11-14 August 2014

We headed up to Camille’s Café that we heard about the night before. The selling point was the homemade bread. It was great, and when it was toasted it had a nutty flavor to it.

At 10 we were departing from the marina on what looked like a calm day. We had two choices, head up the St Mary’s River (direct route) or go up through Lake George, the more scenic route. Of course we took the scenic route. Very nice and very pretty.

Lake George is a wide expanse of water, on the south end it is very shallow, there is only a narrow channel for about 5 miles. It was well marked and the only boat traffic were fishermen. With almost no wind the lake was glassy with just our wake rolling across the surface.

At the north end of Lake George we enter the Root River. It goes north past Sault Ste Marie and the doubles back to join the St. Mary’s south of town. Lots of cottages on the left (US side) and the right (Canadian) side of the river. It’s interesting to follow the markers, since some are USCG and some are the Canadian Coast Guard. In some places the Green is US and the Red is Canada.

We were soon coming in to the slip at the Robera Bondar Marina. Roberta Bondar was the first Canadian Woman to go to the International Space Station, she went in 1999. It’s very nice marina, there is a pavilion next door where they play concerts. The roof is fabric and has petty cool support system. I spent about ½ hour looking at how it worked.

Since it was a nice day, we headed over to the Bush Plane Museum. Bush planes play a huge role in transporting goods and people into North West Ontario. They have some of the early planes and samples of the current planes. It was interesting to see that the plane we took on our tour around Parry Sound is one of the more common models flying today.

There is also a neat 3D movie about how they fight forest fires in Ontario. I never really thought about it until you see the map and realize a)How big Ontario really is b)How much is just forest lands. It’s a good movie and gives you a closeup of how big these fires can get and how hard they are to fight.

We also watched a movie about a bush pilot delivering a passenger to a remote camp. The best part is they start from Sportsman’s. But this is Sportsman’s from a decade ago, it’s interesting to see how Killarney has changed. The pilot also flies down Baie Fine and it was cool to see it from the air.

Asking the dock staff for places to go has served us well in the past. They suggested Muio’s for Canadian home cooking. One of the popular items in Canada seems to be broasted chicken. It’s deep-fried food that is pressure cooked at the same time. My chicken strips were verygood, Susan’s half chicken could have used some more spices.

The other thing I ask about is dive bars. On their recommendation we hit both “The New A” and “Reggie’s Place”. If you are looking for traditional “shots / beer” places, these two should be on top of your list. Sadly, because we were there mid-week there were no other customers.

Tuesday started up as a cold, rainy, blustery day. We left the boat to check out the Norgoma Freighter that is docked at the marina. It is a freighter from the 1930′s that is in the process of being restored. It made trips from Killarney to Sault Ste Marie every week for two decades.

Next up were hair appointments for both of us. I headed off to two of the other small museums in town. I love the local ones and how they show life in the towns. One was the building used by one of the original settlers in the town. The other was in the old post office from the 1930′s. One had an entire floor dedicated to sports in town. Turns out Tony and Phil Esposito came from the Soo and were hocky stars in school.

Dinner was at a place called Dock’s next door to the marina. The waitress was interesting, she is taking aviation classes and wants to start out as a bush pilot.

Wednesday opened up sunny and bright, and it was a good thing because at 7:30 we were board the train to Agawa Canyon on the Algoma Central Railway train. We both love trains and it was a very nice ride. They have TV’s along the cars and you get a narrated tour of the trip. When the narration isn’t going on, there is an engineers eye view of the activities.

One of the high points is crossing the trestle at the Montreal River. It’s a curving trestle so from our location in one of the rear cars we could see the engine. These feats of enginering always impresses me.

Agawa Canyon is very interesting. There are three waterfalls that splash into the river below. There is also an observation platform that is 321 steps above the river. I wanted to try, and once I got to 175 steps I decided I was going to make it. Yay me!! I got some good pictures from the top.

I met up with Susan at Black Beaver Falls. It tumbles 175 feet down in multiple cascades. The Bridal falls wasn’t working, the summer has been dry. We had a picnic lunch along the river and enjoyed the tranquil nature. Well as tranquil as it can be with two diesel engines idling in the background.

The only problem with a long train-ride to see something is the long train-ride back. It was past 6PM before we pulled into the station. We headed to town to an Italian place called Solo. We were quite pleased with our food, but the best part was the home made bread. It came with a baked head of garlic. Ummm, warm, soft garlic to use as a spread. Yum.

Thursday started out as another cold blowy day. We would have the choice of spending an extra day in Canada or in Michigan, we opted for Canada to do some shopping. The nice people at the marina took us out to Pino’s market where Susan got us stocked for the next week of boating.

We spent part of the afternoon picking up the salon so that it would not be such a mess. The rest of the afternoon gave us both a chance to nap since we had walked so much in the Canyon.

Dinner was a place called Embers that specializes in grilled and smoked dishes. Susan had the smoked mussels, they were good with just a hint of smoke flavor. I had an appetizer that had four types of meat, smoked salmon, duck breast wrapped in bacon, smoked sausages and pork riblets.

While we were at Embers we talked to the waitress about my quest for butter tarts and microbrews. She said we should go down to Loplops to check out their selection.

Loplops is a small storefront that leads back to a huge set of rooms. At one end of the bar are four coolers containing beers from around the world. Two of them are full of Canadian microbrews. They also had 11 beers on tap, 8 from Canada. Bob the bartender gave us the tour and I picked out a few different ones to try. As we sipped Bob told us about his travel adventures going through the Panama canal on a cruise ship. Maybe something else to add to my bucket list.

We got home late, but did the final prep to head across the river in the morning. Fair well Canada, it was a great summer!