The Claude A. Desgagnes Makes an Appearance

Technically, this is the second appearance of this ship but the first was a glimpse of her bow, so I'm not sure it really counts.

 The Claude A. Desgagnes has eluded this blog since her introduction to the Lakes in 2012.

 And given the weather yesterday, she almost eluded this blog again but I wasn't going to let that happen since I was already there.

 I do like the look of the Desgagnes ships.  They seem to be one of the few companies that run salties that keep their ships looking fairly nice.

 The other reason that I wanted to catch her was because she was carrying odd cargo.  She was carrying some construction equipment but I'm not sure what it was for.

 I believe that she is on her way to Thunder Bay.

 I presume that she will pick up a load of grain for the return journey while there.

One more shot as she works her way up the St. Clair River.

A Pair of Ships on the Maumee River

So I decided to head down to Fostoria again.  As I was passing through Toledo, I saw that both of the drawbridges were open.  That led me to the conclusion that a ship was going to pass through.

 I didn't see the ship that passed through because she was heading out of Toledo and there really isn't a good place for ship watching on that part of the Maumee.  But I did get to see the Birchglen unloading at one of the grain elevators.

 It's kind of cool seeing a ship getting loaded or unloaded since I don't normally get to see that part of shipping.

 Trying to get a a shot of the grain elevator.

 I would have liked this picture more if I didn't have the branch right in the middle.

 The Claude A Desgagnes has eluded this blog for a long time.  And technically, she has eluded it again, since I don't have much of a picture of her.  If had decided to stick around for a little while longer, I could have caught her as she headed out of Toledo.

 So I decided to stop at the grain elevator on the way back home.  I was hoping to catch it more or less lit up since I don't have many night time ship pictures.  Again, if I had stuck around, I could have caught her leaving Toledo.  I can almost count this as a trifecta picture though.  I have the Birchglen, an approaching train and with the contrails, there's a plane somewhere in there.

Part of me wants to learn how to do HDR.  I like the exposure of the ship on this picture and the sky in the last one.  It would be nice to combine them.  But oh well.