New Campground and the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum

Location: Brimley State Park; Brimley, Michigan
(click pics to enlarge)

I'm playing catch up on the blog posts again. Today is the 24th but this post will be about exploring on the 20th. I blame this delay on Canada and Verizon. I'm close enough to Canada that Verizon thinks I've crossed the border and am in a roaming area where the roaming charge for data is $2.00 per MB. At the rate I use data, my bill would been a couple thousand dollars if I don't switch some of the devices off.  

Brimley State Park is located in Brimley, Michigan on Whitefish Bay/Lake Superior about 25 miles west of Sault St. Marie, Michigan. "Sault" is pronounced "Soo" and means 'river rapids'. So, Sault St. Marie means "the river rapids on the Saint Mary River". The St. Mary river connects Lake Superior to Lake Huron. Lake Superior is 21 feet higher than Lake Huron. Lake Superior is the largest of the five Great Lakes and the last one for me to visit. There has been a constant misting rain with fog that hangs around all day. I was here for four days and got lucky with 2 days of clear weather to see the two things I came to see.

 My exploration of the 19th took me north of Brimley along the coast to Whitefish Point. It is where the Whitefish Point Light Station and The Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum are located. There are over 500 known shipwrecks in Lake Superior and of those, more that 300 are around Whitefish Point. Whitefish Point is a peninsula that helps form Whitefish Bay. Whitefish Bay is the beginning empties into the Saint Mary's River which ultimately connects to Lake Huron. During the late 1800's there were more than 3100 commercial ships on the lake; today there is less than 200. Twenty foot high waves are common on the lake during winter storms with over thirty foot waves being recorded.

One of the more famous shipwrecks is the Edmund Fitzgerald which sank in 1975 with the loss of the entire 29 man crew. She was only 17 miles from Whitefish Point and the relative safety of Whitefish Bay. The Fitzgerald was one of the largest ships on the lake and had been moving iron ore on the lake for 17 years before she sank. She sank during a terrible November storm and the reason for her sinking is still in doubt. Several dives have been made to the ship in search of the reason for her sinking. On one of the last dives, the ship's bell was raised at the request of the family members of the crew that died in the sinking. The bell is now on display at the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum and that is one of the main reasons for me going to Whitefish Point.

Freedom and Liberty's Campsite
You can see the Lake just to
the left of Liberty thru
the trees.

A nice "thinking bench" looking
out to Whitefish Bay/Lake
Superior. It is about 300 feet
from the campsite.

Another view of Whitefish Bay

And yet another view of Whitefish Bay

From the "thinking bench" looking
back towards the campsite

A view of the bay from the
boat ramp in the campground

The bell from the
Edmund Fitzgerald

A lego model of the Edmund Fitzgeral
made of 18,000 peices

An overall view of the museum
Too much detail to list everything
The lighting was poor inside, so
some of the pictures didn't turn out
too good. They keep it dark to
set the mood for shipwrecks and
loss of lives.
 

A 2nd order Fresnel lens
used in lighthouses. It
is 9 feet in diameter
and weighs 3,500 pounds.
There are 344 separate
crystal prisms that will
focus a small light into a
powerful light beam that
can be seen for over
28 miles


 



A view out to Lake Superior
from the Whitefish Point
Light Station

Another view of Lake Superior
from Whitefish Bay Light Station

Whitefish Bay Light Station

This picture is for Mrs. Mac's third grade
class. In another picture from an old
post, I had Cheetos. The kids said that
wasn't healthy so I have replaced the
Cheetos (dairy product) with a
vegetable product. In the skillet are a
couple fish filets and on the upper right
is my new favorite fruit, a Pluot.

Ya'll take care of each other. Cya down the road.