Junior Bear Rates Some of the Beaches of Lake Superior

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1.  Agawa Beach, Ontario.

Located in Lake Superior Provincial Park, right off Highway 17.  Nice long sandy/pebbly beach.  Not too crowded, even in peak season.

If you go there after Labor day it’s pretty much empty.

The water is cold early in the season, but it’s shallow and warms up nicely.   Towards the end of August, I find it’s  one of the nicest swimming beaches on the lake.

Junior Bear’s Rating:  9 out of 10

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2.   Gargantua Beach, Ontario. 

To get here, you have to exit Highway 17 and drive on a gravel road for 15 km through the bush.

This is one of my favorite quiet areas, away from the crowds.  It gives you a good sense of remote wilderness.   Even in peak season, you might be lucky to see a couple of other hikers or kayakers here, and that’s it.

The beach is very rocky with big round pebbles, and not really good for swimming, though.   The water is deep and cold.  It almost looks too dangerous to go into the water here.

Junior Bear’s Rating:   7.5  out of 10  (due to lack of swimmability)

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3.  Old Womans’ Bay, Ontario.

Nice little cove, with sheer cliffs and sandy beach, just south of Wawa.   Sea kayakers enjoy this area.

I always stop here because it’s right off the highway and it’s a quick photo op.    The water is deep and cold, though.   I once dunked my head here in May, but I don’t usually swim here.

Junior Bear’s Rating:   7 out of 10 (due to poor swimmability and close proximity to the highway).

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4.   Sandy Beach, Ontario.

Located a few km off Highway 17,  just outside of Michipicoten.

This is one of my favorite beaches.   It’s sandy and quiet.   Even on a summer long weekend, you can have the place almost all to yourself.   It’s a great place to come in the evening and relax and just listen to the lake.  This is where I get my “Zen Like” moments.

This is a special part of Lake Superior.   Just west of this beach is a long tract of roadless wilderness.  For about ~ 150 km there’s nothing but pristine shoreline with no towns or cottages or road access.  It happens to be the  longest undeveloped freshwater shoreline in the world.   This is what’s so special about Superior, compared to the other crowded Great Lakes further south.

The water is cold and gets deep quickly.  I don’t bother swimming in June or July, but towards the end of August you can probably brave the water.

Junior Bear’s Rating:  10 out of 10

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5. Pebble Beach, Ontario. 

This beach is found just outside of Marathon, Ontario, which is a pulp and paper town on the  north shore.

This is definitely NOT a swimming beach.   It’s strewn with football-sized pebbles and piled high with driftwood logs.

You can hardly walk on the beach without risking a sprained ankle.  The water is very cold, and  gets deep very quickly.   Again, this looks like it would be a dangerous place to swim.

But there’s a certain charm to this area.   It’s wild and untamed.  Outside the town, the shoreline is pretty remote, with no cottages or road access,  just big tracts of wilderness on all sides.  It’s one of those beaches that’s good for sitting and just contemplating the lake.

I love the polished round granite pebbles.    I once photographed some rocks and turned it into my all-time favorite painting.

Junior Bear’s Rating:  8 out of 10

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6, Neys Provincial Park, Ontario. 

Located just west of Marathon, there are two parts to this beach.    The first part  is shallow and warm, next to all the campsites  If the water is calm, it’s clear as champagne and very nice to swim in.    However, if the wind picks up,  the water quickly gets muddy and turns brown.

Here’s a photo of the beach on one of the rare calm days.

The best part of the shoreline can be found if you hike a kilometer east.    The sandy beach disappears and the shoreline transforms into solid bedrock, polished smooth by water, wind and glaciers.

This is one of my favorite parts of Lake Superior.   Rugged, untamed, and wild.    This is the North Shore at its finest.

I can (and have) sat here for hours watching the waves, which can get spectacular on a windy day.

Junior Bear’s Rating:  10 out of 10

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7.  Grand Marais, Minnesota.

I’m sad to say, I found Minnesota had the least impressive shoreline.   It was average/mediocre.   No islands or rugged shorelines or long stretches of sand.

Furthermore,  Highway 61 pretty much hugs most of the coast, so there is very little shoreline that’s more than 100 feet from noisy traffic.   And most of the shoreline is privately owned.  There is little public access. except for the occasional State park, boat launch or picnic area.   But these are few and far between.

One exception is Grand Marais, which is one of the nicer areas.  It’ s a quaint town with a  big marina and a harbor, though it’s also somewhat touristy.

There is no swimming beach to speak off.   Just a lot of rocks.

The water, however, is amazingly crystal clear, and very deep.   In theory, you can jump in if you wish.

I did, years ago, in June.  All I remember was opening my eyes underwater  and seeing green-blue, and thinking it was like being in a furnace.   The water was so cold, it felt like my skin was burning.

Junior Bear’s Rating:   6 out of 10  (because it’s not really a beach).

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8.  Nameless Beach, Minnesota.

In my quest to find a decent Minnesota Beach,  I kept stopping at the all the rest stops to see if I could find anything.

Here’s a typical one  just outside the city of Duluth, which you can see in the background.     This was right off the old Highway 61.

What a dud.     There was almost no shoreline between the paved road and the water.  Nothing but brown rocks with bits of twigs and wood and debris all over the place.

Furthermore, it was a windy day so the water was stirred up to a silty, dirty chocolate-milk brown.   Nothing you’d want to go swimming in, unless you wanted your shorts to fill up with dirt and junk.

Junior Bear’s Rating:    Pretty sad.  2 out of 10. (And it’s only getting a 2 because it’s Lake Superior)

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9. Cornucopia Beach, Wisconsin. 

Located on the Wisconsin Coast between Duluth and the Apostle Islands.

Again, this was an unimpressive beach.    Nothing but a tiny strip of sand between the sand dunes and the water, where people were jam-packed.   And once again, the wind had stirred up the water to a chocolate-milk brown.    Nobody was actually swimming.

Maybe I’m being too harsh.   Perhaps I saw the beach on a bad day, when the water was unusually high and stirred up.

Either way,  based on what we’ve seen, Junior Bear rates this a 5 out of 10.

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10.  Eagle River, Michigan.

This beach is located on the western part of the Keewenaw Peninsula,  which juts out ~60 miles right into the middle of the lake.

This beach was a delightful surprise, after the disappointment of Minnesota and Wisconsin.

It’s a nice white sandy shore,  with clear blue water, that goes on for miles and MILES.

Granted, I was there on a weekday, but it was July 3rd, and I’d figured it would have been crowed for the American Holiday.

But there was hardly a soul there.

I didnt’ swim because the water was quit choppy, but I walked along forever, and the beach it just kept going and GOING.

Yes, there were houses along the shore, but they were mostly tucked in among the trees, and there’s plenty of access to the water.

Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is out of the way for most people, so isn’t very developed.

This is probably one of the few beaches where you can see deer tracks in the sand.

It’s comforting to know there are areas in the Lower 48 that are still unspoiled like this.

Junior Bear’s Rating:  10 out of 10.

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11. Bete Grise, Michigan

Located on the opposite (eastern)  side of the Keewenaw Peninsula, just south of Copper Harbor.

Beautiful sand.   Shallow pristine water. When I arrived, I was surprised to see it so uncrowded, especially just before the July 4 holiday.

I was expecting this would be a perfect ten.

But it was NOT.

In fact, is the the WORST BEACH EVER.

The setting and water temperature were fine.    The main problem, however, was the SAND FLIES.

The #$%*ing  little bastards were EVERYWHERE.

Within seconds of coming out of the water, they’d swarm all over your ankles and legs, by the dozens, and start biting.

It was enough to literally make you run to the car screaming, even before drying off.

What a horror show. That’s  probably why there were not people here.

Junior Bear’s Rating:   ZERO out of 10.

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12.  Miners Beach, Michigan

Located within the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, this is one of the top 5 most beautiful areas I’ve seen on Superior.

It was a stinking hot day and the water felt so good to jump into.     I stayed in as long as I wanted  without getting cold, though my American fellow beach-goers were somewhat less enthusiastic about jumping in.

I found the water had a nice turquoise color to it, that I hadn’t seen in any other parts of the lake.  It almost looked Caribbean.

As an added bonus, there was Miners Castle, an interesting rock formation just down the road.

The entire coast in this area is spectacular.    I guess this is why they made it a protected National Seashore.  I definitely want to come back and explore this area some more.

Junior Bear’s Rating:    Sweet.  10 out of 10

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My Latest Northern Ontario Back-Roads Adventure With The Bear

This is downtown Espanola, a mill town located just west of Sudbury, near the north shore of Lake Huron.  This town is the gateway to Manitoulin Island.

It’s other claim to fame is the paper will, which apparently spilled a bunch of toxins in the Spanish River back in the 80s and killed off tons of fish.  People still talk about it.

See this lake?  It’s pretty big…you almost can’t see the other side.

This is Lake Manitou, which is located on Manitoulin Island,  which itself is located in Lake Huron.

Which makes this lake the worlds largest freshwater lake, within a freshwater lake.

Which I think is pretty cool.

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Here’s Lake Huron itself, on Providence Bay on Manitoulin Island.     It was stinking hot…and the water was swimmable.  Just barely.

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This is Downtown Thessalon, on a Saturday night.

It just doesn’t get any better than this.

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Here’s Wawa (two hours North of the Soo).  I’ve blogged about it before.   This is an aerial view from the bush plane that returned me back from my fishing trip.

Just outside of Wawa is this old ski hill.

It boggles my mind…no matter how remote, or how small a town is…you can always find some kind of ski hill of some sort. Seems this was the thing to do in the 60’s and 70’s.

But now, as course, as you can see from the trees, it’s long since been abandoned.   A sign of prosperous times long since past.

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Next, is the town of Dubreuville.   This is your proverbial company town,  named after the lumber company which founded it. It’s on the end of a 30-km dead-end road,  Northeast of Lake Superior.

I wasn’t really excited about being here.   I just went to say I’d been.  Another place to tick off on the map.

I must admit, I’m a bit biased against the town.  They’re located south of the fishing lodge I like to go to, which is in a protected wilderness area.     But the Dubreuvillers apparently want to change that, and gain access to the lake with ATV trails and such.  They’ve been feuding with the lodges and the provincial government for years.

I have no sympathy for Dubreuville.   There are hundreds of miles of trails, and hundreds of other lakes in the area.  If they’ve already spoiled those areas with over-hunting and over-fishing, that’s their problem.    Don’t ruin the few remaining unspoiled areas.  Leave them alone,  I say.

Anyway, the town isn’t doing that great.  The only industry is the sawmill, which recently shut down because of lack of a lumber supply.

  You can already see the signs of decay (empty apartments, etc.).   This might become another ghost town, if things don’t pick up.

 

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I’ve also blogged about White River before, which  is the birthplace of Winnie the Pooh.    Junior Bear and I always stop and pay our respects at the Pooh statue.

White River is basically a railway town in the bush Northeast of Superior.   And it, too, has seen better days.

I wonder what it was like when this hotel was still running, or the S_andoni Bros. department store was still open?

Though I hear the town is starting to take off again.   They just got a contract for some air service to some fishing lodges, which means more people will be staying in the hotels there.  Tourism in the area is starting to grow.   I wish them well.

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Here’s the Michipicoten First Nation village, on the Northeast shore of Lake Superior, just outside of Wawa.

I like the bilingual signs…there were a whole bunch of the on the road, welcoming tourists.   It felt friendly.

At the end of the the village, there is a picnic/camping area right by Superior.   The signs indicate this as a “sacred place”.

Given the wilderness setting and the beauty of the place, I have to agree.

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Highway 101 crosses the Northeastern part of Ontario.

This is typical, when driving through Northern Ontario.    All you see are …trees, trees, trees….

And more trees…trees…trees.

(Just be careful not to hit a moose along the way!)

And then every hundred kilometers of so, you come across a town, like Foleyet (pop. ~ 200).

 The is another railway town, in the middle of the bush.

Downtown Foleyet, on Labour Day Monday:

(Not exactly a prime cottage country/tourist area).

 I wonder how long ago this burger/fries restaurant was open?

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After hours of  driving through the bush,  I finally hit my first “Big City”:   the town of Timmins (pop. 43,000).

It was a novelty to see a “real city”, with multiple traffic lights, a water tower, and “high-rise” buildings greater than four storeys.

Timmins’ claim to fame (aside from being the birthplace of Shania Twain) is it’s gold mining, which is still on-going.

You can also see old derelicts too… This is a boom-and-bust town.

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Heading home, I always like to stop at the Arctic Watershed:  the point at which the water drains into either the Great Lakes, or Hudson’s Bay.

Point of trivia:  the Arctic Watershed lies mostly in Canada, but it also includes parts of the States (mainly Northern Minnesota and North Dakota).

Aside from being of geological interest, the watershed has had historic significance, in delineating boundaries for the fur-trading industry…

I always feel sad heading south of the watershead, because it means I’m leaving the “North” and my vacation is ending and soon I’ll be home.

Even though home is still hundreds of km away and I won’t be getting in till midnight!…

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Driving Around The Big Lake

I’ve driven around Lake Superior before, but I haven’t seen the South Shore very much.  Only in bits and pieces, and often at night.

This year I decided to finally take the time and drive and see the whole thing.  And in daylight.
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Approaching from  the East, here’s the North Shore of Lake Huron, at Blind River.

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Here’s a glimpse of shoreline in Lake Superior Provincial Park, just North of the Soo.

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These are Indian pictographs at Agawa Rocks.  They’re hundreds of years old, if not a thousand.

Those are the only two pictographs I managed to see because they’re located at the base of a slippery cliff, right at the waters’ edge.  You have to hold onto chains so you don’t fall in, and it was a bit treacherous that day.

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Further along in the park is Gargantua Beach.   It’s 15 km from the highway, via a twisting gravel road through the bush.

There are no cottages or campgrounds here.   I had the whole place to myself and experience my “Moment of Zen”.

Superior’s shorelines in Ontario are often unspoiled like this.  That’s why I keep coming back.

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One of my favorite beaches is Sandy Beach, just outside of Wawa.   Again, I had the entire place to myself.   Even on labor day weekend, you might only see a dozen or so people here.

It was too cold to swim at this date in late June.   Though the water temp becomes reasonable at the end of August.

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Next, is the Bear having a pensive moment at Neys Provincial Park, near the town of Marathon.

 In the 1940’s, this place was so remote, they used it as a German POW camp in WWII.

I imagine that camp would have been pretty escape-proof camp, back then.   With only one train to get in and out, and surrounded by hundreds of miles of bush and black flies.

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In the 700 km trek between Sault-Ste. Marie and Thunder Bay, there are about 7 towns/villages of any significance, totalling about 12,000 people.

 Schreiber is one of them, with a population of 900.  It’s basically a railway town.

Notice the scrubby black spruce trees everywhere.  That’s because this is the boreal forest.

It has a very northern feel:  you dont’ see any pine trees or maples.   The only hardwoods are birch and popular.

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Just a bit further down the road is Rossport.  This is more of a village, without even a grocery store or gas station.   It appears to have a small artist colony of some sort.

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I took a side-trip and went North of Superior to the town of Beardmore.   Apparently its claim to fame is a giant 40-foot snowman.

Notice the Bear in the “BEAR” part.

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Of course  I had to take the detour to see Lake Nipigon, for the first time.

This is a pretty serious lake.  About 60 km x 100 km, it’s almost like Great Lake itself.

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Lunch was a cardiac burger at the Nipigon Drive-In.    It was awesome.

 Too bad it’s a 2-day drive from where I live.  Otherwise I’d eat there more often.

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Here’s downtown Nipigon itself, population 1,700.

I notice every town in Northern Ontario has an old hotel which is always shut down.    Apparently a relic from the older railway days, before mom-and-pop motels took over.   Seems downtown hotels just don’t do well anymore in the north.

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Here’s a scene just outside Thunder Bay.  It was rush-hour and there was traffic.  I wasn’t in the mood to go see the town itself.

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Crossing into Minnesota:  I always like road signs shaped like the place they’re in.

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I found the shoreline in Minnesota disappointing, though.   Sure, it’s a beautiful lake.  But public parks and beaches were few and far between.  Most of the waterfront was taken up by either private property or by Highway 61.

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Here’s Duluth, taken from my car.  As it was a big city, I was in no mood to stop and kept on driving.   This was the furthest point West of my trip.

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At least we got back to sandy beaches and trees in Wisconsin, near the Apostle Island National Lakeshore.   It was quite scenic, but somewhat busy,with sailboats and lots of marinas.

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There wasn’t a decent state sign to take a photo of the Bear with in Wisconsin, but at least I got one of him entering Michigan.

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The first thing I noticed with the Upper Peninsula was the population density.   Here’s the town of Ironwood, population ~ 6000.    Seems there was one town after another, like this, every 10-20 km.

 The U.P. is said to be empty, but I found this part of Lake Superior surprisingly crowded, compared to the Canadian side.

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Two things fascinate me on my road trips:    One is photos of large things.   Another is finding ski hills in the middle of nowhere.

Here, near the town of Wakefield, I found BOTH.

It amazes me that someone went through a lot of trouble to build this.   Look at the craftsmanship that went into the skier.   A sculpture for the ages, this will be.

The ski hill itself was interesting.   You don’t see too many old metal double-chairlifts like these anymore.   They date back 30-40 years.

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I was pretty impressed with the Porcupine Mountains.    Here is nearly 60,000 acres of virgin forest, one of the largest remaining tracts of old-grown hardwood left in North America.

This place is large enough to have wolves and moose.   It’s nice to see the state of Michigan had the foresight to preserve this area.

I managed to get a swim in there, too.   The beach was rocky..but the water temperature was do-able.

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There is s definite southern feel to Superior along this part of the U.P, with the sandy beaches and hardwood trees.   The forest is totally different here.  Gone is the boreal forest from the North Shore, and its scraggly black spruce.  It’s amazing just  2-3 degrees of latitude can do.

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Next  on my agenda was to drive up the Keweenaw peninsula, which is a  ~100 km long strip of land that juts right out into the middle of the lake.

One of the first towns I came across was Houghton and Hancock, across the river.   These were surprisingly big towns, with a combined population of ~ 12,000.   This alone is more people than the entire population between Sault Ste. Marie and Thunder Bay on the north shore.

Point of trivia:   It’s less distance to drive from Detroit to Washington, DC, than it is to drive from Detroit to Houghton.  (This gives you a good idea of  how far off the beaten path the U.P. is!)

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At one time, copper mining was really huge in the Keweenaw peninsula.  But the industry peaked decades ago.    What remains are a lot of ghost-towns and abandoned mines, reminders of boom-years that have long since passed.

The economy is definitely not doing well here.   I came across one town after another, with closed-down stores and abandoned gas stations.  The town of Calumet seemed to be hanging on, though.

Everything was made of red brick, even the church, which you don’t see too often.

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Here’s the beach near Eagle Harbor.  This was on Saturday, July 9th.     Peak tourist season, and the place was absolutely deserted, which I kinda liked.  (Though I suspect hotel and restaurant owners didn’t!)   The locals assured me that business will pick up in August.

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Here’s as close as I go to the tip of the peninsula in Copper Harbor.    Of course, you had to pay money to enter the State Park to see the lighthouse up close, and I wasn’t going to do that.

It was actually downright COLD that day.   The local bookstore had the wood stove going.  This did NOT feel like July.

Heading south again, there was a nice beach at Bete Grise.  But again, too cold and damp to swim.

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And of course, there was a SKI HILL!  And a pretty decent sized one, too. (Boggles my mind the places where they build these things!)

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Okay…now this is just GAY.

It was strange to see a huge abandoned smoke stack still standing just outside of the town.  Probably from an old copper smelter.

It didn’t look perfectly vertical.  I reckon it’ll probably fall over one of these days.

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A few hours later, I hit the town of Marquette.  (Another major metropolis, by Norther Ontario standards!)   The weather went from cold and damp to stinking hot in only a couple of hours of driving.  Summer was back.

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The next day was a scorcher…hot and humid, and stagnant.    The lake was like glass.     So I put my canoe in it, and I paddled Superior for the first time.    This was at a beach along Picture Rocks National Lakeshore, another pristine area that is nicely preserved.

The water was so amazingly clear, you could see all kinds of rocks and fish, right to the bottom.

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Of course, I could have taken the main highway back to the Soo, but I did one last side-trip, and ended up on some logging road, east of Grand-Marais Michigan.  It was one of the few highways I found in Michigan that was unpaved.

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One last view of the Lake before heading back to the Soo, was at a picnic area off Highway 123,  next to Tahquemonon Falls State Park.

There was a sand-bar and you could wade out hundreds of meters, and only go up to your knees.  The water was incredibly warm..the warmest I’d ever seen the lake.

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Finally, I was back at the Soo, crossing over to the Canadian side.

I considered that end of my road-trip.

Home was still hundreds of km away.

But as far as I was concerned, the best part was already over.

Another Northern Ontario Adventure with the Bear (Part I).

On my annual trek to the fishing lodge, I ended up spending the night in Blind River.   Here’s the Bear the next morning, on the north shore of Lake Huron.

Later that day, we were at the Soo locks.  This was July 1st, on Canada Day.

If you look closely at the bridge, you can see the bumper-t0-bumper traffic, from everyone wanting to cross the border to the Michigan side.

(If you ask me….what a crappy way to spend a holiday!)   I was so glad to be heading the other way!

We followed the Trans-Canada Highway on the way to Wawa, and stopped at Katherine’s Cove in Lake Superior Provincial Park.

It’s rare to see the lake this calm.    The water looked quite inviting, but I only managed to dunk my head for about 5 seconds.

After all, it’s still early in the season and Superior is still @#%*&ing  COLD!!!

I love how pristine and clear the water is, though.   It makes you want to just gulp it down and drink it.  (Giardia risk be damned!)

What a difference up of how clean everything is up here, compared to fecal Lake Ontario down south.

We arrived in Wawa around supper time, in time for their “big” Canada Day Celebration.

The street was blocked off and at least 50 people were drinking by the beer tent!  (Woo Hoo!!)

I always find it bittersweet visiting Wawa, though, because it’s a town that’s slowly dying.

At its peak, there were 7700 people living here.    But the mine shut down a few years ago, and so did the board mill.

There just aren’t any jobs, and people are leaving.   Businesses are failing.

You see signs of it everywhere, and it gets worse every year.

It reminds me of Bruce Springstein’s lyrics from My Home Town.

“Foreman says these jobs are going boys and they ain’t coming back”.

It’s a shame, because it’s a nice little town.

The motel manager and the waitress chatted with me, and remembered me from last year.   I’ve apparently become accepted as  a “regular”

I mean, any town that has a Viking Restaurant (compleat with a Battle Axe and Helmet sign) can’t be all that bad!

(Next time I’ll have to eat there!)

But I decided to forego the Beer Tent, and visit the Sandy Beach at Michipicoten, on the northeastern shore of the lake.

It was sunset….9:40 PM this time of year.  I just sat there, and let Superior talk to me.   Like an old friend visiting.   I had the place almost to myself.

This photo is facing towards Michigan, which is over the horizon about 100 miles to the south.

That still boggles my mind:  the other side is 100 miles to the south.   And that’s not even the biggest part of the lake

(Damn!  This is one BIG body of water!)

I’ve written about this before:   there’s something incredibly calming and soothing about being in Superior’s presence.   It’s almost a spiritual experience.

I don’t know what it is.  The vastness…the unspoiledness….whatever it is, it just gets to you, and makes you keep wanting to come back.

(But those are enough “Deep Thoughts” for now…)

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The next morning was the bush-plane flight from Wawa Lake to the fishing lodge.

But that will be for PART II.

Feeling Superior

There’s something about Lake Superior that gets to me.   Especially the North Shore.

I don’t know what it is.  Superior doesn’t have any spectacular snow-capped peaks like the Rockies.  There aren’t any dramatic icefields or fjords like you find in Alaska.

Superior is just a big body of water, surrounded by lots of forest and rock.  Occasionally punctuated by a few towns trying to eke out a living out of the Canadian Shield.

Still, there’s something about the Lake that gets to me.

Part of it is the the sheer SIZE.  It’s not so much as a lake, but an inland sea, cutting a big chuck of the continent in two.  It takes a good 7-8 hours to drive from Sault. Ste. Marie to Thunder Bay (if you push it).

Imagine explaining this to someone from Australia:  a freshwater lake so big that it takes a good part of a DAY to drive past.

And the water is cold.  REALLY cold.    It could be late May, stinking hot and 80 degrees.  But as you drive around the Lake, you’ll get pockets of fog and suddenly feel the air cool like it came out of a giant refrigerator.

That’s Superior…reminding you of her presence.

(As for swimming…don’t even GO there!)

Another thing I like is the remoteness.   There are no huge cities and urban sprawl out here, like on the lower Great Lakes.  Even today, in the 21st century, Superiour still has huge tracts of roadless shoreline that you can’t get to except by boat.  If you can arrange to be dropped off, you can hike there for miles, and get a sense of how things looked like before Europeans arrived.

As for roads, the Trans-Canada Highway is still mostly single-lane.   In fact,  Lake Superior was one of the most difficult places to build the highway.  The connection between Wawa and Sault Ste. Marie didn’t get completed until 1960.

Just think, men were already starting to venture into space, but there were still sections in Northern Ontario that weren’t’ connected by road yet.

Superior is the unofficial dividing line between the crowded South and the still relatively unspoiled North.   When people talk about “North of Superior”, there’s a bit of reverence in their voice.

“North of Superior” evokes images of still-existing patches of virgin forest, loons swimming in pristine lakes and pinkish granite rock.  Not to mention fishing lodges only accessible by bush plane where you’re guaranteed to catch some whoppers.

Even the forests change as you around the lake.  The friendly maple trees and majestic white pine start to disappear, and give way to the haunting black spruce and scraggly birch trees of the Boreal Forest.    Reminding you that you’re a long way from home…and don’t get LOST in these woods, as the nearest help might be miles away.

Sometimes, Superior can be a darling.  At the right time of year, she’ll say “Come on in, the water’s fine“.

(And yes..in late summer, there ARE a few places where you can swim without hypothermia).

Some of the most refreshing swims you’ve ever had, that make you shiver, not with cold, but with sheer ecstasy as the blue-green water seeps into your armpits and between your toes.

And giardia be damned, sometimes you just want to stick your head under water and gulp in the cool, cool sweetness.

But on other days, Superior can be a bitch.   The sky will turn grey, the winds will pick up, and suddenly she’ll turn on you.

“Don’t MESS with me!“, she warns.

And you don’t.   Because she WILL mess with you, if you’re not careful.

Just ask the hundreds of boats that she’s shipwrecked.  Or unfortunate kayakers stranded on a remote island for three days because it was too rough to head back to shore.

But what I like best about Superior, is that it’s one of the few places on the planet where I can get my head right.

Whenever life gets to be too much,  I’ll make a special road trip, and sit on the shore.

I’ll stare at the infinity of the horizon, and feel the chest-thumping crashing and pounding of the waves.  And just take in the sheer POWER of it all.

And all the crap…the job, family issues, financial problems…it all melts away.

None of that means a damned thing out here.   Superior dosen’t care.   She’ll wash it away, and empty your mind.

It’s just you and the Lake.

And when you’re in this state of mind, if you listen carefully,  she’ll talk to you.

“Don’t worry, Friar.  It’s all right.   Everything’s going to be all right…”

And hearing that, alone, is worth the 10 hour drive.

At least for me, it is.

More Travels with the Bear in Northern Ontario

Of course, the one place in Wawa where you have to stop is by the Big Goose.

Though there are actually THREE Big Gooses (geese) in Wawa.   (Which I consider a disproportionate amount for a town of 3000-4000.)

One of the geese is a 10 foot replica over a motel entrance.  Another larger one (about 15 feet) is next to a trading post.

But the BIGGEST goose of all is right at the exit, near the Trans Canada Highway turn-off.

(By the way, can you spot the Bear?).

This marks the spot where the final stretch of the Trans Canada Highway was completed, in 1960.

Think about that for a second.  The U.S. and Russia were already working at putting men in space.  Yet in Canada, we hadn’t even completed a road across the top of Lake Superior.   Almost within my lifetime, you couldn’t drive across Ontario.   Even today, there’s a four lane Interstate that takes you to the Soo, but as soon as you cross the bridge to Canada, it’s still mostly single lane.

That just goes to show you how wild and remote Northern Ontario was (and parts still are…).    Which is why I go fishing here.

If you go beyond Wawa, the road pulls away from the Lake, and the scenery becomes somewhat less interesting.

Though you can see the trees start to change.  Within 10-15 miles, there are no longer any pine trees or maples, it’s just black spruce and white birch.    The eco-region has sharply transitioned from Mixed Forest to Boreal Forest.

After about a fifty miles of bush, you’ll arrive at the bustling Metropolis of White River (population 841).   Not much there, really.  A few hotels, and a railway station.

But the one claim to fame for this town is it’s the Birthplace of Winnie the Pooh. They have a park there commemorating it.

So naturally, I had to stop and take a look.   

Plus, the Bear’s a big fan of Winnie, and asked to have his photo taken with him.

Travels with the Bear: Northern Ontario

The Bear in downtown Wawa.   At 7:00 PM, Saturday night.

You could tell,  it was a  real happenin’ place.

This was the last pavement I saw for a week. (But more about my fishing trip later…).