"Thanks to the interstate highway system, it is now possible to travel from coast to coast without seeing anything."
- Charles Kuralt
August 31 (cont.): We managed to escape the hustle and bustle of Kitchener/Waterloo during rush hour, but decided not to tempt fate by going the “fastest” route through Toronto traffic. We’d probably still be there if we had. Instead, choosing a route that zig-zagged in a northeasterly direction through the gently rolling agricultural countryside, we leisurely ambled along, enjoying the small towns, the numerous Mennonite horse and buggy carriages and the beautiful multi-colored brickwork from which most of the homes in this area of southern Ontario are built. Just north of Barrie, Ontario, we pulled off the road and spent the night in the parking lot of the town’s office buildings.
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| FRAN & GREG STEWART'S HOME NEAR PARRY SOUND, ONTARIO |
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| MONSTER SMALLMOUTH |
September 1: The shortest drive of the entire trip! Only an hour away, on the shore of Parry Sound, part of huge Georgian Bay, part of gigantic Lake Huron, live our friends, Fran and Greg Stewart. This is part of the ever-expanding “cottage district” around the lakes 50-100 miles north of Toronto. These “cottages”, so named because they originally were small summer homes, now are primarily luxurious lakefront houses, many still for summer use only, but also quite a few that are year-round, like the Stewart’s. This is the heart of the Pre-Cambrian Shield, where the land is nearly solid granite, some of the oldest rock on earth, so most of these waterfront homes are perched atop massive rocks that compose the shoreline. If you want soil, either bring it in or go somewhere else. Where the ground isn’t solid rock, it is bog or swamp water trapped on the surface above the impenetrable substrate. Gale and I know Fran through birding in Florida, where, until recently, they also owned a home. The two of them are exceptionally gracious hosts and we instantly felt right at home. After lunch, Greg took me out fishing in their “tin” boat, a beat-up rowboat with a 40 year-old ten horsepower outboard. We trolled up and down the shore, handily managing to catch four very large smallmouth bass. I hadn’t fished for smallmouths in a long time, but if you want wild action on light equipment, they are the best! I was using a bright red and yellow woolly bugger fly that I had tied in 2009, fronted by a small silver spinner I made around 1973. Fresh fish for dinner were phenomenal! To quote Dan Aykroyd from an old Saturday Night Live show, “Wow! That’s good bass!” After dinner, Fran drove us to the small town of Parry Sound, so we could watch the sun set over Georgian Bay from a hillside park. We pulled in just as the sun was dropping below the horizon, filling the sky with blazing color, but nobody was paying attention. A black bear sow and her very small cub strolled out of the bushes and began grazing their way across the lawn, only 30-40 feet away! To complete the show, a pair of common loons flew directly overhead, yodeling all the while.
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| GOOD BASS! |
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| WOOLLY BUGGER |
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| BLACK BEARS |
September 2: On a sun-filled morning, our hosts took us out for a spin around Parry Sound in their speedier craft, wandering among the islands and inlets. After lunch, Greg said, “Would you like to go fishing again?” Oh, my. What a difficult decision. This time I took my lightweight fly rod, a 5-weight, but used the same woolly bugger/spinner combo. I caught two more monsters. Right after striking, both fish took to the sky, with leaps that I swear were four feet above the water! What fun! Greg said he wanted to keep the fish, so we brought them in. Fran insisted we take them, so after filleting the pair, they reside frozen in Albie’s locker.
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| FRAN AND GREG STEWART |
September 3-4: Bidding the Stewarts farewell, we headed north for an all-day drive to Nagagamisis Lake Provincial Park in northern Ontario. I first visited this remote area 47 years ago. I was just a lad of 22, but had been fishing crazy since a tot. This was like getting a free visitors’ pass into fishing heaven. The lake was pristine, with only a small provincial park and a fishing lodge on it. The dirt road to it came south from the Route 11 and ended at the small town of Hornepayne, 20 miles south of the park. The forest around the lake was untouched and the fishing was superb, not to mention the perfect enjoyment of camping in a northern forest. I came back a couple times more with friends and the experience was just as good. During law school, I dreamed of building a primitive log cabin on the north shore of the lake. But then the entrance road got extended south to join with the highway from Michigan. I was greatly looking forward to returning to this heavenly spot, but also very anxious over what I would find. Thomas Wolfe said it best, “You can’t go home again”. The memories drew me back, but the reality of returning was a harsh blow. Pulpwood logging had attacked the region with a vengeance and we saw it all along the northern route through Ontario. Logging had decimated the entire north shore of the lake, leaving only a hairy fringe of undesirable birches. Logging roads tore through the sandy soil and exposed the land both to erosion and much worse, home builders using those roads through the forest. Yes, I know I wanted my cabin, but my dreams did not involve roads, just clearing a small plot and putting up a simple dwelling from on-site trees. The park had quadrupled in size and almost every camper brought a motorboat along. Too much fishing pressure on a fragile northern lake has obvious consequences and the toll was taken. After renting a boat and motor at the park, we cruised the lake for about 5 hours, but it was windy, wavey and no fish. Just keeping the boat under control was a challenge. We left after two days, disheartened. How far do you have to go now to get away from the crowds and find the quiet and quality we sought at Nagagamisis? For these overpopulated times, to find what we were looking for, you pretty much have to go where there are no roads or few people or get in a float plane to find that remote experience.
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| GALE AT LAKE NAGAGAMISIS |
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WINNIE-THE-POOH PARK,
WHITE RIVER, ONTARIO |
September 5: We decide to head back to the States and drive about 60 miles south to White River, Ontario, where we plan to drive on to Sault St. Marie and cross the border. When we hit White River, ordinarily a junction in the middle of nowhere, there is a crowd of vehicles. Further south, earlier this morning, there was a horrible fiery car crash on the highway, resulting in fatalities. The road is closed until it is all sorted out. Thankful that it was not us, we’re just chillin’. Turns out that over a 100 years ago, a British soldier purchased a black bear cub right here and took it home with him, eventually giving it to the London Zoo. The English writer, A.A. Milne, took a shine to the little cub cutie and wrote some fanciful books about Winnie-the Pooh, based on his imaginary adventures with pals Eeyore, Piglet, Kanga, Roo, Tigger and their best friend, Christopher Robin.
The road opened at about 6:30 PM, allowing the congealed mass of cars, trucks, buses and RVs to pile onto the highway and head south. Figuring that we would just be heading into another traffic jam at the accident site, with no place to spend the night, and a follow up crowd at the USA border crossing, we opted to stay put at Winnie-the Pooh Park, watched a movie in the RV and retired for the evening.
September 6: Another long day on the road. This is not as exciting as it was four months ago. We’re both tired, a wee bit grungy and looking forward to the final visits and activities before returning to home sweet home in Florida. Funny how your perspectives shift during travel. I now think of Florida as just a hop, skip and jump from here, since we’re ONLY 2000 miles away. We went over 21,000 miles for the trip today and it’s beginning to feel like it. The scenery is still exquisitely beautiful, but the day is not. Stunning Lake Superior Provincial Park in Ontario is magnificent, but not today, draped by leaden skies, soaked in pouring rain, not even conducive to getting out of the RV.
We crossed back into the USA at Sault Ste. Marie, taking the bridge over the Mackinac Straits where Lake Superior pours through rapid channels, eventually carrying all that water to Lake Huron. From there we traversed the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, passing by the home of John Voelker, who wrote “Anatomy of a Murder” under the nom de plume of Robert Traver, in Traverse City. More importantly, he wrote “Trout Madness”, describing his obsession with fly fishing for trout, which profoundly influenced my similar dream life as a youth.
On and on we drove through the deluge until it gradually cleared in central Wisconsin, our 28th state for the trip. Trying to find SOMETHING to do that might be fun and interesting before returning to Illinois, we ended up for the night at the entrance to Horicon Marsh National Wildlife Refuge near Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. Pulling in at dusk, we set up for the evening, had dinner and watched the wild and woolly lightning storms that surrounded us. Rain music never ceased and during the night as four inches fell.
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| TRUMPETER SWAN JUVENILE |
September 7: Horicon NWR is the largest freshwater cattail marsh in North America. It hosts gigantic numbers of migratory waterfowl, not quite here yet, as the birds pass through the central flyway. Oddly enough, it was originally famous for the largest congregations of migrating Canada geese. These large birds barely migrate now, except from your local park to the golf course, where their primary focus is to cover everything in a slather of goose shit. The NWR has a huge Visitor center, so we made that our first stop to find out where would be the best parts of the refuge to visit, especially those that weren’t now under water. Unlike many refuges that have extensive drive-through roadways for observation, to see this one you drive around it on heavily traveled public roadways. There are many hiking trails, but most were flooded and the rain had brought out swarms of our dearest friends, blood-sucking mosquitos. We wisely stayed in Albie and toured the area for a couple of hours. There were quite a few breeding ducks and geese, plus breeding trumpeter swans, which have been reestablished in the Great Lakes area after being extirpated over 100 years ago. A couple of huge gray immature trumpeters presented my first experience with the young of these creatures. With not much else to see, we pushed on south to Dixon, Illinois, for a return engagement with another type of Swan, Gale’s bro Scott. It rained all evening and night. It seems that all the precipitation we didn’t have during the trip is catching up with us now.
September 8: A day to relax, catchup on correspondence and pay the bills that have arrived at Scott’s during our absence. The sun is (gasp!) shining and it’s a steam bath outside. Much like breathing under water. perhaps we’ll go and play golf if we can find a course with a dress code that doesn’t require wet suits. Indeed we did, playing the first nine twice (the back nine was completely inundated).
