On Saturday I drove my kids and my parents up to Sault Ste Marie. I never ever drive on road trips but with Tyler unable to join us on our trip (he had to go to High Adventure Camp with his Scouts) and it being my car, I did it! I drove the entire trip and I am quite proud of myself. I even drove over the Mackinac Bridge which is quite scary. The outside lanes are scary because, well you are right by the edge. And the inside lanes are scary because they are metal grid that moves. Then there's the fact that it's just super long. But we survived, so go me!
When we arrived in Sault Ste Marie we stopped at a park to stretch our legs and eat. Unfortunately when we got out of the car we realized it was FREEZING- I was wishing we had packed warmer jackets. We were all shivering as we ate our PBJ's and played on the playground. The one perk of that outing is that we saw a really cool freighter boat.
Our next stop was the Soo Locks. The Soo Locks is a water elevator for boats. It helps boats travels from the high waters of Lake Superior to the lower Greater Lakes. We got to watch it in action with a boat that was on a tour. If you look at the water behind Steven you can see how low the water is. They then shut the gates on both sides and slowly fill up the water. If you look at the second pic of Steven you can see how high the water has gotten. Once it was that high they opened the gate on the higher water side and the boat sailed out.
It is a long process to fill the Locks up with water and the kids were not entertained so it was kind of rough going- lots of wiggly, noisy, whiny kids- but I thought it was cool to see. When we left they had a big freighter in the locks behind where the tour boat was (it took awhile for the freighter to get in there because the fit for the boats is tight). I knew the kids wouldn't last through another one so we headed to a tiny museum nearby. In the museum was this creepy stature that looked VERY real.
When we left the tiny museum the freighter had already gotten lower. I should've taken before and after pictures of it because it was really cool.
After the Soo Locks we checked into our hotel and got situated. Then we went on another adventure to the Point Iroquois Light House. I just love light houses! This one was super cool and the grounds and beach around it just beautiful. We were able to climb to the top of the Light House Tower. Penny was super fussy and I didn't want to climb curvy, steep steps while holding her so I let my mom go with Steven and Lucy first (Ben was too scared). Well, Steven ended up getting scared too and didn't make it to the top but Lucy was super brave and had no problem getting to the top. She even went to the top again with me (while Grams and Poppy watched the screamy/fussy Penny). I made sure to include a pic of the fussy Penny because that is the reality of trips with little ones. Also, I am usually not that scared of heights but for some reason (maybe that the steps were metal grids that you could see through?) this light house really got me nervous and my legs were so shaky so I don't blame my boys for getting scared.
Driving back to the hotel my phone lost signal and we had to rely on instinct to get us there instead of Google Maps- we made it! It was a very stressful experience though! I decided all that stress meant we needed a nice quiet night. I bought TV Dinners and we rotted our brains watching Cable TV. I almost went a bit crazy that night when the girls decided they wanted to play instead of sleep. I ended up having Penny sleep on my bed so they would stop goofing around. Thankfully that worked because I really needed some quiet time!
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