the side curtains down, there was no way we would get wet. However, the engine exhaust swirled back inside through the stern opening. It affected a few passengers, including Susie. Of course it didn’t help that we were the last to board and in the seats furthest aft. She was able to move forward to an empty seat. We were about a 1/2-hour into the tour, the rain had slowed, and the port side curtain was rolled up. The folks (me included) on that side had a great view. Once again we saw numerous bald eagles, cormorants and seagulls but this time the Ranger told stories about the different animals. We heard how the bald eagles are captured and banded early in life and how seagulls don’t make a nest but just drop their eggs anyplace. They show no interest until the eggs hatch and suddenly a fuzzy little thing appears. Then they show interest.
We heard stories about local people who lived in the area in the early 1900’s. There were some characters living here! We had lunch at the Kettle Falls Hotel. This hotel was originally constructed to house the construction workers who built two dams near Kettle Falls. Rumor has it that the Madame who used the profits from that business to pay for the construction. Who really knows? We headed back at 2:15pm and arrived at 4:00pm after a round trip of 48 miles. Two geology tidbits: the Park lies at the southern portion of the Canadian Shield; the rock along the lake shore and the islands is Pre-Cambrian (2.7 billion years old) and everything above this layer was removed, probably by the numerous glaciers, some were 2 miles thick (how do they know that?), that came through the area. When we returned, Susie took Daisy for a swim.
That made Daisy very happy! Into the RV and off we went south on US53 to the McCarthy Beach SP, which is located about 15 miles north of Hibbing MN. If we had been coming from the south, the signage would have been great, but coming from the north, it was a bit challenging. The SP sits between Side Lake and Sturgeon Lake on a piece of land less than a 1/4-mile wide. It is full of big trees, and there seemed to be a lack of flying insects. We were unable to get an electric site but were more than content to be there. After all, the Park had showers. There were kids running around and having a great time. All of a sudden around 10:00pm, the Park went silent so I think the kids had crashed. We did so a bit later.
July 31, 2009 Friday:
When I awoke around 7:00am, the Park was as quiet as could be. Daisy and I took our walk and found the fog so thick that we couldn’t see across Side Lake, a distance of less than 1/2-mile. I took another shower and filled the water jugs. We had a cup of coffee each and decided to head south to Hibbing MN with the Hull-Rust Mahoning Mine for our first stop and breakfast. Gabby Garmin got us there, but it was along a dirt road when there was a perfectly good paved one two streets away. The mine is 3 miles long, 2 miles wide and 600 feet deep at the deepest point. The footprint covers 3,075 acres.
The town of Hibbing was relocated to make space for the mine. We drove through a bit of the old town and noticed that the original streetlights and roads exist. They used the roads as circulation for a park for camping. The cost is $15/night, and we should have taken advantage. This mine started operating in 1895 and has shipped out over a billion tons of material. At the present time, the mine is closed down due to the weak economy and resulting lack of orders. It is expected to reopen next summer. There was a retired dump truck that had a carrying capacity of 170 tons. The new ones have a capacity of 240 tons. The tires were so large that it takes only 162 revolutions to go a mile. We discovered that Greyhound Bus Lines started in the town of Hibbing so we had to stop at the Museum.
It was a nice history but stopped in 1983. I don’t know the details, but I think the company is in deep financial trouble. Hibbing is the birthplace of Bob Dylan (really!) and Kevin McHale, the pro basketball player. We had lunch in the parking lot before heading north to Chisholm MN to the AAA ‘Gem” the Ironworld Discovery Center. It was almost impossible to access because of all the roadwork and lack of signage. They have dropped the Ironworld and have added (we assume) exhibits that had no connection to the mining. The only exhibit that was fun was a special one about different types of animal poop and how it was used. Too complicated to discuss, and this is a family show. We were very disappointed and would not recommend stopping there. We are in a RV Park in Chisolm for one night. No internet, but electricity and showers. The County Fair is being held this week and the campground is full of trailers that provide sleeping facilities for the workers. We have never seen these before, but these trailers have individual ‘apartments’ that are about 6’ by 8’. Each has a bed and wash sink. Don’t know about showers but assume the people use the campground facilities. Could be interesting tomorrow morning. One note on geography: about a mile north of Hibbing, there is a hill that the Native Americans called ‘Hill of Three Waters’. From this hill, a drop of rain may find its way to the Gulf of Mexico, Hudson Bay or the Atlantic Ocean. This is a follow-up from the blog of 7/29/09. I wish we could have seen it, but that’s life. It is interesting that the Native Americans knew of the water flows long before we, with our sophisticated surveys, did. Tomorrow we plan something exciting for tomorrow, so stay tuned!
August 1, 2009 Saturday:
It rained and blew all last night, and when we got up, it felt like a late fall morning at home. The temperature this morning was 58 degrees. It seems unbelievable for the 1st of August. Wonder how it feels in January? Today we headed northeast to Soudan SP and then Ely MN. Well, we never made Ely. We took showers at the RV Park and gassed up the RV. While paying, I asked where we could get breakfast in town. The owner of the gas station suggested the place a few doors down and then pondered where there might be another place as an alternate. A few seconds later, she said that she couldn’t think of a second place and then mused that the town seemed to have many more bars than places to eat. I allowed that I was too old to drink in the morning so off we went to the Iron Kettle. I had my usual omelet and Susie had waffles and sausage. At the end of the meal, I overheard the group at the next table talking about Ironworld and said that we had been there and been terribly disappointed. One of the couples was local and was very interested in our comments and allowed as he was of the same opinion. He said a lot of money had been spent on the project, and it was having a terrible time making a go of it. We left and headed northeast towards Soudan SP but we diverted trying to find more overlooks into the open pit mines.
We found one and gave up on the second. There was rain and wind on occasion, but that didn’t slow our progress. The variety of trees was interesting even though they were not very tall. I noticed in several areas beyond 50 yards off the road, there were numerous pines and suspect they had been planted. Along the road, there were numerous varieties but aspen seemed to be the most numerous. There are neat looking in the wind and the rain. We also stopped at an ATM to replenish our funds. We reached the Soudan SP at 12:15pm.
Soudan SP is the location of the start of iron mining in MN. It is in the Vermillion Range, the oldest and richest of the three ranges in MN. On July 31, 1884, the first shipment of hematite was made. The original ore was excavated from the surface by means of seven pits. It was dangerous work due to falling debris from the unstable pit walls. We looked down into one of the pits and were told that this year snow remained until mid-July. It was both cold and wet work. The ore was so rich that the decision was made to start sinking a shaft to get to the ore below.
The peak year of production was 1892 when 568,000 long tons were shipped. In 1982, production was stopped, and US Steel gave the mine to the state of MN. They made it into a Park and have kept the mine open for visitors. I purchased tickets and at 1:00pm we entered the mineshaft riding the same type of car as the miners had used to go up and down and to haul ore from the shaft.
The cars have added a few safety features, such as solid walls and doors. Down we went at 1,000 feet/minute (or 11.4 mph) until we reached bottom or Level 27, a distance of 2,341 feet. The temperature is a constant 50 degrees, and the air is changed two times per hour. The miners considered this the ‘Cadillac’ of mines for the reasons above plus it was a dry mine. Many mines have water seepage, as does this one. Here they pump 33,000,000 gallons/year; other mines have pumped as much as 2,000,000 gallons per day (730,000,000 gallons/year). In spite of these benefits, it was hard work with limited lighting making it even harder. Ore was loaded by hand, ore carts pushed by hand until mules were brought into the mines, there were no mechanical rotary drills to make holes for the dynamite and so on. Another benefit was the strength of the rock. It did not need shoring, making the vertical shafts and drifts (horizontal shafts) safer. There was also no methane gas as there is in coalmines, making the danger of explosion negligible (except for maybe a defective piece of dynamite).
The drift we toured was 3/4 of a mile long. So we were a bit less than 1/2-mile down and 3/4-mile off to the side. The reason production at the mine stopped in spite of the excavated material (hematite) being superior than the magnetite found in the open pit mine was that open pits are much more efficient. One year of open pit mining produced as much iron ore as did 80 years of production in the Soudan Mine.
We pushed on to Bear Head Lake SP and we relieved to find that there was a spot for us, one of three remaining. The Park has showers but no electricity. It rained on and off, and the temperatures fell. At 8:30 pm it was 54 degrees and as I took Daisy for her nighttime walk, I noticed numerous folks sitting outside around a big campfire. They were wearing warm pants, warm coats and hats.
August 2, 2009 Sunday:
We expected temperatures in the 40’s last night, but it only dropped to 52 degrees. When we woke, the sky was clear and a beautiful blue. W took our walk, and I took a shower. We decided to drive on to Ely and find a place for breakfast. We did, and it was named ‘The Front Porch’, and there was (slow) internet. We both had coffee, quiche and a cinnamon twist. Susie spotted a place to get her hair cut. The sign said ‘Open on Sundays’ so she walked over to check the times. When she returned, I thought she said 2:00 to 4:00pm, but she really said Noon to 4:00pm. We did some grocery shopping, walked through the town and did some shopping. We stopped in one store and found what we thought would be a perfect gift made from wood, but when I noticed the type of wood, I asked the owner if it was made locally. She said ‘No, it was from China.’ I shocked her by saying that there were enough people in this part of the country who could make the same product and I wouldn’t buy it. Susie was getting her haircut at this time, but agreed. We jumped back in the RV, filled it with gas and headed southeast on the only road to the shore of Lake Superior. As we were approaching the Lake, we came up a hill and around a sweeping bend, and there it was, Lake Superior. It was a wonderful shock! We headed northeast along the coast through a few small towns and numerous State Parks. As we approached Grand Marais, we had to stop at ‘The Pie Shop’ for lunch. Mine was Dutch Apple Pie a la mode, and Susie had Strawberry Rhubarb Pie a la mode. I still seem to be losing weight but don’t know why. The RV Park is run by the City of Grand Marais and is the only one in the town.
The price was a bit high, but at least the funds are going to a good place. There was some sort of event going on it town and many campers, who were supposed to check out at 1:00pm hadn’t left, creating turmoil in the office. We found a spot that someone had turned down because it was too wet. We loved it and were parked next to a family from Ontario. They were a good source of information for our trip around the north shore of Lake Superior. The Canadian City of Thunder Bay has just opened a Visitor Center in Grand Marais with the hope that it will attract some of the many Americans who come this far but can’t seem to get across the border. We’ll stop there tomorrow before moving on. Daisy went swimming in Lake Superior, and it was really cold. We took photos of the harbor, breakwaters and entrance lights when the clouds separated enough to give us good light.
August 3, 2009 Monday:
The sky was overcast when we took our walk along the edge of the harbor. There was no wind, and the water was calm. A large powerboat pulled in at 7:30am. I’m not sure where it came from because they are not many harbors on this shore between Duluth and the US/Canada border. Susie had stayed up late last night dumping files from her computer in an attempt to get more free space on her hard drive. She was successful in increasing the free space from 2.0GB to 9.0GB before she came to bed. She was at it again this morning and managed to clear another 3.0GB to get to 12.0GB. That should hold her until we get home and figure out what to do. These computers seemed so big when we bought them less than3 years ago. We had a hearty breakfast of bacon and hot cereal. It felt good in the cool morning air. The RV Park had begun to clear out before 7:00am, and by the time we left just before noon, it was probably 50% full. It should be nice there tonight. We went to the new Thunder Bay Visitor Center, but they had just opened and weren’t well organized. We drove through the old part of Grand Marais, saw a donut shop and Susie jumped out. We stopped at Grand Portage National Monument, just a few miles south of the border. This site was the headquarters of the North West Company until 1803 when the headquarters was moved north to Fort William, a point at the southern edge of what is now Thunder Bay. The North West Company was owned by Scots and problems of citizenship, licenses, etc. made the move necessary. The Grand Portage was an 8.5-mile path that went from Lake Superior to Fort Charlotte on the Pigeon River. Numerous rapids and falls were avoided by making this portage, but it was a tough start of the trip west with an elevation change of more than 800 feet, carrying two 90-pound packs, over the 8.5 miles. The north canoes heading west were approximately 25 feet long, and those heading east (lake canoes) 35 feet. The lake canoes carried about 4 tons of cargo and traversed the route between Montreal and Grand Portage Bay. From there we headed into Canada. Immediately after crossing the border the land is very different from that in the US. There was no significant farming in the US, but there was in Canada. The hills in the US rolled gently, but in Canada, large rock outcroppings and vertical rock faces existed wherever we looked. After visiting the Ontario Visitor Center just across the border, we went to Kakabeka Falls SP for the night.
This is a pretty falls and according to the information, its height is only 49 feet less (128 ft vs. 177 ft) than the Canadian Niagara Falls, but there are a few differences: 1) it isn’t near as wide (233 ft vs. 2,215ft), 2) the water cascades down the rocks rather than an uninterrupted drop, and 3) the volumes are nowhere near as great. Other than those items, it’s almost as good as Niagara. By the way, the American Niagara Falls is 184 feet high and 1,075 ft wide. When we arrived at our campsite, we couldn’t find the electric and when we did we didn’t have near enough cord, including our extension. Luckily, the Park Warden came by, he called the office, and we were able to move to a spot where our cords were sufficient. We took a bike ride through aspen and birch tree and then went down to see the falls. After that it was showers. We had a light dinner and then talked about what to do the next few days. We’re not settled yet, but we know we’re headed to Fort William tomorrow morning. We went to bed at 10:00pm EDT, or 9:00pm CST, much earlier than usual.
August 4, 2009 Tuesday
It was a clear morning and not as cold as the last few days. Susie penciled in more pictures, trying to catch up again. We left the PP at 10:45am and headed to the Fort William Historical Park. We thought that our tour would take about 2 hours, but were we ever surprised.
This reconstruction is not on the original site, but a few miles up the Kaministiqua River from the original site on Lake Superior. This is the 4th historic recreation we have seen on our tours, the others being Williamsburg, Fort Steele BC Canada and Louisbourg NS Canada. At the end of the day, we thought this was the best. The re-enactors were happy, exuberant and glad to hear that we were from ‘the States’. We went through the Visitor Centre and had a 10-minute walk to the entry of the site. A young lady who informed us that it was 1815, and we were about to enter the site of the headquarters of The North West Company, established here in 1805 met us.
If you remember, the Company originally had its Headquarters in the US at Grand Portage MN, about 100 miles south. The stockade area covered 25 acres and had 42 structures. She established the mood and directed us to the Ojibwa Indian campgrounds outside the stockade enclosure. We saw them making bread, smoking fish and drying pelts. We also saw teepees made of birch bark skins, rather than the animal hides we had seen on the US Plains. When we asked about the difference we were told that the Ojibwa were much more stationary than the Plains Indians and actually had 2 houses, the 2nd being further north to permit hunting for larger animals such as moose, caribou and bears.
On we went and were invited to join the crew of a Voyager birchbark canoe for a paddle around a small island in the river. That was great fun, and we didn’t capsize! Finally, into the Fort for a review of the buildings. We were in the 1815 mood. It is interesting to note that the Fort is a very good reproduction because when the Hudson’s Bay took over the Northwest Company in 1821, plans of the structures were drawn and an inventory of the contents was taken. It was interesting to note that the reconstruction was done using only period tools. We noticed that the glass in the windows had a wavy surface, as was the standard before float glass was developed. We saw a cooper making wood barrels, a tinsmith making cups and pitchers, a hand operated fire pump, canoe building and a farm among other activities. We saw the gaol and the butter making facility that was above the icehouse. All of a sudden it was 5:00pm, and they had closed down the exhibits.
I think we were the last ones out. What a wonderful, but exhausting day. We went back to the RV and had a snack before moving to the west side of Thunder Bay to the Trowbridge Falls Campground run by the City. We were parked adjacent to the Current River, which flows south through Centennial Park (we’ll go there tomorrow) and into Lake Superior.
Susie took Daisy for a walk and discovered the falls and all the hard rock that lies just below the dirt in this area. It looks as if it is sedimentary, but it is awfully hard. We heard the Falls as we went to sleep.
August 5, 2009 Wednesday:
Today we walked Daisy, took showers and left the Trowbridge Falls Campground. On my morning walk I discovered another set of falls, and later Susie took her last walk and took pictures.
We drove to Centennial Park and decided that it would be a good place to ride our bikes. Most of the Park is old growth and probably the largest trees we have seen in quite a while. There is a dam on the Current River about 1/4 mile from lake Superior. The only purpose of the dam was to create Boulevard Lake within Centennial Park. We saw canoes and kayaks and a few brave souls in the water. The dam has a fish ladder but no fish. The bike/hiking path around Boulevard Lake seemed to be heavily used, especially for a Wednesday morning. After the bike trip, we loaded up and drove along the Thunder Bay waterfront with a marina with mostly powerboats. I suspect the water is very cold, but I do know of a Lightning sailor who sails here. We met him in Sheboygan WI at the 2005 North Americans. I talked to a man who was brushing his dog and mentioned that the geography in Canada was very different that that in US. He agreed and said that with all the mesa, etc, you might have thought we were in New Mexico (except for the temperature) rather than Canada. We then headed east to Sleeping Giant Provincial Park, a drive of about 50 miles.
Sleeping Giant is named for a large rock formation and an Ojibwa Indian Legend. Nanabosho (the Giant) was the son of Kabeyun (the West Wind). He led his tribe to the north shore of Lake Superior to protect then from the Sioux, their traditional enemies. Nanaboshho discovered silver and had his people move it to a tiny islet at the end of Sibley Peninsula. A few days later, he saw a Sioux guiding 2 white men to the secret hiding place, raised a storm that capsized the canoe and killed all three. Kabeyun was so mad that he turned Nanabosho to stone, and Nanabosho still lies in repose where his father struck him. He can be seen from Thunder Bay. It turns out that the white men found the silver and mined approximately $3,225,000 of silver from Silver Islet before it was overcome by the Lake Superior waters. The mining has stopped, and approximately half of Silver Islet has been eroded away. After we arrived at our campsite, we tried to take a bike ride, but the maps were so poor and the attendants at the Visitor Centre so unknowing, and it started to rain lightly before we could get very far. Eventually we were able to look at a much better map, and the weather is expected to be better tomorrow so we’ll do out trip then. Susie madly colored her pictures with the hope that she’d be caught up tonight. Daisy was able to take another swim and now is sleeping peacefully.
