We are familiar with this neck of the woods and recalled liking a nice spot at Iron Bridge where we had breakfast on the way out. So we headed about 26 kms down the road and found our memories to be in pretty solid state. The peaceful atmosphere with wonderful background music and the moist climate outside was just as we had experienced before.
Our journey on from there took us by a gently flowing river working it's way to Lake Huron. Shortly thereafter we were catching occasional glimpses of Lake Huron. The water was very calm perhaps the rain was filling the holes between the waves. This notion relates to a navy story that Bill had told me back in Halifax. We were making pretty good time as we rode along and within the hour, about 60 kms from Sault St. Marie the highway became this beautiful four lane divided highway. That made it a bit more pleasant as the rain was reducing visibility. This stretch of the road must be very new because the GPS didn't know where we were.
We fueled up in Sault St. Marie eventually. At the gas station with one pump out of order the kid parked at the pump was inside talking on the phone. After a long conversation he decided to buy a few things and then finally came out to move his car. I suppose the fog made it hard for him to see that someone else was waiting to use the pump.
Finally we got on our way again. I was getting a little worried that our intentions of enjoying the sights of Superior would be spoiled by the reduced visibility. On the other hand I was happy to see that the rework on the wiring of Jill's highway lights I had done last night kept her well lit up on the road. It's always good to have lots of lights on the highway. It is surprising to see how many cars were without any headlights out on a foggy, misty day.
The road from Sault St. Marie up to the north end of Superior is one of our favorite stretches of road to drive. Smooth as a baby's bottom, frequent passing lanes and gently sweeping curves make for relaxed riding.
After about 75 kms, we made a return visit to Pancake Bay. This a stop on #17 that is very much like Coombs on Vancouver Island but without the goats on the roof. Besides a gas stop there are a few unique stores, a liquor outlet, ice cream, wood carvings, animal pelts, propane tanks, trailer tires, tee pees, old army gas cans and a whole variety of things. This is where the bottle of Sambuca came from. During our stop there the showers reduced to a mist and within five minutes, the roads started to dry and the sky worked at being blue again. It seemed as though the vacation gods were smiling at us because this stretch from Pancake Bay to Wawa is the most spectacular road we have ridden so far. All the way to Wawa the sun shone and Lake Superior gave us it's best views. What a wonderful day it turned out to be!
We put on another 100 km from Wawa on dry roads often in sunlight which gave our clothes a chance to dry out. The northern landscape is dotted with hundreds of lakes and pink granite rock faces bordering the highway. One of the joys of the tour is the expectation of beauty around every turn.
We passed again, Dad, Mom and Baby Lakes, all in descending size. The lakes that dot the north are the colour of strong tea. Out in the centre where they are free from the shade of the pines, the refection of the sun dapples the surface in the colour of the sky. It's peak water lily season and they spread the sunniest edge of the lakes with white and dark green.
We had the road to ourselves. There were some very heavy, black clouds gathering so we made the prudent decision to ride until it rained. It just takes too much time and effort to get dry again.
We called it a day in White River where we got the senior's price at the motel. The forecast is calling for rain overnight and part of tomorrow, but it looks good around Thunder Bay for tomorrow night. Hopefully we will camp around there. For now, the Sambuca is washing away all memory of rain.
Canadian Carver omg!
ReplyDeletenow I'm really homesick