July 19 - 24, 2025
 |
| On Saturday, July 19 we drove to Linden Lake Campground in Linden Lake, MI. It was 50 amp electric and water for $33.00 per night. It was a nice stop to do sightseeing and errands. |
 |
| On Sunday it was a beautiful day and we went to the Quincy Mine Smelter. There was a mine tour but we've already been to coal and iron mines on this trip, as well as a pit copper mine six years ago, so we decided to skip that. The smelter was a walking tour that took about an hour and was well worth it. We first started watching a video about the mine and smelter. Then we were given hardhats and started on the tour. |
 |
| Our guide gave us information that she had looked up on her own in addition to the standard tour info. The smelter was built in 1898 to process the copper from Quincy mine as well as other local mines. Quincy started with several sandstone furnace buildings and support structures, and then added additional buildings as technologies changed over time. With the decline of the industry after World War II, the local sources of profitable copper diminished to the point that it no longer made sense to keep the facility open. Plus the EPA came in and said they had to make a lot of upgrades to stay open, so they closed the smelter in 1971. Fortunately, rather than scrap the facility, the company locked the doors, put up a fence, and left the complex intact. The fence is probably the reason that the equipment is mostly still here as no one could load up their trucks and sell it all for scrap. |
 |
| One of the five furnaces. The local area had the purest copper so it was easier to process and made a better profit. |
 |
| Lots of rust. |
 |
| A customer could order what weight (40+ pounds) they wanted for their needs. These were some of the forms the copper would be put into. |
 |
| They tested the copper output in this lab building daily to make sure the quality was good. |
 |
| A steam engine generated electricity that powered the plant. |
 |
| You can see the date 1898 on this building. They don't make stuff to last now like they did back then. |
 |
| Boiler room. |
 |
| The safe where they kept the payroll, etc. in the superintendent's office, which is now the tour office. |
 |
| Copper displayed in the office/gift shop. |
 |
| After the tour we were on our way to get lunch and run some errands and got stopped by this bridge. The whole roadbed raises so boats can go underneath. You can see the top of the road between the signs and the signal. |
 |
| The next day we followed the Copper Harbor Guide Along tour. One of the stop was this snowfall thermometer. That's a lot of snow! |
 |
| Another stop was a waterfall viewed from this bridge. |
 |
| This beach was supposed to have interesting rocks but we didn't see any. |
 |
| We drove to the top of Brockway Mountain, which is 720 feet above Lake Superior, and had our picnic lunch. What a beautiful view! |
 |
| This is looking down on the Devil's Washtub. This natural volcanic rock formation is a blowhole that blows when the water conditions of the lake are right, which they weren't when John hiked down there to take this picture. |
 |
| The waters of Lake Superior are so clear. |
 |
| The last town on the peninsula is Copper Harbor. Just beyond the town is the beginning of US 41 that goes from this point to Miami. |
 |
| Here you can see that Miami is only 1,990 miles away. On Tuesday, July 22 we drove through the rain and a thunderstorm to Curry Park in Ironwood, MI. It was my birthday and I made brownies to celebrate. First brownies we've had in months! |
 |
| It's a city park with 50 amp full hookups for $40.00 per night. It was right next to a busy highway and was only quiet in the wee hours of the morning. Not a destination but served our needs. |
 |
| On Wednesday, July 23 we drove through Wisconsin to Red Pine Campground in Saginaw, MN. It's 30 amp full hookups for $50.73 per night. |
 |
| Site #75. I finally found someone that had an open appointment to cut my hair, which I really needed, so I got that done on Thursday. That should do me until I get home. |
 |
| On Friday we took a small part of the North Shore Guide Along tour. There are fires in Canada and the smoke is pretty bad. You can't see where the lake ends and the sky begins, so I didn't take any pictures. I wanted to go to Betty's Pies as it's a famous stop along the route. I researched their pies and there were some that I could eat, so we went there for lunch. I had a hamburger which was really good and John and fish and chips, which he said was ok. We were pretty full so we took our pie to go. We had things we needed to do so got some fuel and came back. Tomorrow we'll be... Roving on... By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible. Hebrews 11:3 |
