Our Featured Attraction...the Alpena

So these are some of the pictures I took of the Alpena yesterday.

 First I stopped at the slip where she was currently laid up.  As I saw a deckhand walking around on the deck, I asked him when she would be leaving.  He told me and was right on the mark.

 What a difference a week makes.  Last week, this was all covered in ice.  This week, it pretty much all open.  Also, the Alpena was riding higher in the water.  This indicates that she is loaded.

 A shot of her from the front.

 This was a shot with a plane flying in the background.

 A slightly off angle shot to get the bridge behind her.

 Another shot, but this one is showing smoke coming from her stack.

 Her pilot house.

 Her unloading equipment.

 Her Plimsoll lines.  The numbers show the depth to her keel.  The lines with the letters show where you can load the ship too.  The marking with AB is her American Bureau of shipping marking.

 A shot of her stack.

 One of her anchors.

 A shot of her pilothouse again.  It is nice to see a ship getting ready to sail.

 Around the time that the deckhand told me she would appeared, she appeared.  It was a cool site.  It is definitely a sign of spring when shipping starts to move again.

 She makes her turn into the channel.

 A shot as she starts to move out.

 I kind of like the looks of this one.

 To her side is the tugboat Iowa, more on her later.  The Iowa is moving in front of her in order to break ice in the outer channel.

 A cloud of smoke and she gains power.

 Another shot of her with the Iowa.

 I kind of like the reflections in the water.

 She starts to make her way to the ice bits.  She had no problem moving them.

 A shot of her side.

 Another cloud of smoke and she gets moving a little faster.

 She works her way out to Lake Erie.

 She starts to enter the fog.

 And she passes the lighthouses.

 The Iowa comes back in.

A shot of her obscuring into the mist.

And she disappears into the fog.  She is heading up to Alpena, sadly I wasn't feeling well today or I would have caught her as she passed Detroit.