July 4th Week (Michigan)

Today we headed the opposite direction from yesterday and went to Port Huron, Michigan. I was really excited to see this town. We were careful to watch the signs so we didn’t get in the lane on I-94 that goes to Canada. In fact, we got off the exit before the last one, accidentally. But it was fine. HA We went to Thomas Edison Depot Museum. This place is in the old train depot where Edison worked. Even though small, there is a stripe on the floor that you follow and it leads you around and back and forth and twisty but it offers so much information. It hit the highlights of Edison’s life and we thought it very informative for children and adults alike. Edison was hard of hearing due to Scarlet Fever (according to his mom), but he said it was from being boxed and lifted by his ears by a train conductor. 

Oh, bless his mom! He would be a very hard child to raise but looks like she did great. She pulled him out of school, which was pretty common for families to do. A few of his childhood experiments: he gave a friend gas-forming Seidliz powder thinking since that would lift balloons it would lift him. Nope. Another was he and some friends would lay on the hill overlooking Fort Gratiot. They would mimic the military bugle calls to confuse the soldiers. Soon the soldiers came looking for the boys! He set up a chemical lab in the back of the baggage car when he sold things on the train between Port Huron and Detroit. He also started a print shop there and made a train newsletter. One time his experiment went wrong and caught the car on fire. Of course the conductor “tossed the chemistry equipment, the printing press – and the chemist/printer – off the train at Smith’s Creek Station.”

This museum is part of a 4-part Port Huron Museum. Each place costs $12.00 each. Or, you can become a member for $28.00 and bring a guest. Thankfully Kevin picked me as his guest! Outside we were fascinated by the bridges from US and Canada and back. Kevin was in awe of the semi trucks and trailers and all the weight as they were just sitting there stopped waiting in line. The St Clair River starts right here at Lake Huron.

We walked a few blocks to Fort Gratiot Lighthouse. Our tickets included a tour of the grounds and climbing the lighthouse. We got to go inside the lighthouse keepers house. It was used until recently. However, it was redone to look like it did in the 1930s. The kitchen used to be in what is now the dining room but someone back then made the wood shop into the large kitchen and moved the outhouse farther behind the house. The lighthouse used to be 65 ft tall but captains complained they couldn’t see it so it was added on to be 82 ft. The tour guide said a storm years ago was so bad the water was 1/2 way up this lighthouse! The sand eroded so much that they later determined if the storm had lasted one more hour, they would have lost it. Of course the lighthouse keeper was at the top keeping the light lit. Wow. Inside the lighthouse, I chose not to climb the stairs. I have been dizzy today (common from vertigo with my ears) and didn’t feel safe to climb. Kevin went up and took some neat pictures. We saw a bride, groom, and wedding party taking great pictures around the lighthouse and the beach. The fort hospital was there for us to see, as part of our tickets. It was just two large rooms with a few beds and information. We walked back to the truck at the museum and drove to get something to eat. I was really surprised there were no restaurants or food trucks around this whole beach area. 

After the late lunch we went to the other part of the museum to the Huron Lightship. According to their sign, “Because Iron Ore was so important for the war effort, she was the only Lightship to stay on duty throughout World War 2. She served on Lake Huron from 1935-1970.” It has a crew of 11 men with 6 or 7 on at a time. They rotated off every other week. We enjoyed sitting along the Blue Water River Walk and watching the boats on the river. 

Last night when I couldn’t sleep, I was looking at Flipboard on my iPhone and found an article from AOL for iconic food for each of the states. Today I went through it and thought it was so fun! Too bad I didn’t know that when we started traveling full-time. Anyway, I entered it into Paprika (my recipe app) and then put a “yummy” face by the ones that we ate that IN that state. Very fun. Then I sent the article to some RVer friends. They all really liked it. One friend wrote, “We were actually pondering what to do for dinner tonight…and now that I know ‘chislic’ is the South Dakota dish…we are going to seek it out! Thanks for sharing.” Isn’t that great?

Happy July 4th, Independence Day. The other day Kevin’s oldest brother had texted him about their great aunt Josephine and she was buried at Cadillac Memorial Cemetery West, around Detroit. Kevin wanted to go there and I did, too. A quick look at maps showed it was about 30 minutes away. This morning I set the map and no, the close one is Cadillac Memorial Cemetery “East.”HA “West” is west of Henry Ford Museum and an hour away. Good thing we didn’t try to go to it on a different morning before work. HAHA. We got there around 9:30 a.m. and boy, it was very hot! The humidity and dew point were very high. The information we had was that his aunt and uncle were buried in Old Rugged Cross section. While he went off looking for the names, I started at the edge and found that most headstones didn’t have pictures on Find A Grave (footnote 1). I would look up often to see where Kevin was and if he had found the headstone. He got farther and farther away. After almost an hour of going up and down the rows, he found it. Of course there were only a few rows left in that section. That is why it is nice to have GPS marked so a person can easily find a headstone.

He moved the truck closer and then was so good to get out his mini shovel, paper towels, and water and really cleaned up the flat headstone. We noticed that the flat headstones are really sinking into the ground. Kevin says in about 10 years you won’t be able to see them at all. 

When he was done he sat on a bench in the shade. I kept taking pictures and GPS for Find A Grave. However, the heat index was getting pretty unbearable. If you look at the GPS map, you will see that I skipped a bunch and did work where there was shade. HAHA

We took the long way home, through the small towns and side roads. It added 40 minutes but only 10 miles and we enjoyed that drive. After naps we left at 5:00 p.m. to go to St Clair. This was very good timing that Kevin picked. We parked in the recommended place on their website. It was right across the blocked off street. There were a lot of people and stuff around but we found a good spot to set up our chairs. We noticed people had staked down tarps to save their places. One spot even had twine running back and forth between stakes. There were food trucks there and live music on the other side of the street. I had packed a cooler with food for us. I made fruit salad, tortellini in olive oil and parmesan cheese, and chips and guacamole. Of course the fireworks didn’t start until way dark – 10:00 p.m. But we had a good time watching people, watching the boats, walking around, and Kevin visited with a family next to us. We saw 2 border patrol offers and 4 police officers walking around. 

The fireworks were shot off a barge in the middle of the St Clair River. The barge was pushed out to the middle of the river and then the tug went back up the side river where it came from. Soon we saw the police patrol boats having the boats move away from the barge. A lot of them set anchor and enjoyed the show. We saw several tour cruise boats plus several cargo barges. So neat!

The BEST PART OF THE WHOLE FIREWORKS event was this…seeing the Canadians on the other side of the river sitting in their chairs watching the USA fireworks. OH, that just makes me giggle with delight! Good for them. I wonder if they set off fireworks on their special day and the Americans set out their chairs and watch. Wouldn’t that be just grand?! The fireworks were really good and lasted exactly 1/2 hour. This was unique in that it was on the water so the reflections showed all sorts of colors on the water. 

Leaving, we got to the truck pretty fast. And then, in line, we sat and sat. As in, not moving. There were no police doing traffic control which we don’t understand why not. And then, in this huge parking lot, no one would let people in on the side rows. In our home state, it is every other person enters into the exit. Not here. In fact, a guy we let in in front of us finally lifted his hand out the window in a wave to ask someone if they would let him in. I kid you not, both the driver and passenger (looked like two young women) immediately both shook their heads no. I have never seen that before. So rude! We saw this rude behavior throughout the leaving process, not just one person. Shocking! It took us 45 minutes to get out of the parking lot and another 40 minutes to go less than 3 miles. Mind you, the parking lot to the campground is 6.5 miles! It sure made a memory! HAHA

On Saturday we went back to Port Huron to the bus transit building to take a tour on the trolley. The lady at the Edison Museum the other day recommended it and yes, it only cost $0.10 (ten cents) a person to ride. It is an hour long tour with the driver talking the whole time. Why ten cents? Because that is what was charged with horse and buggy for a tour back in the olden days, plus, it is funded by the city. HA We got on the trolley – a nice one with A/C along with 3 other people. Kevin happened to ask the driver if there was a script. (I am deaf.) I didn’t even think about it. Tyler was nice and looked in a cabinet for something. He gave me a paper that listed the stops on it. Then we started. Soon Tyler pulled over and said something to Kevin. Tyler texted Kevin a link to his word document of his own script. I was able to read it on the iPhone while on the tour. That was amazing! He gets an A+ and a thank you letter to him and his supervisor. Kevin said it would have been hard to interpret because Tyler talked really fast. HA I was thrilled! One of the things Kevin told me later, it wasn’t in the script, is that the American Red Cross was first deployed here to Port Huron – they had a devastating fire. So many things to see. One old church is where the Canadians would cross over the river to attend church because Port Huron was the only place that had the England Church in the area! LOL We gave Tyler a big tip and thank you.

*The blog posts are taken from my daily travel journal. Would you believe – it takes me a 1/2 day every week to whittle down a week’s worth of journal so it won’t be too long for the post each week. HAHA Thank you for reading!

1. Find A Grave – https://www.findagrave.com/about

2. “Home” is where we park it. Home is our 2022 Alliance Avenue, 36 ft, 5th wheel.