Traveling with the Stampers: Sault Saint Marie

Here is an example of a tree in the campground that is changing colors. We have been told that means that the tree is stressed and not that it is time for all of the trees to change. I don’t care—I think it is pretty anyway.

We decided to drive up to Sault Saint Marie today to go through the Soo Locks. We had forgotten that there was a tractor parade through town. As you can see, they had the road that we needed to take to get to the bridge closed.

Some of the older tractors were on flatbed trailers.

We finally got on the bridge and guess what—the parade continued over the bridge. This guy is enjoying the view as much as we were.

I guess this guy wanted to see what was way up ahead of him.

The parade took up one lane of the bridge as far as the eye could see.

These guys were part of a club for old tractors.

Of course not all of the drivers were guys—some were gals.

We made it over the bridge and into Sault Saint Marie with no problems. This is the oldest town in Michigan. This building still has old ads painted on its walls.

This is some sort of government building. I liked its cupola.

We arrived at the Soo Locks Boat Tours and boarded a boat.

Here we are getting ready to enter the lock. You can see the wall at the other end that is holding back the part of the St. Mary’s River that is 21 feet higher than the part we were on.

After the door closed behind us the lock was filed with water up to the water line that you can see on the side wall. Here the doors in front of us are opening as we prepare to exit.

This is the international bridge to Sault Saint Marie, Ontario. There is a railroad track running below it with a lift bridge.

The lift bridge operator lives on this side of the river and every morning he climbs the tower and walks across the catwalk to the other side.

It is from the little building below that he operates the bridge which is usually twice a day. Then he climbs back up the tower and crosses over to go home. Not a job that I would like to do.

After touring around in the St. Mary’s River and seeing an old but still operating steel mill we reentered the lock. You can see where the water level is as we enter.

This time gravity works to quickly lower the water level.

Until we are down at the lower level and the doors open for us to exit.

The trees along the locks are also beginning to show color.

We went around on the Canadian side and saw this poor moose. He has had his antlers stolen twice this year.

There is also this nice floating fountain in front of the park on the Canadian side.

This building is an operating electric generating facility using water as the power to generate electricity.

It sis a beautiful building made of hand cut stone from the area.

Down a short way is the Soo Locks Campground. We had already visited it and decided that we will move here when we leave Mackinaw Mills Creek Campground next Thursday.