The Superior Way

To this point in the trip, I haven’t had any long stretches of remoteness. Sure I’ve had 50km or maybe a bit more of stretches where there’s nothing between places, but these have never taken me more than part of a day to bike through. That was about to change now that I’ve reached Lake Superior. Towns/villages are regularly around 100km apart, which is about equivalent to a whole days worth of cycling. To go with that, there is generally nothing in between towns, maybe a nature park but that’s about it. To start my journey around Lake Superior, it was presenting me with an even bigger stretch of remoteness, as I had over 200km to go to get to the next town/village.

Closer spots leaving Sault Ste. Marie

Before leaving Sault Ste. Marie, I swapped my chain again and stocked up on groceries, making sure I was prepared for the next few days. Overall it was a slow start to the morning and I didn’t get out of the city until after 2 in the afternoon. I’m not sure if it was because of the headwind, or my body was generally tired, but I felt sluggish when I did get going and like I couldn’t make much progress. Along the way, I crossed Chippewa Falls which is the halfway point of the Trans-Canada highway. This meant I was probably about halfway or maybe a bit more than halfway done crossing Canada. I made it as far as Batchawana Bay before I decided to stop for the day. I found a nice spot along the beach to setup my tent, well nice at least once I got out of the mosquitoes that were swarming me.

Chippewa Falls

Batchawana Bay

 I enjoyed the morning on the beach before taking off. I heard there was a chance of thunderstorms so I picked up the pace, trying to cover some ground before anything may potentially roll in. The riding was very nice as I was surrounded by mostly undisturbed nature all day (other than the road of course). I had been told by other cyclists and people in general, that as I got further into northern Ontario, I would start encountering more and bigger hills. The hill going up from Montreal River especially was quite the climb. The really nice thing about climbing these big hills is the descent on the other side. For the first time I think ever in my life, I reached 60km/hr on the bike. Hike it was nice getting to zip down at the speed, I learned that’s about the maximum I’m comfortable handling, as I was starting to feel uneasy and like 60 may be too fast for me.

At the end of the day, I reached Sand River where I found one of, if not potentially the best, camping spot I’m going to find on the trip. Where the river meets Lake Superior, I had a whole big beach entirely to myself. When I got there, I hopped in the very cold water and got cleaned up. As I’ve gone along, the water’s actually been getting colder. Lake Muskoka was nice, Lake Huron was cold but fine and Lake Superior was so cold, I hardly wanted to be in it. I got my tent setup early for once and got to making supper. From here, it was something like a scene you’d see in a movie. I used a log as back support to sit on the beach, while I slowly and calmly ate supper and sipped my tea, all while taking in the surroundings. The Sun was getting lower over the horizon on my right while I also looked out at the islands and shoreline within my view. I mostly just heard the waves of the lake and the rougher part of the river, with some background noise in birds chirping and the occasional vehicle passing over the nearby bridge over the river. It was easily one of the most relaxing states I’ve ever been in that evening. I even made a campfire for the first time too, although it didn’t do much as I was hoping it might help calm the mosquitoes near my tent (it didn’t.

Camp spot at Sand River

Sand River beach

As great as the evening would be, the night wasn’t so great. First I woke up from a dream absolutely confused and had no idea where I was. Soon after that a very loud thunderstorm passed through and was constantly lighting up my tent. After the storm passed, I think because I had gotten somewhat worried from it, I proceeded to have a couple of dreams where I died. Then after all that, a heavy downpour came and kept me awake as well.

As rough as the night was, I was still able to have the beach to myself to relax and stayed there for most of the morning. During the day, I stopped to take a break at a campground. While there, a guy came over and talked with me about what I was doing, which is quite a normal thing that usually happens a few times day, and he ended up giving me a cold ginger ale. Normally I don’t really drink soda, however, on the trip so far (and others have told me it’s the same with them), cold fizzy drinks are insanely refreshing during the day, so it was much appreciated that he did that. For the last 30km of the day, it cooled down a lot as a dense fog cloud rolled in off of Lake Superior. It cooled down enough that I even got cold while riding. I ended up making it to Wawa and layered up when I got there. Now that I had made it to Wawa, I had completed the longest stretch of remoteness that I had done yet, being over 200km from Sault Ste. Marie to Wawa. While in Wawa, I ended up staying near the tourist center and met a couple there (Gilbert and Caroline). I got talking with them for a while and they were quite nice, so nice in fact they ended up giving me $20 before I left the next morning.

Wawa goose statue

I said goodbye to Gilbert and Caroline before taking off in the morning. The highway started going a little more inland now, which I was disappointed by as I had really been enjoying overlooking Lake Superior the last few days. While there wasn’t much to see on the highway other than trees and cars, I did meet a couple of bikers during the day. First was Morgan who I got to chat with for longer than most other bikers when we stop on the side of the road. He was quite nice to talk with and was also going across Canada, starting from Vancouver like most others. Than shortly after meeting Morgan, I met Leo. Leo was a shorter conversation, which is more typical when stopping on the side of the road, but I did find out that this trip was his second time crossing Canada. I would make it to the small village of White River, which is where the bear that inspired Winnie the Pooh came from (the bear didn’t gain its fame from here however). While in White River, I met some guys who were going across Canada by train hopping but they had stopped in White River for the day to celebrate Canada Day.

Morgan

Winnie the Pooh in White River

The highway would again keep me away from Lake Superior when I left White River. This would prove to be a very difficult day mentally. While I’m going against the wind the majority of the time, sometimes it can really get me and today was one of those days. I had expected to be going downhill for a lot of the day and therefore getting to have a bit of an easier day, but instead it felt like I was going uphill the entire time and that felt incredibly defeating today. Nothing of note happened during the ride otherwise other than meeting another biker. This was Trevor who was going across Canada as well. I would make it to Marathon, which did get me back to Lake Superior which was nice. I decided to treat myself after having a difficult day by eating out once I got there. After eating I met another cyclist in town (Rudy) who was also going across Canada and he told me that he averaged 150km per day.

In the morning, I had my first run into trouble. I had camped behind a school that was quiet with no one around. Considering it was July now, I figured no one would be around a school anymore, but turns out there were janitors that still came to the school in the morning. They saw me and my tent and decided to call the cops (I don’t know why they didn’t just come out and ask me to move on themselves but whatever). So when a police car showed up I was surprised. The officer was nice and told me just to pack up the tent which I did right away. He even told me how he saw me going on the highway the day before and got asking about my trip. After I got the tent put away he even let me stay back there to finish up my morning stuff as he took off. Plus I could tell from how he told me how the janitors called for them, that he considered having to go here and make me put my tent away a waste of time (and quite frankly, I think it was too).

With the police call behind me, it was time to take off and start travelling along Lake Superior again. Others had warned me that it would get very hilly with some very big climbs as I got further along Lake Superior and now I had reached that point. Even though I now had some very big climbs, I was enjoying doing them. Most of the time I liked putting in the effort to climb up them and then the reward of getting to fly down the other side made it even better. Not to mention, I way rather climb a hill than fight headwind (I still had a headwind against me of course, but it wasn’t nearly as strong as the day before). Towards the end of the day, I made it to Terrace Bay but decided to keep going to Schreiber. Right after Terrace Bay though, I saw a sign for a waterfall and decided to go check it out. It was a bit of a climb to get to it but it was worth it. Aguasabon Falls were spectacular as it was a rather tall waterfall with quite a bit of power that funnelled into a pretty narrow gorge. Overlooking the whole thing was Lake Superior in the background and you could see the gorge heading to the lake.

Aguasabon Falls

After checking out Aguasabon Falls, I made it to Schreiber where I stopped for the night. Right as I got to Schreiber however, I felt an unfortunately familiar feeling. My back rack was on my rear tire again. The attachment that was used to hold my back rack near the axle had snapped. I still remembered that originally, the mechanics had told me to try using my cable ties before they came up with the attachment as a solution. I repositioned the rack and strapped it with a couple cable ties and it held firm when I tested it. In testing and playing with it a bit, I actually believe it’s probably a better solution than the attachment was in the first place anyways. 

Snapped attachment and cable ties

The following day started off nicely and for once, I had a tailwind which felt like such a nice break. The highway also continued to have some very large and steep climbs that I still was happy to do. Around noon though, when I was stopped in a reserve, the locals warned me that there were thunderstorms in Thunder Bay and that they may be headed in our direction. I didn’t see the sense in waiting around though and wanted to make it to the next town along the route within the day. Not long after I left the reserve, it did start to rain. I decided not to put my tent up to shelter from the potential of a storm and instead hid in the edge of the woods for some cover. After about an hour, it never did more than rain and I got tired of waiting so decided to go. Right as I was packing up to go though, another biker came along who had been riding in the rain. This was Camille who was going from Edmonton to Montreal and she was very wet and cold from riding in the rain. After talking with her the rain would entirely stop and I made it to the next town of Nipigon nice and dry.

When I made it into Nipigon, I found the library and checked the weather to find out that there were severe thunderstorms alerts, that had the potential to start at almost any moment. I’ve gotten that I don’t like messing around with thunderstorms much (I wasn’t really expecting much from the rain earlier in the day), so I asked where I could find shelter for my tent. The librarian told me there was a gazebo down by the marina, so I headed down there for shelter. The immediate thunderstorms didn’t come but it rain on and off. During this, a local man (Jim) who loved to tell stories showed up and talked the whole time he was there. A thunderstorm did finally show up though and sent Jim away back to his truck so he could go home. Outside of one more storm that came in the middle of the night, that’s all there was, leaving me a bit disappointed, as I wouldn’t have minded seeing some storms since I had a roof over my head.

When I tried to leave Nipigon in the morning, I had quite the hard time doing so. Somehow I had become Mr. Popular as 5 different people all had conversations with me before I could go. This included about an hour long one with the librarian when I went to fill up my water there and also a nice couple from Quebec (Luce and unfortunately I can’t remember the husband’s name). I didn’t end up getting on the road until noon time but that was fine. As this was the day of people being nice and chatting with me, it would continue even after Nipigon. I stopped for a break in Dorion next to a little general store and the owner (at least I’m guessing he was the owner) came out and gave me a Powerade. Considering I just about only drink water, any sort of drink that helps give me energy is a much appreciated treat.

Heading to Thunder Bay (courtesy of Luce)

I would make it to Thunder Bay, which meant that I had now completed cycling the length of Lake Superior and with that, had now completed the Great Lakes portion of Canada. With it being later due to the late start, I decided to find the nearest park after entering the city to try figure out what I was doing for the night. Well this also worked quite well as the kindness of people continued to shine for the day. There was a rink at the park and I went there to see if I could fill my water. The man in charge of the arena for the night (Brad), not only let me fill my water, but when he asked and found out about what I was doing, even let me shower in the arena. As if that wasn’t enough, while I was showering, Brad gathered some odds and ends that he could find and put together a little supper for me that had a sandwich or two and some other snacks. I ended up talking with Brad for an hour or two, in between him making sure everything was good at the rink (it wasn’t very busy that night). I was really happy to have met Brad and hear his perspective on things as his life has had some turbulence and how it had all lead him to this point.

I had a great introduction to Thunder Bay, but the next couple days that I stayed there for a rest, showed me there wasn’t much to the city. Really about the only nice things there that I saw were the Terry Fox monument, as this was around where his journey ended, and then there was also a pretty nice and big sports park in the city but that was about it. Downtown was pretty ugly and the city was also full of homeless people, where it was quite easy to see there was a large drug problem. The only other real thing of note from Thunder Bay was that I finally gave in and hand washed my clothes for the first time (this was how I imagined I’d mostly be taking care of my laundry on the trip). I filled my 2 back panniers, one with soapy water and the other clean and cleaned all my clothes.

Terry Fox monument

With the Great Lakes completed, maybe, just maybe I might soon be able to finish the seemingly never ending province of Ontario.

Distance Biked: 803.2km

Total Distance: 4497km