Slightly Off the Mark: travel

Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts

The Mackinac Bridge in Pictures

One day--let's say it was the 50s, because these things happened back then--some people from the lower peninsula of Michigan rowed over to meet with some people from the upper peninsula. "Isn't it wild," one said, "that we're part of the same state, but can't just drive back and forth?"

"I've got it!" a Yooper said. "Let's make the U.P. its own state! We'll call it, let's see .... Upper Michigan!"

"Or," said some engineer looking for contracts, "we could build a bridge".

"Ha!" said another, who operated a ferry. "Over that long piece of water? It'll never happen."

Opened in 1957, it was at the time the world's longest suspension bridge between two anchorages, and still is the longest in the Western hemisphere. For you flat Earthers, that means this side of the ocean. The main span is 3,800 feet long, and it sure felt that way as we were driving over it. The rest of it is ... well, longer.

In the old days, 9 ferryboats carried 9,000 vehicles a day--plus other ferries that hauled train cars--across the Straits of Mackinac. Or is it Mackinaw? Or is it, as the natives said, Michilimackinac, which means "Straits of the Great Turtle With a Long Name"?

But, with 16 mile backups of drivers waiting to use the ferries, it seemed like there should be a better way. A well-heeled fellow by the name of Cornelius Vanderbuilt II proposed a bridge all the way back in 1888. Someone else suggested a floating tunnel, which sounds like a nightmare from every direction.

Yes, that giant ship hauling iron ore, or rubber duckies, or tanks of Mountain Dew, or whatever, is going under the bridge--and it's a BIG ship. I know, because we later got much closer to it.

President FDR tried to get funds for the bridge project during the Great Depression, but Congress thumbed its nose at him. Figuratively. When it finally happened, it took three and a half years, five lives, and a quarter of a billion in today's dollars before the first person to drive across: Michigan's Governor Mennen Williams, who paid $37.26 in today's dollars. People must have carried around a lot of pocket change back then.

There's a statue in a park on the north end of the bridge, a memorial to the ironworkers who built it and the five who died. Why is it looking away from the bridge? Um ... well, maybe for pictures like this.

40 years later, the 100 millionth vehicle crossed.

By the way, it cost us $4 to get across, during our tour of Michigan that I'll speak more about later. Yes, I took lots of pictures.

What's the point of being at the junction of two Great Lakes, if you can't play in the water?

For those of you who are curious--or fearful--exactly two vehicles have gone over the side, one due to excessive speed and one a suicide. Why someone would choose to drive fast 200 feet over the water is beyond me.

One plane has hit it, crashing into the suspension cables during a heavy fog.

The Old Mackinac Point Lighthouse, along with a steam powered fog horn, helped guide ships through the busy Straits until the year after the bridge was finished. It's now, naturally, a maritime museum.

Oh, one more thing: On April 24, 1959, Captain John S. Lappo flew a Boeing B-47 Stratojet UNDER the bridge. Yeah, I looked it up: It's a six engine strategic nuclear bomber.

Under the friggin' bridge.

No word on whether it, or he, was loaded at the time, but he didn't work for the Strategic Air Command after that.

(By the way, my novel Radio Red is set near Lake Bellaire, which is a real place about 80 miles from the bridge.)

Although we’re based in Indiana, you can find us and our books all over the internet:

· Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B0058CL6OO

· Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/search?attributes.contributorId=13727646

· Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4898846.Mark_R_Hunter

· Blog: https://markrhunter.blogspot.com/

· Website: http://www.markrhunter.com/

· Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ozma914/

· Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkRHunter914

· Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markrhunter/

· Twitter: https://twitter.com/MarkRHunter

· Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@MarkRHunter

· Substack: https://substack.com/@markrhunter

· Tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/ozma914

· Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/ozma914

· Audible: https://www.audible.com/search?searchAuthor=Mark+R.+Hunter&ref_pageloadid=4C1TS2KZGoOjloaJ&pf

Remember: If you’re not traveling, you should be reading.

One Video Proves the Stupidity of Mankind

Okay, so, for this week's photo post I have only one video. I felt guilty at first, but at least the video will grab attention.

Here's the YouTube link, in case it doesn't show up here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKZBV40hryw

Emily took it off our dash cam. You might remember that camera got a really good view of the terror-inducing moment when our car caused a deer to go from 0 to 60 in one second. The deer lived, although it took a few years off of my life.

I cut this video down to 20 seconds, using an editing program (the kids apparently call them apps) that I learned to use in less than five hours, which is a record. In the video Emily is driving east on SR 8, in the area (I think) of around C.R. 700 East. That big bright thing is, yes, the sun.

Now, you'll notice her pass a construction ahead sign. Then a car traveling in front of her activates its left turn signal, on a hill, in an area that is not only no passing, but double yellow--no passing either way. (It was probably the driver who activated the turn signal, but these days who knows?)

There's a pickup truck behind Emily, being driven by a guy who, from this point forward, will be known as the Stupidest Human On the Planet, or SHOP. This is in no way meant to imply that they're stupid while shopping. They may be very good at price comparing, when their truck is sitting still and the little hamster wheel inside their head is allowed to cool down.

Maybe it was a politician.

It could be that Emily's slowing down because of the car turning in front of her got our SHOP pickup driver all butt-hurt about how he wouldn't be able to set a record for the most fuel consumption in a drive to Wal-Mart. I don't know. But the guy (let's face it, and assume it's a guy) felt very strongly that slowing down would interfere with his constitutional rights.

So he passed Emily. On a hill. On a double yellow line.

Then, as you might expect, the person who was turning left turned left. Just as the SHOP passed them.

If I hadn't watched Emily download the video, and reviewed it multiple times myself, I'd think it was AI. I have never in my life seen two objects actually pass through each other without touching. It was that close. Sure, theoretical physicists say it could happen, but in real life you don't expect a turning car and a moron in a pickup truck to actually pass through each other.

"If I can figure this one out, I'm a shoo-in for another Nobel Prize."

I actually called work to find out if they'd received any 911 calls at the time about a hit and run accident, since the truck kept going and the car went on down the side road. No, they hadn't. We had witnessed a moment that proves, beyond doubt, that angels watch over stupid people.

I feel for our left-turning person, who probably had to wipe a big brown stain from their driver's seat. I don't feel for the pickup driver's imbecilic nitwit twit, who probably just laughed, popped open another beer, and took that as proof that all traffic laws are just suggestions.

I do not want the SHOP pinhead to find out the hard way--too much chance that he'll hurt other people. Would a couple of expensive traffic tickets slow them down? Probably not.

We can only hope that if he does get into a crash, it's with another SHOP.

Don't forget, the e-book of Coming Attractions is still free over on Smashwords! Here's the link:

https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/ozma914

You can also find adventures in our books: