Sunshine, cloudless skies and cool temperatures today. We tendered in across Thunder Bay to Alpena a town of about 10,000 people. There is a large cement plant and tourism as the major industries. Hit hard by COVID we, once again, were their first tourists in two years. Since we tendered in, no dockside greetings, but when we walked around town people were friendly and excited t hear of or trip. They weren’t irritated at the drawbridge on the main street had to be raised for each passage of our tenders.
Our tour was the Great Lake Heritage Museum operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). NOAA runs the museum because Thunder Bay is a Maritime Heritage Site due to the 500+ shipwrecks dating from the 1800s to 1960s. Three factors contributed to the numerous disasters, the large number of ships that transit the area, uncharted limestone reefs, and suddenly changing weather.
We traveled by glass bottom boat to see one of the wrecks. The on-board guide was excellent pointing features on shore and once we arrived at the wreck scene. An Alpena native he remembers that growing up it was not an unusual practice to remove artifacts from the wrecks. A bar where we had our nacho lunch was paneled in deck timbers salvaged from a wreck. With the heritage site designation, it is illegal to remove anything from the wrecks.
Our Tender to port
The Lady Michigan our glass bottom boat
After the boat tour we had a guided tour of the museum. It seemed kind of odd that NOAA operates and staffs a museum with archeologists doing shipwreck research. They did rather loosely tie their archelogy work to measuring changes in the lake water environment. They were certainly excited to take us through the museum, which from the dialogue they played a large part in designing.
After the museum a walk around town, lunch and a t-shirt search.
Deck Planks in a bar, from a shipwreck
Nachos, a day early, but so good
The tender home
Tonight was our last meal in The Restaurant. Our tablemates were a former C-141 pilot and his wife. SO lots of conversation about where and when we were stationed.
A sunset over the lake ended the evening.
