An Amazing Day at Ottawa

 It was a pretty quiet day on the river today.  I saw that the drive was open at Ottawa in Ohio, so I decided to head down there.

First up is a Canada goose and her baby.

An egret.

Another egret.

I'm not sure what kind of duck this is but it looks kind of cool.

I had to get a few pictures of it.

I like this one the most.

One more.

A puddle duck that looks like he's throwing up a salad.

Another puddle duck.

I think this is a muskrat.

they have such cool looking red eyes.

Another.

Close up of a Canada goose.

I thought this duck looked kind of like a vulture.  Turns out it's called a gallinule.  It used to be called a moorhen.

And egret, I love these birds.

A pair of painted turtles.

A heron.

As he was looking for food.

I love these birds too.

Another heron.

I went over to Magee next.  I saw that the eagle family was in the nest.  The younger eagle looked like he was practicing how to fly.

Dad was just kind of watching over.

Mom brought fish for dinner but I wasn't able to catch her flying over.

Nearby, there was a group of people taking pictures of something.  turns out it was a fox but I wasn't able to get any pictures of him.  It's really no surprise because he looked scared at all the people.

This is a blue-gray gnatcatcher.  He was not a fun bird to try to get a picture of.  This was probably the best of the bunch.

This eagle was at Ottawa.  I think there are 5 or 6 eagle pairs that live in the area now.  Frankly it is amazing.

It was starting to get windy.

The sky was getting grayer, so I decided to head home.

Stupid Heat Haze

 I had one more ship to catch.  I didn't think I would catch her and I really didn't catch her.

The Blacky stopped off at the Sterling Fuel Docks to get some fuel.  After that, she was on her way to Antwerp in Belgium.

And I say that I really didn't catch her because she was far enough out that I was getting heat haze.  The air was warm enough but the river is still cool.  That causes some evaporation and the vapors mess with long distance pictures.  I was shooting this at 600 mm.

And In this Corner, the Terra!

 I had one more ship downbound.

I figured that I would stick around to get pictures of her.  Mainly because I like the colors.

The Algoterra was heading down from Sarnia.

She was heading to Nanticoke.

I think she was carrying Fuel Oil.

She is a pretty nice looking ship.

The orange hull really stands out.

I didn't have much juice left in my drone, so I had to be careful about the angles.

I like this one.

and I really like this one.

And the beam shot as she moves on her way.

A 757-300 Flies Overhead

 When the winds are right and the airport flow is in the right direction, I get to see planes on occasion.

When planes are landing to the south at Metro Airport, the upwind leg of their pattern follows along the Detroit River.

I heard this plane and then when I saw that it was a 757, I had to take a picture.

I couldn't make out the tail number though but I had an idea of what flight it was.  So I looked up the Orlando-Detroit flight and saw that the times matched this plane.

Catching Up With the Mark W. Barker

This the other ship that I was hoping to catch.

The Mark W. Barker is one of the newer residents to the Great Lakes.

She was completed at Sturgeon Bay last year and spent the last couple months of the season doing shakedown type stuff (while delivering cargo of course).

I was able to catch her once last year and the drone pictures were not the greatest.

So I was happy to catch her this year.

She's built for getting into some of the smaller ports on the Great Lakes.

I think her hull has been designed so that she can haul salt.

Her cargo holds carry more cargo.

She's not a bad looking ship.  She was heading down to Lorain with a load of stone.
 

Catching a Couple of Cormorants

 I see these birds all the time.

And I can never get tired of them.

I love the way they look as they skim across the water.