SAULT STE MARIE-WAWA-TERRACE BAY & “HOUSTON, WE HAVE A PROBLEM”:((

THIS IS MY WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 1 POST…NO INTERNET SIGNAL WEDNESDAY NIGHT

A quiet night boondocking in Sault Ste Marie’s Home Depot parking lot.  We were the only one’s there.  Nice.  Taking Pheebs out for a walk Tuesday night I was encouraged to see the cloud cover had parted to reveal a big half Moon overhead.  Fingers crossed for a cloud free morning.  Finger crossing doesn’t always work & as our early morning dawned it was obvious this was one of those times.  A discouraging solid cloud cover for the third day in a row & we were fogged in!!  Weather map shows we are headed into rainy days & colder temperatures.

SOON AS THE FOG HAD THINNED ENOUGH WE WERE ON THE ROAD

   

When light enough we headed north from Sault Ste Marie on highway 17 with a misty drizzle keeping me busy with intermittent sweeps of the windshield wipers.  This sporadic drizzle continued for about an hour.  Fall foliage colors are in their prime & despite the dull day views were awe inspiring.  Passed a pulled over lettered Class A with the words JESSE'S JOURNEY.  Remembered hearing something about that on the news. 

THE RUGGED NORTH SHORE OF LAKE SUPERIOR

  

This drive over top Lake Superior is truly spectacular made even nicer by Fall colors & lite traffic.  Would recommend this drive to anyone.  Great highway with gentle grades & long curves.  Again today traffic was light.  Highway follows along the rocky Northern windswept shores of Lake Superior the largest fresh water lake in the world.  We pulled into a view point along Alona Bay & discovered the great lake freighter Edmund Fitzgerald had sunk in 1975 just 19 miles off a point we could see to the south.  That sinking was immortalized in the song by Canadian songwriter/singer Gordon Lightfoot, ‘The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald’.

NINETEEN MILES OFF THAT POINT OF LAND SANK THE EDMUND FITZGERALD

Well before reaching the great Goose at Wawa Ontario the days misty rain had stopped.  Highways were dry with a comfortable temperature of 60F.  Such beautiful country.  Wawa soon hove into sight & we decided to pull off & have us a look at the big Goose.  I have been by here maybe 4 or 5 times many years ago but my memory banks were blank.  While taking some photos of the big Goose Kelly slipped into the Visitor’s Center.  We had seen a sign for Tim Hortons coming into town so Kelly asked the lady inside where it was.  She said about a 15 minute walk from the center & it was not very accessible for big rigs, even along the highway.  So now here is something very amazing for this day & age & it is a page out of Mayberry RFD.  The lady reached into her purse, handed Kelly her own car key’s & said, “take my car it’s much easier to get into Hortons with’'.  And that’s what Kelly did & the lady didn’t even want a coffee for herself.  Now doesn’t that just knock your socks off for good old small town hospitality.

 

VIEW TOWARDS LAKE SUPERIOR FROM WAWA’S BIG GOOSE SITE

 

   

THE TRANS CANADA HIGHWAY HEADS WEST OUT OF WAWA & THE VISITOR’S CENTER

THIS IS THE LADY WHO GAVE KELLY HER CAR KEYS TO GO GET US A TIM HORTON’S COFFEE

A TRUE HISTORIC CANADA GOOSE

Kelly also asked the lady where we could dump our tanks & find some water.  All Parks are closed now up here in the North so we figured we had better clear the tanks & take on water wherever we could.  Lady said just down the road across from Tim Hortons was Young’s General Store & we could dump & take on water there for free.  Bonus, so that’s where we headed.  And that’s where we ran into trouble.

JUST PULL IN BESIDE THE OLD FIRE TRUCK CAUSE THAT’S WHERE THE DUMP STATION IS

 

SEEMS THERE IS MORE THAN ONE GOOSE IN WAWA

  

  

PRETTY NEAT OLD FIRE TRUCK

 

No problem emptying our black & gray water tanks so hooked up our hose & began filling the fresh water tank.  Seemed to take forever.  Stood inside watching the tank level gauge finally go from quarter full to three quarter full.  Figured that was enough & headed out the door to turn the hose off.  Soon as I stepped out I saw water coming out by our steps.  Water was running out three rubber drain hoses.  Ran around & shut the water off at the tap but water continued to run for another 5 minutes or more before we heard air sounds from the hoses.  Had also noticed something hanging out of one hose.  Steel wool?  Reached in & pulled more steel wool out of all the hoses.  We think the former owner plugged up those hoses for storage to keep rodents out.  A check of our fresh water tank now showed the level at a quarter full.  We had lost most of the water we had just put in.  We still had water from the tap inside but how much water in our fresh water was an unknown.  I didn’t trust the gauge.  So now we had a problem.  Checked all the bins for water but all was OK there & bins were dry.  Decided to not re-fill the tank because we didn’t know what the original problem was.  Pouring through the rig’s manuals Kelly found a section saying be sure drain valves are free of obstructions because if not serious problems can occur when filling the fresh water tank.  ‘OH-OH’ we could have some serious water line trouble here:((

 

ENJOYING THE DAY’S BREATHTAKING SCENERY

 

THIS IS WHAT I SEE IN MY REAR VIEW MIRROR WHILE ROLLING DOWN THE ROAD & A POLICE SPOT CHECK FOR TRUCKS BUT THEY WAVED US THROUGH

Just before emptying our tanks we had decided to drive to Pukaskwa National Park near Marathon Ontario & hole up for a couple days.  Plan was to arrive in Winkler Manitoba next Monday or Tuesday.  Winkler is the home of Triple & is where our rig was made.  But now with some kind of problem or leak with our fresh water tank we knew we probably didn’t have enough water to last that long.   Our crappy weather also aided in this decision.   Decided the only choice we have is to head for Winkler & try to make it there before the week-end & before we run out of water.  Hopefully they could diagnose our problem & help us out.  So for right now that is our plan.  We will try to reach Winkler by Friday afternoon sometime.  After a first great day our journey has taken on a stress factor.  A furnace problem, a water problem, & the weather has been the total pits.  Other than that the rig has run great.  Impressed with the power this 8.1 Chevy engine has.  We kept right up through the hills & dells with those big diesel banging truckers:))

 

Ended our day in a drizzly fog.  Found a place beside the Ministry Of Natural Resources in Terrace Bay & pulled into their parking lot for the night.  Fingers crossed we don’t get kicked out.  About 9 o’clock it began pouring rain…..:((

   

Meant to include a link to Mike’s blog over at PHANNIE & MAE a few days ago but it slipped my mind until tonight.  Their Motorhome was burglarized while in a high end RV Park.  Be sure to read his latest follow-up post as well.  Some lessons to be learned here.

 

OUR SPOT FOR THE NIGHT AT THE MNR

About 80% of today’s photos were again taken from a moving driver’s seat so pictures may be a bit fuzzy & not the best.  I’m hoping they will at least give readers a sense of the Fall’s colors.  There are literally a million photos per mile along this stretch of road & how I would have loved to been able to spend some time in fine sunny weather just wandering along a rugged Lake Superior shoreline trying to capture even a little bit of the awe inspiring majestic scenery & absolute beauty which abounds here in this land of Indian myth & legend…………………

 

WE ENDED OUR DAY IN A SHROUD OF FOG

GROANER’S CORNER:((  Unable to get on the internet tonight & not able to reach my Groaner’s Corner joke source or Hotmail account where I have jokes filed.  Therefore I am unable to come up with anything humorous.  I did manage to save something from Hotmail this morning though.  Saw it on my Son Sean’s Facebook page.  Another stunning photo of Granddaughter Erin…………

GORE BAY TO SAULT STE MARIE ONTARIO…A COLD WINDY START, SOME RAIN, & ALL CLOUD:((

IT WAS A COLD & WINDY MORNING WALK IN GORE BAY THIS MORNING

  

OUR BOONDOCKING OVERNIGHT SPOT WAS JUST SOUTH OF THE MARINA & ROLLING SOUTH OUT OF GORE BAY ONTARIO ABOUT 9:30 THIS MORNING

Rains finally ended sometime in the night but wind gusts were still buffeting our awning flaps when I took Pheebs out about 6 a.m.  Temperature was 45F.  Figure in the wind chill factor & we’re in the upper 30’s.   A check of our weather had shown a change again & now called for a sun & cloud day.  By 9 there was no indication of any breaks in the heavy cloud cover & the biting East wind had not let up.  Made the decision to pack up & head off on our continuing journey. 

  

Justified our not toughing out the cold windy day by agreeing that at some point in the future when we are unable to head South in the winter anymore we would one day return to Manitoulin Island.  Leave Bayfield right after a Labor Day week-end in early September & do a warmer weather circle tour up through Collingwood, Parry Sound, Sudbury, Manitoulin Island, Sault Ste Marie, cross into the States at Mackinaw & slip down the Michigan Peninsula crossing back into Canada at Port Huron/Sarnia & back on to Bayfield.  Yep, we’re already looking forward to that trip one day:))

We rolled out of Gore Bay about 9:30.   Gore Bay looks like a nice scenic little town & seemed to have a nice feel to it despite the bad weather.  Saw a Valu-Mart, Home Hardware & a GM dealership all on the main street.  Again had the sun been out the scenery would have been prettier than it already was.  I had to pour a little contrast into today’s photos just to dance a little vibrant color out of the leaves.  Just out of Gore Bay a slight rainy mist followed us across the Island to Little Current where we crossed over to the mainland on a swing bridge at 10:30.  The road from Gore Bay to Little Current was much better than the road from South Baymouth to Gore Bay.  Much better.

 

SWING BRIDGE TO THE MAINLAND AT LITTLE CURRENT

SPOTTED THIS WHAT LOOKS TO BE A LARGE CRUISE BOAT JUST EAST OF LITTLE CURRENT (NOT THE CHI-CHEEMAUN)

Again beautiful northern Ontario scenery all the way from Little Current to Espanola.  It was 11:15 when we rolled into a mall parking lot on Espanola’s southern edge for a leg stretch, egg salad sandwiches & a computer check.  Not raining but cloudy & cold & still very windy.  Decided to press on for Sault Ste Marie.  Just a couple miles north of Espanola we turned left & headed West.

 

ABOVE PHOTOS TAKEN BETWEEN LITTLE CURRENT & ESPANOLA

STOPPED IN AN ESPANOLA MALL PARKING LOT FOR EGG SALAD SANDWICH’S, PICKLES, & CHIPS

Been 40 years since I traveled this stretch of the Trans Canada highway & was expecting a lot of two lane traffic.  I needn’t have worried.  Traffic was surprising lite & I was really surprised at the lack of big trucks.  The highway is much improved since I last drove it & now has lots of passing lanes.  There were long stretches of highway today where no vehicles were visible either ahead or behind us.  My kinda traffic.  Nice Fall foliage all the way but without the sun……well, you know.

Rolled into the ‘Soo’ about 3 o’clock & proceeded to get ourselves a little turned around a couple times but we did manage to finally find Walmart which had a Home Depot beside it.  We knew from experience Home Depot would be quieter so that’s where we dropped anchor for the night.

WE WERE SO HOPING THAT PATCH OF BLUE ON THE HORIZON WAS HEADED OUR WAY BUT ALAS IT VEERED OFF SOMEWHERE & WE ARE STILL UNDER CLOUDY SKIES AT THE END OF THE DAY….BUT MUCH MILDER THAN GORE BAY…WE ARE AT 62F AT 6 P.M.

 

Been having a bit time with one of our rig’s two furnaces.  Bedroom & bathroom area furnace works perfect but the furnace heating the kitchen & living room area is giving us grief.  Monday it blew hot air but would keep shutting itself off after a minutes running.  Kelly tried all the settings but to no avail.  Today it is blowing only cold air.  We (whenever I say we I’m really meaning Kelly) have all the furnace manuals out & are trying to trouble shoot the problem.  If we can’t solve it maybe the manufacture’s of our coach can help us out when we arrive in Winkler Manitoba maybe next week sometime.  In the meantime it’s fur lined boots & toques in the living room & Bermuda shorts & Hawaiian music in the bedroom & bathroom areas.

 

OUR SAULT STE MARIE ROOST FOR THE NIGHT

And we were able to determine the Corner Gas set I want to see has not burned down.  It was another separate building in the town of Rouleau sometimes used in the series that burned.  Whewwwww, close call there…….

 

AN OCTOBER 2012 FILE PHOTO FROM SPENCERPORT NEW YORK:))

GROANER’S CORNER:(( Shortly after reporting to the 101st Airborne Division, we were ordered to fall out in our dress uniforms. Only problem was, I didn't know how to tie a necktie. So I asked the guy in the next bunk for help.
"Sure," he said. "Lie down."  Confused, I lay down on the bunk and he tied my tie. "Sorry, but this is the only way I know how," he said. "Comes from practicing on my father's clients."  "What does your father do?"  "He's a mortician."

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