The Canadian Shield

Despite the title, this post is not about the Mounties. It's about geology. Well, not the whole post, but it starts out that way. Some of the last week of our trip was spent traveling through a part of the Canadian Shield. The Canadian Shield is the ancient core of the North American continent. It extends from the Hudson Bay in an arc outward and southward. The southern ends of it extend a bit into the northern parts of Minnesota, Wisconsin, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and northern New York. The Adirondack Mountains are part of that formation. The Canadian Shield is characterized by a landscape of mostly rolling hills (and occasional mountains, like the Adirondacks), thin soil supporting little agriculture but lots of coniferous forest, bare rock outcroppings, and many, many lakes. The rocks of that rocky terrain are very old: 2 to 3.5 billion years old. Mostly igneous and metamorphic, so really hard rock. And valuable. The Canadian shield has some of the most valuable mineral deposits in the world. The rock was laid bare in the last glacial age when all the upper layers of soil and softer rock were scraped away and pushed southward, forming the hills and moraines of central New York, Wisconsin, and other places as the glaciers retreated.

The Canadian Shield in shades of red

And that's what we were driving through. In my last post, I told you just how dramatic the change was from the very flat prairie to the land of forest, rocks, and lakes. That difference became even more apparent as we moved on through northwestern Ontario. Rolling hills broken up by cliffs of shear, hard rock. Rocky islands jutted just off the shore of Lake Superior. 

Lots of rocks. And lots of moose. Or at least warnings about them. Vicky and I saw moose warning signs more often than speed limit signs as we drove along the north shore of Lake Superior. The moose silhouette on these signs looked angrier than the ones on the signs we've seen in northern New England. We took to calling them "Pissed Off Moose Warning" signs. We'd actually been in moose country ever since the Grand Tetons, but in most of those places, the highway gives you plenty of visibility down the road. Not so much on the rolling, winding roads in western Ontario. I never saw a moose on the whole trip, but in a way I'm glad. In all my years of living and driving in central Pennsylvania, I've been lucky enough never to have hit a whitetail deer. But I'd rather hit a deer than a moose any time.

Pissed Off Moose warning sign

One of the myriad lakes we passed along the way

Our next stop after Kenora was Thunder Bay. We had originally planned to camp in a park just out of town for a couple of nights. But the trip was starting to wear on us, and we needed a break after driving 1300 miles in 4 days. We opted for another AirBnB, a basement apartment in town. We really needed to decompress before the last push home. We did a little sight-seeing, but, truth be told, there's not a real lot to see in Thunder Bay. Thunder Bay is one of the largest ports on Lake Superior, after Duluth-Superior and Sault Ste Marie. But its better days are behind it. It's still an important part of the Saint Lawrence Seaway, but a lot of its importance waned with increased rail and truck shipments west and south from Duluth. It has a bit of the hard-bit Rust Belt look of many Midwestern US cities. And some of the crime. Thunder Bay has the second highest murder rate (after Winnipeg) in Canada. But Chicago, in that regard, it ain't.

On our first day in Thunder Bay, we went to Prince Arthur's Landing, a small lakeside park near the marina. From there, looking out over lake, we could see the Sleeping Giant, a steep-cliffed peninsula across the bay, and some islands in the bay. After communing with the wildlife, inclusing some geese and a blue heron, we walked through the "happening" district of town a few blocks away, a street with many shops, restaurants, and pubs. We had a pleasant dinner. at the Paradise Restaurant and Bar. We texted Andy that we were due north of him. After dinner, we went back to the AirBnB to watch some really old movies on Cinevault.

The Sleeping Giant, a rocky peninsula across Thunder Bay

Thunder Bay is several hundred miles due north of Andy's place in Madison, Wisconsin

The next day was spent mostly decompressing and catching up on the travel blog. We went out again, this time to a not-so-trendy part of town. We caught dinner at one of our favorite spots on the whole trip. It was a place called The Sal. The Sal had once been called the Salisbury Grill. They changed the name, but the menu looks like classic, old-school diner food. Burgers, sandwiches, and home cooking. And poutine. You can get poutine, a Quebecois side, anywhere in Canada. It's simple: Fries with a lot of crumbled cheese curds smothered in gravy. But at least two of these components are easy to get wrong. The Sal got everything right. Great fries, nice cheese curds, and great gravy. Vicky had what she said was one of the best BLTs ever, I had a burger with really good onion rings on it, and we split the poutine. It's a good thing we only had this stuff once on the whole trip! 

The Sal, a homey spot in Thunder Bay

The Sal has great poutine!

The next morning, we were up early for our last long drive in Canada. We would almost complete the tour of the north shore, driving 360 miles to Agawa Bay, about an hour north of Sault Ste Marie. We stayed at a nice provincial park right on the lake. 

After resting a bit from the drive, we took a walk to some Indian petroglyphs. The walk was a bit taxing, but nothing a couple in their sixties couldn't do...until the end. The trail led down a steep ravine, but that wasn't the hard part: there were stone steps in some places that made it easier. Then we were at the shore. The petroglyphs are on a cliff face right on the shore. The problem was that the last 30 yards or so was a fairly treacherous walk along a narrow rock face on slick surfaced rocks that roll quickly down to the lake, a good 10 feet below. A slip would take you to a landing on either hard rocks or cold, deep water. There were some ropes and steel chains to help you, but it wasn't an easy walk for the faint of heart. And, according to signs posted at the spot, not a walk you'd want to attempt at all if there were any waves on the lake. People have been washed in, some to a tragic end. Vicky didn't attempt that walk, and I thought twice about it. But I made it across, until I was standing face-to-rock-face with the petroglyphs. The big problem in viewing them is that you can't really step back to view them. If you do, you're in the drink. You have to view them more from the side. Or, better, from a canoe (if the lake is calm). One woman was doing just that as I made my way to the vantage point. She definitely had a better view than I did!

A suspended rock in a narrow rift on the walk down to the petroglyphs

The walk to the petroglyphs is steep but not treacherous

It's a scary walk to get to the petroglyphs

More lakeside petroglyphs

The petroglyphs are really best viewed by canoe

After a dinner of sandwiches at camp, we started a campfire, but we'd bought only one bundle from the camp store and it wasn't good hardwood. The fire was dying down as it started to get dark. So we went down to the shore. Agawa Bay faces west across the lake, so we caught a beautiful sunset! We lingered until the last crimson rays were gone, and headed back to camp. The next day, we'd have a short drive, but we'd be saying our spiritual good-byes to Lake Superior, to Canada, and to the cool north we'd become accustomed to.

The guy was in our way of the view of the sunset, so we had him vaporized

Stunning sky after sunset