To quote Robbie Burns:
"The best laid schemes o' Mice an' Men,
Gang aft agley"

I moved my son to Toronto over the long weekend and had arranged to spend a night in Sault Ste. Marie, take my time driving back along Lake Superior to Thunder Bay and then spend the next night in Dryden, so my final day of driving back to Saskatoon wouldn't be 16 hours long. Since 1985, I've driven from Thunder Bay to Sault Ste. Marie 6 times, but this would be the first time I drove this route in reverse and the first time I wasn't pushed for time. My plan was to stop at all the scenic lookouts and pull-outs and take lots of pictures, because I wasn't sure I would ever have the opportunity again.

The first good look at Lake Superior from the Trans Canada Highway comes at the southern portion of Lake Superior Provincial Park on Agawa Bay.



Lake Superior is huge, with a surface area of over 82,000 square kilometers, nearly the same size as Austria. It sits on extremely old geology, its rocks were formed before life as we know it existed on the earth.



It is possible to drive completely around Lake Superior, Highway 17 from Sault Ste. Marie to Thunder Bay is 700 kms, which gets you about half way around the lake. The lake is an awesome, wild force of nature, in spite of human development.



This beach is at Old Woman Bay, near the northern border of Lake Superior Provincial Park, there is a nice beach further south at Pancake Bay just north of Sault Ste. Marie and numerous sandy beaches on the southern shores along Michigan's Upper Peninsula and in Wisconsin from Ironwood to Duluth. However, not only is Superior large at the surface, it is deep as well, up to 406 meters deep. Deep water usually means cold water. Didn't prevent one courageous person from going for a swim in the lake.



There are very scenic viewpoints from the highway north of Marathon at Neys Provincial Park and the entire stretch from Terrace Bay to Thunder Bay is gorgeous. It was just after noon when I got to the town of Wawa and the Trans Canada Highway was closed due to a traffic accident 15 minutes north of town that resulted in four fatalities. The highway wasn't reopened until 5:45PM because local authorities had to wait for a special investigator from the south to do his work and the only detour possible involved going to Timmins and Hearst before meeting Highway 17 again in Nipigon, an extra 7 hours of driving! So I parked on the side of the road and waited.

The rain started before I was able to leave Wawa and it was almost midnight when I parked my van in a parking lot at Kakabeka Falls, just west of Thunder Bay. I didn't bother stopping anywhere else along Lake Superior. So no pictures of lakers at the port in Thunder Bay, no more pictures of rocky islands, steep cliffs and high waves to share. And it took me 16 hours to get home the next day.

[Tonytee]

Very nice photography. I have heard that The Great Lakes are so enormous they are referred to as , "Fresh Water Oceans."

Many thanks for uploading.

Tony

[normhead]

I haven't been there since my trip to the Slate Islands in 2008, I'm trying to convince Tess this might be good year to drive up in the fall. When my kids were small we spent the ends of 3 or 4 summers in Lake Superior PP. It was close enough to home in Timmins we'd hang out until the last day before school started then arrive home from the park at 11:00 at night. Talk about getting the most out of your vacation.

[RGlasel]

The Great Lakes are so enormous they are referred to as , "Fresh Water Oceans."

Thanks for commenting, Tony. Michigan, Huron and Superior really are enormous lakes, they generate their own weather patterns. Lake freighters that carry ore and grain on the Great Lakes aren't much different than ocean going vessels.

we'd hang out until the last day before school started then arrive home from the park at 11:00 at night.

Was this when you were teaching, Norm? What about taking a week to prepare for the start of classes?

Just a small slice of what Lake Superior is, unfortunately I'm too far away to explore it any further. Seeing the Great Lakes isn't like going to Disneyland or even Yellowstone or Vancouver Island, so much is inaccessible to most people and there aren't a lot of "must see" attractions where you get out, take the tour, take some pictures and get back in the car to go to the next stop on your itinerary.

[gavinhw]

Excellent pics and storytelling.

[RGlasel]

Excellent pics and storytelling.

Thanks for checking it out, it is much more enjoyable when I'm not the only one who looks at the pictures I take.

[Clarkey]

Not to hijack your thread, but I think this is appropriate. From Thunder Bay:


Vast by Aaron, on Flickr