ONTARIO PROVINCIAL PARKS

The welcome we received at Ontario Provincial Parks was always warm. The young people that run the registration are competent, cheerful and well-informed about their park. They whiz through computer chores that baffle oldsters, sell firewood and ice, mark your availible sites, answer questions about the wildlife and history and SMILE.
Ontario builds their parks for camping, so the emphasis is on shaded sites for a family to set up one of those palatial-sized tents and maybe a dining fly/bugscreen. There are few sites dedicated to the mullti-slide satellite equipped set. This being Summer, there are lots and lots of bikes, kids, dogs, cartop boats, floaties and harried parents that don't have too much time to chat. We are good with all that.
We arrived at Neys PP in grey, drizzly weather and landed a site right on the shore. Al had somehow gotten the idea that a pebble beach was awaiting, but it was the usual narrow Great Lakes beach with lots of telephone pole shaped driftwood that should not be burned because of it's picturesque qualities. Did I say it was grey and miserable? I think that "colored" our perception some. We hiked some and looked over the little model of the POW camp once situated here. (You know, they didn't site those POW camps in the primo scenic areas, Eh?) We did (nearly) fondle a full body mount of a young Woodland Caribou (shot by accident by a Moose hunter with eyesight issues). That perked us up, but we learned that the Caribou were on a island and your own private vessel was required. In the immortal words of our hero, Meriwether Lewis, We Proceeded on...

Lake Superior PP was on our list and the highway views as we passed along the length of this Huge park were spectacular. We should have stopped lakeside at Rabbit Blanket campground and explored the pictographs and hiking, but we found ourselves in a long line at the beach campground competing for one of the last available sites in this closely packed enclave. The overworked clerk warned us that a trailer like ours couldn't get in that site last night. Goaded by other onlookers, we gave it a try and nearly sacrificed a mirror to roadside trees. We proceeded on to ...

Pancake Bay PP where we found yet another beach park and an equally skilled young clerk who fixed us up with a one night, stay-hitched, pull-through site, but failed to warn us about the infernal swamp of a dump... We proceeded on, but this time Patty took the reins and next day we turned off the main drag of Massey ON, went just a few blocks and came upon...
Chutes PP which had yet another charmer in the office, huge shaded sites and scenery like this...

Chutes was named for the log flumes built around the falls to drive logs to the Spanish River and then on to Superior. The park is off the Around Lake Superior Greatest Hits list just far enough to make the perfect stop. We did laundry, ate a wonderful meal, hiked all the trails and still had time to visit the Massey Public Library (open tonight 7-9PM) and post a few blogs. We love this park. A nearby sister park has lots of lakes to paddle, more hiking and canoes for rent. Plenty to do.
The roads in western Ontario (just over the border) were superb -- the smooth pavement, occasional big views and thoughtfully placed passing lanes. As we wandered East, they deteriorated measurably until, on this leg, we covered 20KM of dirt and detours. (big road project, not nearly ready for new surface yet). Motels and outposts at roadside looked bleak, like we were crossing the Yukon soon. Our goal this last day was Champaign PP. The amiable young clerk met us outside the door in welcome, but we wanted to see the sites first; we had endured the frost-heaved and broken approach road. The sites were horrible. No attempt to level anything. There were tent sites where you would have to be "on belay" to sleep in your tent.
The bridge to the campsite was interesting,

but we proceeded on without stopping.




Driftwood PP was laid out with the same disregard. Details would sound like whining, but would you really like to be camped next to the site with four tents, three flies, two boat trailers and about 19 people plus dogs? We took a murky pull through, didn't drive the entire road network to the shower or take the "path through the woods" which would pretty well undo any effects of the shower. We used the marginal power to plan our run for the border.

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GRAND PORTAGE NATIONAL MONUMENT

During what Good Sam's calls our "disablement", we were fortunate to be close by a truly great National Monument. We spent portions of two days walking the grounds of the reconstructed North West Company summer Headquarters and soaking in the exhibits. The modern Heritage Center tells the story of the Ojibwe people, their history, and the essential skills they shared with the traders of the Scottish-owned North West Company and which made them the most profitable enterprise in the world for the years a Beaver felt Top Hat was the fashion. The emphasis is on the respectful nature of the partnership between the two cultures and the canoe-building, forest navigation and established trade routes of the Objibwe.

This is the Great Hall where the richest men in the world ate and entertained at "corporate headquarters" in the wilds.

Wild rice and maple sugar, two Objibwe trade goods in addition to pelts.

 

Alexander Mackenzie's luxurious quarters, quite a change from living on snowshoes all winter just a few years before.

 

 

The Park Service interpreters were incredible. This young man quietly carved a lacrosse stick while spinning yarns and answering questions about the period. We could have listened all day. Over this weekend ( second weekend in August) three hundred reenactors will join them for the combination Rendezvous and Pow Wow of the Grand Portage Band. This is an event for the Bucket List.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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WHAT COULD HAPPEN?

What if you were entering Terra Incognita, say along the North Shore of Lake Superior where No kind of Verizon cellular service reaches you from the US and the only signal from nearby Canada informs you that the costs will be prohibitive once you get in range. Say, for the first time in your traveling life, you have back-to-back reservations at Ontario's finest Provincial Parks for the next 18 days. The weather is clear, traffic is light, your documents are in order and you are carrying no illegal food stuffs which might endanger the lives and agriculture of our friendly neighbors to the North.

Why look! A national Monument AND a gas station with attractive prices, just before the border. How Fortuitous, he exclaimed. AND, it is large and commodious, easy to manuever in and spotlessly clean...part of the Grand Portage Casino complex...

What, you ask, Could go wrong?

Well, your right front trailer axle hub could crack, your wheel going a tad asymmetrical, loud screeching of complaning metal and cries of horror from bystanders. That might happen just as you pull away from the pumps...

We stopped, blocking horrified convenience store customers in their parking places, ASSESSED, and pulled away to the parking apron to yet more shrieking from metal and spectators.

We took advice from all assembled. Letting the air out of the tire and pulling up on levelers helped free the tire with no further damage, but the carnage was impressive. Clearly, this JUST happened. The grease wasn't burned or even hot. The guts of the brake assembly were a tangled mess, but the lugs were tight. The fracture to the bearing cup was new and clean. No sign of careless maintenance. The tire temperature sensor had not even peeped. We were lucky this happened as it did: Happening WHERE it did, Not so lucky.

POOR THREE WHEELED TRAILER IN A FIELD OF WILDFLOWERS

 

Well, one bit of Luck. Part of the Casino complex is a pleasant campground and site #1 was the easiest to access and empty. This I learned from Richard, who as I was told, would know what to do if anybody did.

 

It was Sunday. It was Festival day in Grand Marias, forty plus miles back and, if we left right away, we could arrive during the Parade which would assure that no one would be at their place. Halfway back we MIGHT get cellular service to try our Roadside Assistance folks at Good Sams, but we thought it would be prudent to depend on ourselves to find someone capable of fixing this. Then, if necessary, risk the towing.

AND NOW, THE REST OF THE STORY...

The people of Grand Marais and Grand Portage are warm, generous and neighborly folks. We learned this through the week, long before the recent mechanical unplesantness. They know and like their neighbors and LOVE their home on the North Shore.

When we drove back into Grand Marais, on Sunday --during the big Fisherman's Picnic Parade -- with our fractured hub, the staff at the Municipal Campground could not have been more helpful. They went through mental inventories of who might be helpful, referring to folks by first names, waving off the place Good Sams was planning to drop our trailer using a towing company no one thought capable. They fixed on Greg Olsen and called him. We later learned that Greg was pulling a float in the parade at that moment with dad's tractor. But right after the parade he appeared on his motor scooter.

Yeah, this is the kind of job I usually get...only Bigger and by the side of the road.

He talked us through the problem which was mostly about Nobody keeps those parts in the county. But he would do his best to get us rolling again. The brake parts were questionable but...

We took a day off to visit the really terrific Grand Portage National Monument and Heritage Center interupted only by a run to the ER (but that's another couple of stories).

Next day, Greg announced that ALL the parts would arrive and he would have us running by sundown. And he did, with grace and skill and a number of pretty good stories of his own.

 

 

 

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SLEEPING GIANT PROVINCIAL PARK

 

We have about decided that the foul-smelling 3AM visitor to our campsite is a randy Fox, not a Sasquatch. There's a plentiful supply of Fox around Sleeping Giant Provincial Park; 30% of last year's photo contest winners were cute fluffy Fox pictures. Flipping on the noisy water pump sends "Stinky" on his way; in our experience, this doesn't work with a Sasquatch ...

Arrived Wenesday at Sleeping Giant after a day of mild anxiety.

• Until noon we were awaiting lab reports (negative, all good).
• Our border crossing was pleasant. (We should have kept those eggs.)
• We were suffering wheel bearing neurosis, but when we pulled into Woody's RV in Thunder Bay at mid-afternoon, they "double teamed" the Airstream and we had new bearings with synthetic grease all around and a new brake assembly on the left rear before we returned from egg shopping. Like with a newly washed car, we imagined the AS pulling more smoothly; even did a couple hard-braking stops to our complete satisfaction.
  
• Now it was 4:30, Sleeping Giant PP was on the itinerary we scrapped during the three day "disablement". We wondered if we could still fit in a visit, but with no Internets, and multiple miles/kilometers down to the tip of the long peninsula before we would know, we were still holding on to our anxieties. The two Ranger Laurens found us a spot.

Lucky, it's August Long (??) and festival weekend at the park.

Oh, we are all about Lucky today!

And speaking of blind luck, we weren't five miles along Canada's superb roads when a full grown Black Bear loped across the four-lane divided. We were the only vehicle in sight (Oh, Canada) and Patty swears he looked both ways before bolting.

The campground at Mary Louise Lake has 200 sites of all kinds. There are premium sites overlooking the lake (a couple of knowledgeable Airstreamers there), most sites with trees and privacy, many with acreage. Tidy vault toilets with running water spaced around, one central shower house/laundry with individual unisex showers which never seem to be oversubscribed, a well-run family place with lots of kids, bikes, tents and an absolute minimum of mega-motorhomes.

They are deadly serious about bear proofing here. No smelly dumpsters here. All the refuse is hauled out of the park, promptly (a 35 km run to the park boundary). Campers can deposit their recycling at multiple locations but bagged garbage in the One collection point well away from campsites. It is a cement block FORTRESS with a thick Sasquatch-proof, latched chute.

 

The Visitor Center is small, but the exhibits are first class, including details on tiny Silver Islet. This tiny rock just offshore was once the richest silver mine in the world! Now the silver and the miners are gone and Lake Superior storms have reclaimed it.

Hiking is what you do here. For this short walk near the CG, the park provides this detailed FULL COLOR guide to the plant life along the way. WOW! ....and a gentle suggestion that you might want to leave yours for the next hiker.

 

 

Textures along the trail:

 

 

CLUB MOSS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WHITE CEDAR BARK

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That's the Sleeping Giant formation in the background. In the foreground, Stooping Woman, position #1 in rock skipping.

 

 

Again with Stooping Woman trying to document the "Descend Steeply" in the Trail description.

 

We have seen a lot of crashing cascades along the North Shore but beautiful Sibley Creek is a charmer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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BOUNDARY WATERS DREAM

Yesterday's trip up the Gunflint Trail got me as close to the Boundary Waters as I've ever been. The pencil sketch ads for the Gunflint Lodge ran in Field and Stream, Outdoor Life, Sports Afield -- the adventure porn of my youth. Drop a postcard to the Chamber at Ely and your mailbox would be filled with the most glorious colored brochures from outfitters providing canoe adventures in the Quetico-Superior Boundary Waters. Long hours of study....

But I, then WE, then The four of Us never made the trip...

Watching young families, and seasoned veterans launching and recovering at the edge of the BW yesterday rekindled the Dream. Surely we were too old and stiff and soft to even think about such a trip at our ages... but I guess we could read a few webpages...

There we found that Sawbill Outfitters at the end of the Sawbill Trail offered a half day sampler: three lakes of dramatically different character, three short portages, a little stream, 4-6 hours of "lesiurely" paddling IN A SUPER SEXY 42# KEVLAR TOURING CANOE....

We talked about it over breakfast, packed 25# of totally unnecessary supplies and headed out into the sunshine. The Dream Lives....

The folks at Sawbill Outfitters are pleasant and efficient. Al learned to shoulder the featherlight Kevlar canoe with its custom carrying yoke; Patty schlepped paddles, vests, the 25# of unnecessaries and a smile to the launch which was mercifully downhill on a graded path. There the Dream met reality. It was windy.

 

A West wind on three North-South lakes..? The featherlight Kevlar threatened to windmill around Al's head. Kids, and couples and whole families far less experienced than we were heading out with coolers and fishing rods, gripping poorly sized paddles inexpertly and weaving about.

We launched, Patty adjusting herself into the excruciatingly narrow bow of the Super Sleek Kevlar while Al found that Super Sleek Kevlar touring boats have seats about 4" off the deck forcing aged legs accustomed to upright seating to extend painfully in a position reminiscent of Physical Therapy.

 

 

J

Some relief from the swirling, gusty wind could be found in the wind shadow of the lee shore, but some bays were just full on "whitecappy."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The portages were the novelty to us as downriver canoeists. We were a mixed bag of experienced folks returning from multi-day adventures and those of us on the "four hour tour." Things slowed down a little, but that was good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Al LOVED THE PORTAGES. The whisper lite $3000 Kevlar, the evergreens brushing the canoe and not him, AND his legs could flex somewhat naturally.

 

Patty schlepped along good-naturedly EXCEPT when Al reprised his "it's always the bowperson's fault" refrain ... I believe a swim was suggested...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Young couple, two kids under seven, 5 days ...AH, YOUTH!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes, she looks happy here, but I'm pretty sure the voyageur dream is dead. I know my legs are.

 

 

 

 

 

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THE GUNFLINT TRAIL

When I turned North on the fabled Gunflint Trail, I had no destination, but one overweening GOAL. Sure I wanted to drive the road that opened the Minnesota "Arrowhead" and took dead aim at the legendary Boundary Waters. I wanted to learn its history, smell the evergreen-scented air and see how the scars of the big Ham Lake Fire in 2007 were healing. But my GOAL was to use my meager, amatuerish photographic skills and pure dumb luck to shoot a MOOSE -- a Moose in the sunlight, not a dusky shadow, a Moose in a really wild place, not the drainage from the local highway salt stores, a moose doing moosey stuff, not cornered by an encroaching mob at roadside. It would be wonderful if this Moose had a rack as wide as a King Size Bed, but let's not get greedy. To be honest, the picture was less important than counting coup on my good friend Dave, a truly gifted photographer, who is, as we speak, piloting his Airstream over countless MOOSELESS miles in the wilds of Canada seeking the image which will complete his portfolio of North American Chauvinistic Megafauna.

Dave, this Moose is for you...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WISH YOU WERE HERE, MY FRIEND.

YOU KNOW THE IMAGES WOULD BE BETTER.

 

 

 

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