The Manitoba

So I decided to go out boatwatching today. It was a nice enough day and not too hot. I was running a little late, so I decided to see how boatwatching from Riverside Park would be because it looked like it would be a nice spot. I'll have to say that it didn't disappoint.
The first ship was making her debut on this blog and she was the Manitoba. Definately a classic lake freighter look.

The Manitoba was constructed in 1966 at the Collingwood Shipyards in Collingwood, Ontario. She originally started life as the Mantadoc. She was named after Manitoba which was the headquarters of the company that owned her. Manta is for the province and the doc afterwords is for Dominion of Canada. She was owned by a grain company.

This is one of the things that I think I will like about this spot. It gives me the Ambassador Bridge as a backdrop and not a bad angle of it either.

She is powered by 4 diesel engines for a total rating of almost 6,000 horsepower. She has a maxium speed of around 16 miles per hour.

At 607 feet long, she is one of the smaller ships on the Lakes but this is just as well as this enables her to go to some docks that her larger cousins can't visit. She can carry 19,000 tons of cargo. She has carried a variety of cargo in her day.

In 2002, she was sold with her fleet sisters to the Canadian steamship lines and renamed the Teakglen. She was laid up during the 2002 season and was used for grain storage. In 2004, she was to be sold as scrap or to be a barge but she ended up getting repainted to be used as a normal ship.

In 2011, she was acquired by her current company and sort of renamed to her original name.