August 11, 2017
We did not allow enough time, by far, to explore this beautiful area. The North Shore Scenic Drive itself is almost 150 miles long, and there are scenic drives that lead from it, towns and villages to explores, and state parks to hike. We spent about eight hours getting a taste for the area.
Two Harbors
Wharves for loading iron ore
Silver Creek Cliff
Split Rock Lighthouse
Silver Bay
We were curious about the large manufacturing facility pictured above. We lucked upon an overlook with excellent explanations. This plant, now owned by Northshore Mining, was built in 1955 and was the first taconite producing facility in North America. Taconite is low-grade iron ore. This plant processes it so it is usable in steel-making and ships about six million tons a year. The ore is blasted from a mine 47 miles away, crushed and loaded into train cars using shovels that pick up 65 tons in a scoop and house-sized trucks that haul 240 tons. At the plant, railroad cars are turned upside down and the ore is reduced from about 4″ rocks to the consistency of face powder. The iron is separated using water, magnetic separation and flotation. About 3 tons of crude produce 1 ton of final product. In this way, iron content is increased from 25% to 65%. The powder is mixed with bentonite [remember bentonite? We saw it as one of the layers in the Badlands at Theodore Roosevelt National Park.], formed into 1/2 inch balls, fired, cooled and shipped.
Cross River Falls
Good Harbor Bay
The basalt over sedimentary siltstone, sandstone and shale in the picture below dates to the last period of volcanic activity in Minnesota, about a billion years ago.
Susie Islands
Grand Portage
Grand Portage (gichi-onigamiing, the great carrying place) was used as long as 2000 years ago by North American natives to travel from Lake Winnipeg to Lake Superior. French fur traders later used the portage to get their products to the Atlantic. The British North West Company had its headquarters here. Today Grand Portage National Monument is jointly administered by the National Parks Service and the Ojibwe tribe.
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