I Can't Believe My Pathway

I know I haven't been posting for the past few weeks because things have been crazy in my life. I'll give you a quick update.

My Job I work in schools as a consultant helping teachers improve their teaching. The current grant I work under expires on Sept. 30 (today) so I have been working every day this month. Not what a retired person wants to do! I'm looking forward to a day off tomorrow but this weekend we are having a garage sale-see next section to see why we are downsizing.

Our House Our house sold recently after having been for sale for months. We had hoped to make our cabin our permanent home but didn't get it done this summer, so we have been looking for a place to rent down here. We found a condo on Monday and will be moving into it the end of October. It should work well because we will be close to our grandkids.

Last week my mother had some medical problems and came down to the hospital here for treatment. She had several issues which they were able to resolve with medication. We took her back home last Friday and got to spend the night at our beloved cabin. Those pictures were taken then.

I hope to be keeping up on the posting now. Bill Keetley sent me some lovely pictures which I never did get posted and now I can't locate, although I know they're on my computer. Bill, if you could resend them, I promise I'll post them tomorrow.

Thanks, Brenda

September Foggy Morning and January Blizzards

We had a beautiful sunrise this morning with just a few wisps of fog. It is quiet this morning with no boat traffic and no gun shots from the goose hunters. But not so yesterday. Lots of gun shots and lots of fog. We were completely socked in for several hours. The US Coast Guard closed the river to commercial traffic which made for a busy time once the fog lifted.

I had a friend who said a foggy morning in September means a blizzard in January. I don't know if there is any truth to that because I could never remember how many foggy mornings there had been in Sept. once we got to January. I even tried to write it down one year but that didn't help.

This week we had a busy on Tuesday with 12 ships observed here. Wednesday was limited to two ships and Thursday it picked up again with 9 ships again. The Lake Guardian, the EPA Research vessel was one of the down bounders yesterday. I wonder what research they are doing here.

Buckthorn Hard at Work-New Info

The US Coast Guard vessel, Buckthorn, is hard at work today in the St. Marys River. It looks like she is taking care of buoy maintenance but that's just an observation.

This is an addition after I had time to sit in the front yard and watch closely what was going on aboard the Buckthorn. It appeared to be disaster training. For a while they were throwing life rings out from the boat. "Man overboard". Later they were having a fire drill. A light was flashing and I could hear a loud voice calling, "fire, fire". Very interesting. They were out there a couple of hours.

The river is quiet today but there has been a fair amount of shipping traffic. The John G. Munson just went up. Earlier today, I saw the Indiana Harbor and the H. Lee White going up also.

The Joseph L. Block was down bound this morning and she is a good looking boat.

We arrived home yesterday from a quick trip downstate just in time to see the Beeghly headed down and the Federal Hudson heading to the Soo.

Today is a picture-perfect day on the river. Low wind and humidity with temps in the low 70's. No clouds in the sky makes for a very blue river.

I received a nice note from a reader who has memories of boat watching that I want to share with you. So many people have great memories of time spend on the St. Marys River as a child. Please share with us if your would.

My grandparents bought a cabin on the west side of Sugar Island (facing Lake Nicolet) in the early 90's. My family would come up every summer for a week or so. My two brothers and I had a blast every year watching the boats and enjoying all the water activities that the Sugar Island/Sault Ste Marie area had to offer. My Grandpa worked on the freighters from the age of 16 and was able to name them all on sight and would often get a salute from the some of the captains. Sadly, my Grandmother passed away in 2001 and that, along with the demands of growing up and work life meant that we stopped our yearly trips. Just last weekend, though, my brother and I were able to make it up to the Sault for the first time in 6 years and it was great to be there again. Thanks so much for your great blog. I'm sure all of your family members will have great lifelong memories of the Soo.

Thanks for sharing your memories and glad you enjoyed a recent trip here too.