Sault St. Marie, Ontario – 3000 km motorbike ride for a wedding

There is not too much to see in Sault St. Marie, so we continue our way to the west. The landscape gets hillier; soon mountains grown over with forests follow. The highway bends around Lake Superior shoreline. An extended family of the rare Canada Goose waddles beside the road. The grey-brown water birds with the black neck and head are sometimes called Wawas following the Ojibwe language.

On the parking lot at Lake Superior Provincial Park we meet two Harley Davidson drivers. They are having a break to slurp a beer and puff on a cigarette. We also get a beer. And they apologize for the beer not to be very cold. The two of them just ride 3,000 km for a wedding party and to visit the son of one of them. Who in Germany would get the idea to just ride to South Greece for a party? I try to figure out what is in their three cases. I guess in one of them is the suit for the wedding, the tooth brush and travel necessaries. They don’t need tent and whatever since they sleep in Motels. The other two cases are probably full with beer. You have to set priorities.

A short but rocky trail leads us to the Indian wall paintings at Agawa Rock at a precipice at the lake shore. You have to proceed hand over hand along a metal chain not to slip from the smooth slope at the foot of the wall. Thick ropes hang into the water; with their help you could rescue yourself to the shore if fallen into the water. The spot is dangerous when unexpectedly high waves wash the hiker off the stones. There have been a couple of accidents in the past years. Today it is pretty quiet. The 150 to 400 years old animal and boat paintings of the Ojibwe aren’t excessively impressive, but the bay with the water clear as glass is a beautiful site. The path through the narrow high canyon is fun, but you should take care of the slippery stones.

We frighten away a flock of vultures besides the road that help themselves freely to a perished moose. In the end of the day we steer for a truck stop at the edge of the town of Wawa like the goose. Luckily Saturdays there are not too many truckers who find it necessary to run their engine the whole night since it is essential to keep the air-condition going with 15° C outside. The few ones parking here still make enough noise. You find Canada – unfortunately – together with the United States at the top of the world’s energy consumers. Or, better to say, the energy wasters. But the site seems to be an inside tip among motorhome drivers. A camper, big as a coach, is already here, with a car in tow where again two bicycles are fixed. The couple travels with at least five awnings with which they could shade half of Wawa. Short after a similar huge RV arrives with three passengers in it. That could be a bit cramped, so they tow a trailer as big as our whole cabin is. Completely unbegrudging I watch their four hydraulic forces that automatically lift the vehicle into a levelled position. As already mentioned, a coach is pretty low in space for the three of them. That’s why now the side walls slide out to make more room. But they are kind people and invite us to Alberta. Later on another house on wheels arrives.

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