The Tug Victory and her Barge

So I made it to my spot on Belle Isle.  It wasn't the best spot, but it was a spot where I could wait in the car and not have to deal with the rain and wind for longer than I had to.

 It wasn't long before I saw the tug Victory and her charge, the Lewis J. Kuber.

 She was on her way to Toledo, but I'm not sure what she was carrying.

 But the fog made for some interesting pictures.

 Rain on the lens unfortunately doesn't.

An attempted shot of the tug but by this time I just wanted to get back in the car.

The Olive Moore/Lewis J. Kuber

As I was watching AIS for the next ship, I saw that she had slowed down a bit.  I was thinking that perhaps she was slowing down because the Detroit was hiding with her.

 Turns out that wasn't the case, but it was still a nice evening for ship pictures.

 I kind of like it when there are some clouds in the sky.

I wish I could have had the right settings to get the moon though.

And Then There Was the Kuber

As I was taking pictures of the Federal Sakura on Belle Isle, I looked down towards the Ambassador Bridge and noticed a ship coming up.

 Turns out that the ship in question was the tug/barge combination Lewis J. Kuber and Olvive L. Moore.

 At one time, the Kuber was a proper ship known as the Reserve.  She was a pretty nice looking ship in the vein of the Anderson or one of them.  But it's cheaper to take out the steam engine and replace it with a tug.

 The Olive L. Moore, which is the tug portion was built in 1928.   She was originally named the John F. Cushing.

 A straight out shot of her from the Rocky Beach.

 A shot of her pilothouse.

A shot as she moves into Lake St. Clair.

Whitefish Bay and Friends

I decided to head down to the Detroit River tonight because I saw that there was going to be a ship passing that I hadn't caught yet.  Plus it was a nice enough night.  Little did a realize there was a Red Wings game and that kind of affected things.

 Well, I did manage to catch the Whitefish Bay as she was making her way down the River.   She is one of the Chinese builds for the Canada Steamship Lines and was launched this year.  Unlike the Baie St. Paul, she is still looking new.

 Not quite so new is the Tug/Barge Lewis Kuber.

 What I didn't realize is that there would be a gathering of ships at one end of the Detroit River.  From left to right, the Wicko, Federal Shimanto and pulling in is the Kaministiqua. 

 But back to the Whitefish Bay for a second.  She's 738 feet long and 78 feet wide.   Her holds can carry almost 38,000 tons of cargo. 

 Slowly she works her way down the river past the grain elevators and what not.

 Not one of the better views of the Detroit skyline but it's still not too bad.  The light was just about perfect for this too.

 One more shot of the skyline.

And one more shot of the gathering of ships as the Whitefish Bay makes her way to Naticoke.

The Lewis J. Kuber at Drummond Island

So we arrived at DeTour and the light was just about perfect.  There was no Roger Blough yet because she was in the kind of AIS dead area.  There was however this ship.

 She is no stranger to this blog but it has been almost a year since I've seen her.

 Last time I saw her she was sporting a red hull.  Now she is wearing the grey and white of Lower Lakes Towing.

I kind of liked her old colors.