Sault Saint Marie to Kenora...

… was this week’s journey – 1,170kms.

We spent a week in Sault Saint Marie, for the most part just killing time as two days would have been enough. The city is on the St Mary River and is twinned with Sault Saint Marie, Michigan. The International Bridge, at 3.2kms long, joins the two cities and spans three operating ship canals.

Not a lot happens here and one afternoon we were listening to the radio and the top story on the news was a 61 year old woman had been attached by a raccoon while she was gardening! Well, I completely lost it and laughed so hard tears were rolling down my face. It wasn’t the attack as such (I’m sure raccoons can be extremely vicious!), it was more the fact that it had made headline news!

The weather was awful when we left, with visibility down to 500m in some place. Needless to say, we didn’t see much of Lake Superior as we drove to Marathon. The next day, however, was much better and the views from Badger were breathtaking

We carried on around the lake to the next big town, formerly Fort William and Port Arthur, the two towns merged in 1970 to form Thunder Bay. We spent a few days at the Fort William Historical Park. This was the inland headquarters of the North West Company and the fur trade. For two months over the summer every year, the trappers (also known as Voyageurs) used to come in from the interior and trade their furs for goods.

These pelts were then bagged up and sent by canoe to Montreal – about a 6 week paddle of 18 hour days. They we tough back then. Fort William Historical Park has been recreated in the year 1816, with all the volunteers dressed in period costume and acting like it is 1816. It was all very well done. We saw some of the local wildlife on the trail:

We also had some beautiful sunsets there too

Just outside Thunder Bay is Kakabeka Falls, also known as Niagara of the north. It drops 40m and the sound of the rushing water was amazing and so loud!

We continued along the Trans-Canada highway to Kenora in Lake of the Woods. This is what the sat-nav showed – we are in lake country!

Kenora is home to Husky the Musky, a very tasty lake fish. I'd like to see the pan that would cook this one!

I decided to bake some of my ‘world famous’ raspberry and white chocolate muffins (which smelt wonderful!) and had a chipmunk trying to get into the bus. It sat on the top step, begging, then scrambled halfway up the screen door trying to get in. Needless to say, he didn't get any J 

Tomorrow we leave Ontario (finally!) and head for Winnipeg in Manitoba, on our journey west.