The Long Journey

It takes more than 10 hours to drive from our house to Lake Superior Provincial Park, not counting stops for fuel and food. Leaving the house at 8 am, and accounting for a lunch and dinner break, we would have been setting up our tent as the sun was setting, and we'd be too exhausted to enjoy it.

So we broke up the trip.

We were travelling with one of our Paddlefolk. She was in her car, with her camping gear and kayak. We met up at the Tim Horton's in Arnprior, along Highway 17. And she would follow us along that roadway—the Trans-Canada Highway—all the way.

We stopped in Mattawa for a bathroom break and to allow DW to take over the driving for our friend, who was tired. DW would drive the second car to North Bay, where we stopped at a Loblaws to grab a sandwich and drink, and then at Duchesnay Falls, where we ate that lunch.

From there, we continued on, past Sudbury, at which point I realized that I had never driven further on the Trans-Canada. A few years earlier, DW and I headed south, toward Killarney Provincial Park, but we had deviated from the 17 before reaching Sudbury, and I had only been to Sudbury twice before this trip.

In the town of Massey, we reached our destination for the day, at Chutes Provincial Park. We knew very little about this park, other than there was a waterfall and a lazy river, and we were sure that we'd find a campsite for the night because it's one of the lesser-known provincial parks and it was a Sunday evening.

We were right. Not only did we get a site but we got a good one in a quiet area that was a short walk to the falls.

We set up our sleeping tents only—no kitchen tent or chairs, as we were planning to get on the road the next morning. We were losing light so we wanted to explore the park before it got dark.

DW and our Paddlefolk friend wanted to try out the lazy river, which was at the base of the bottom falls, so we inflated the tubes that DW and I had last used in Samuel de Champlain Provincial Park and headed to the beach. I came with them to capture everything on video and to snap a few photos.

The lazy river drifts only a couple-hundred metres, going around a bend and meeting another part of the beach. It's nothing like the Amable du Fond River, but the ladies seemed to enjoy cooling off in the river.

We returned to camp after a couple of runs on the river and heated up some chili that DW had made the day before, and we called it a night. 

The next morning, we had blueberry pancakes, something that would be a recurring meal throughout the trip. We had brought a large container of the berries and would pick up more when that supply ran low.

Energy food.

After breakfast, we decided to take some time and hike the Seven Sisters Rapids trail, which leads upstream from the waterfalls at the beach. It's an easy trail and follows both sides of the river. We didn't think we had time to walk the whole trail but we walked as far as we could before deciding we needed to return to camp, pack up, and continue to Lake Superior.

When we reached Sault Ste. Marie, DW and I were famished but our friend was tired. She slept in her car while DW and I had an excellent pizza at Fratelli's Kitchen, which was recommended to us by another friend's brother. He and our other friend had grown up in the Soo and we contacted him for recommendations as we headed to this city.

He reached out to his family and came back with several recommendations. We're glad we chose this one: it was perfect for being filling, delicious, but not heavy.

After all, we had more driving ahead.

We also picked up a few more supplies in Sault Ste. Marie, stopping at a Home Hardware, Dollarama, and a paddling shop that had a great selection of Delta kayaks. We fuelled up just north of the city and continued non-stop until we reached our final destination.

Great Lakes Outfitters

We reached Lake Superior Provincial Park by mid-afternoon and set up camp. Our site was across the road from the beach but there was no site across from us. Though we were going to be in this park for a week, we only had this site for two nights, as our prime spot wasn't available for the whole week and this one became available after our original booking.

The view was spectacular, looking out to Agawa Bay and a pancake-like island, called Montreal Island. From the moment I saw that island, it called to me, beckoning me to paddle out to it.

I photographed it every day, usually at sunset, and I'll share those series of images for tomorrow's Wordless Wednesday.

After dinner, we went to a presentation on wolves at the visitor centre, where we also charged some of our devices. With the sun down, we were tempted to build a fire but we were all exhausted from the long day.

We had hiked, driven, and set up camp on our second day of our long journey that covered more than 925 kilometres. It was now time to rest.

The next day was action-packed, with two paddles and a hike. Stay tuned.