Run down the St. Clair and Detroit Rivers to Wyandotte, Michigan

Sunday, July 2 -- Sarnia, Ontario to Wyandotte, Michigan (72 miles)

Lots of pictures today, because there are always lots of interesting things to see when running up or down the St. Clair and Detroit Rivers. You should see a few freighters and there are bridges and factories and the buildings of downtown Detroit and Windsor. It was overcast and sprinkling when we got underway, and it rained off and on all day, so we spent most of the day riding inside, which makes it harder to take pictures. But we managed.

We began the day with the 10am service at All Saints Anglican Church of Canada, which has a lovely old church building in a section of Sarnia with nice homes from the late 1800s and early 1900s. The service ended with everyone  singing "Oh, Canada" and "God Save the King" (except us, because we didn't know the words). This was probably due to the Canada Day weekend. It made for a memorable last day in Canada.

Once we got underway at noon, we were greeted right away by a pair of chemical tankers at the Imperial Oil refinery dock (the Algoterra -- built in 2010 in Shanghai -- and the Algocanada -- built in 2008 in Turkey), followed immediately by the Walter J. McCarthy running upbound empty. The latter is a thousand-footer, the only one we have seen so far, built in 1977 in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin.

Soon after that was the tanker Iver Bright docked at the Sun Oil refinery, which is a Dutch ship, built in 2012.

On the opposite side of the river, in Marysville, Michigan, we saw the Mark W. Barker unloading stone. You can see its self-unloading boom in action at the front end. This ship is noteworthy because it was launched just last year (although the paint job doesn't look it) and is the first ship built for Great Lakes service since 1981 that is not a tug-barge combination vessel. Interlake Steamship, the owner/operator, is a family-owned business in Cleveland, and the ship was christened there. Mark Barker is the president and second-generation leader. There is a big write-up about her in the 2023 edition of "Know Your Ships", which we are carrying aboard and use to look up and record all of the working ships that we see. 

Next up was the tanker Algotitan at the Dow Chemical Canada dock. She was built in 2007 in Instanbul, Turkey. Just downstream of Dow is the Shell refinery. Sarnia is kind of like Canada's Houston given its concentration of refineries and associated chemical plants. Pipelines bring in crude oil from Alberta and local underground salt beds (which are common throughout the Great Lakes) provide a source of chlorine. John has always enjoyed this industrial scenery. 

We took a break from industry once we left the Sarnia area. We ran into some moderate fog when we hit Lake St. Clair, but it disappeared once we got out onto the lake. But in the interim we got to see a Canadian Coast Guard cutter emerging from the fog as we were heading down the channel, which was fun. We were too busy getting out of its way to catch the ship's name. This picture was taken through the window screen inside the cabin.

We left the main ship channel to run along the southwest shore of Lake St. Clair and admire all the fancy houses in Grosse Pointe, Grosse Pointe Farms, and Grosse Pointe Shores. This is where a lot of Detroit's rich folks built big homes roughly a hundred years ago. One of their monuments is the Grosse Pointe Yacht Club, where John got to stay once as a kid during a family boating trip up to the North Channel. It was very fancy then and presumably still is now. 

Just before entering the Detroit River we saw the Algoma Intrepid running upbound empty. This is a relatively new ship, built in 2020 in Croatia. It's interesting to read about where all the ships on the Great Lakes were built. Algoma has a fleet of 28 ships, and only seven of them were built in the US or Canada, and all of these were back in the 1960s and 1970s. This is typical of all the working ships on the lakes -- the newer ones were usually build overseas. This is another thing that makes the Mark W. Barker remarkable. 

We entered the Detroit River in heavy rain with thunder and lightning, but it didn't last long. You can see the tail end of the storm in this picture of the Detroit skyline. 

Here is the Renaissance Center up close. It was completed in 1977 and still houses GM headquarters. 

On the Windsor side, landmarks include the Hiram Walker distillery and the Caesars casino.

The Ambassador Bridge is immediately south of downtown Detroit. It has been privately owned and operated since it was completed in 1929, which has led to some controversy over the years on pricing, traffic flow, etc. Presumably in part as a result, work is now underway by the Canadians on the Gordie Howe International Bridge a few miles downstream. Construction started in 2018 and is supposed to be finished in 2025. 

Right after this bridge we were at the Great Lakes Works of US Steel, which used to be National Steel before USS bought it out of bankruptcy in 2003. The blast furnaces don't look like they are running, but the coke plant is. The big steam plume is from the coke quenching tower. John's company used to buy coal tar from this coke plant. The big buildings are the 80" hot strip mill. 

While we were admiring the Great Lakes Works an upbound freighter passed us -- the Manitoulin, built in 1991 in Croatia. 

The captain was persuaded not to take a detour up the Rouge River to see the Ford Motor Company's steel works there, and instead we headed directly for Wyandotte, passing the big BASF chemical works along the way. 

The Wyandotte Marina was rather old, but the facilities were new and the local boaters were very nice. One of them gave us a ride in her golf cart into town and back for dinner. 

Today we have lots of pictures!  :)