We almost made it to Sudbury today. If we had, I could have found out if Stompin' Tom Connors' song 'Sudbury Saturday Night' had any truth to it. Oh well, something to aim at for the future!
When we left Terrace Bay this morning it was about 13 C. with low clouds and some fog. It felt like October, but by 10:30 it was warming up and by noon the temperature was in the mid 20s as we got to Wawa and the big goose there. Earlier we stopped at Marathon but we didn't search for the fabled campsite where Jim Knight and I bought beer instead of a five dollar hotel room. We planned to drink a dozen each and sleep in our tents, but after three beers we gave up because we didn't want to get out of the tent to pee and get swarmed by mosquitoes. Kerry, in the meantime, went to the bar, had a beer, then went to his clean almost insect free bed. When he pulled down the covers he found about five wood ants. After getting rid of them he had a good night's sleep. Jim & I couldn't say the same.
Panoramic view at Marathon (such as it was!)
We have been watching the roadside signs that mark every two kilometres for the past two days. This morning about 40 kilometres west of Wawa we saw the sign that marked 1000 kilometres from the Manitoba border. That was a real indication of how far we had travelled since Thursday afternoon.
One thousand Kilometres into Ontario!
Later on we stopped to see the famous Wawa Goose. It was erected in 1960 and while it was refurbished a few years ago it is showing its age. They people in Wawa are raising funds to replace it, with the slogan, 'Wawa needs a goose!' I think.
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Wawa's giant Canada goose
Kerry at Wawa's goose.
John at the Wawa goose.
Since I left that bastion of civilization where they have a Starbucks, I have been trying to get a good cup of coffee. Across Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and Northern Ontario when you ask where you can get a cup of good coffee, you are invariably pointed at the nearest Tim Horton's. It happened to me in Swift Current and again in Brandon. It's getting so that I'm afraid to ask.
Every so often we see road signs reminding people to take breaks when they are driving or not to drink and drive, but the one sign that really amazes me is the one that states: 'Bigger Vehicles Need More Room'. What an amazing grasp of the obvious the person who created that one has! That's the kind of job I could handle for the probably $100K a year the MTO (Ministry of Transportation-Ontario) is paying this bright light.
The size of Lake Superior is difficult to comprehend. Even from a lookout several hundred feet above the water it is not possible to see the other side of the lake. And when the highway runs close to the lake the air temperature drops several degrees. The lake has those typical Ontario lake islands with just room for some grasses and a few pine trees, and every so often there are even sandy beaches interspersed between the granite shores. The whole thing is quite striking when you see it from different vantage points.
Lake Superior from a viewpoint several hundred feet above the water.
Small island in Lake Superior
Lake Superior shoreline
I am still having some trouble with the 90 kph speed limit in this part of Ontario. Even the four lane divided highway outside of Sault Ste. Marie had the 90 kph limit. That's not to say that we ride at 90 kph. Usually we wait until a driver passes us in the passing lane and tuck in behind them to get up to 100 or 110. It seems that a lot of drivers ignore the speed limit and the police, according to the locals, will give you about 15 kph befor they hit you. Today we saw several driver getting caught, two by one policeman in under 20 minutes. He'll have a nice bonus at the end of the month! North of Wawa there was a trap with three cars in the middle of the road. Kerry thought it looked like a takedown of some sort and I couldn't tell.
As we ride along we occasionally see forlorn and overgrown motels, restaurants, truckstops, and even farmhouses that have been boarded up and abandoned. Each one of these places represents the dream of someone and the loss of that dream. I can't ride by those places without feeling a pangs of sadness. It seems that while the cities continue to grow, these out in the country places have died or are dieing slow deaths. It is apparent even in the small towns of 400, 600, 1000, or 1400 that have derelict service stations and restaurants and whose public places are falling into ruin for lack of money and people to take care of them and to make them viable.
We are now about a day from our destination. We have excellent bikes, good roads, a destintion, and the money to do it. Thirty-eight years ago we had good bikes (for the time), a little bit of money, mediocre roads,and no particular destination and yet we all pulled it off, making places for ourselves in a province where we knew no one. When I think back on that trip in the summer of 1973, it was the adventure of a lifetime for me. This too is an adventure, but not quite of the same magnitude.
Right now I an sitting in a motel room in Espanola, about 65 kilometres west of Sudbury. The air conditioner is wheezing away but making very little headway against the heat. The temperature in the room right now is a humid 31 C. After running for two hours the air conditioner has brought the temperature down 1 degree. But that could just be the building cooling down.
Tonight Kerry called Jim Knight and we talked to him for a while. We really had hoped that he would be able to make it but it wasn't to be. And he would have been so happy to find all the Timmy Ho coffee shops across the prairies and Northern Ontario! It was great to talk to him and fill him in a bit on the trip.
Tomorrow Kerry and I will go our separate ways at Sudbury. He, south to Toronto and then to Guelph, and I will continue further east almost Ottawa until I backtrack to Perth somewhere around Almonte. This has been a wonderful experience. Getting together and retracing your steps almost forty years later with an old friend isn't an experience that many of us get to have. For that I am thankful.
When Kerry left Vancouver I was at eased because you were with him but on his return it will be a different story. I am so thankful that you went together. I hope you will have fun and enjoyment as you embark on your journey back. Have a safe return to BC. I will be looking forward to your blogs.
ReplyDeleteWould be nice to see a pic of that little pony tail. And maybe the 'tat, too. Also, blog followers might appreciate the 'correct' version of the 1973 events that are referenced. I would suggest that the 'published' version is shrouded in the fog of time.
ReplyDelete...KEEP ON BLGGIN............................