Thunder Bay

Sunday October 21...8:45pm

Made it from White River to Thunder Bay today. It was about 400 km's. That's a fair bit of a drive when you're only doing 80 km/h and stopping to see the sights. Oh, about 20 km's outside of White River there's a section where there was a big forest
fire about 10 years ago, so there's a lot of left over dead trees still standing, and the new growth is still very young. Anyhow, we saw a bald eagle and his mate sitting in the top of this one dead tree right near the highway. This sighting is important because we've decided there is NO other wildlife in Northern Ontario! Or maybe they're all scared away because it's hunting season. This is the second time we've been up through this area and haven't seen a moose. (The dead ones in the back of the hunter's pick up trucks don't count...)

Our "spot" in White River.

Stopped for lunch and a walk at Neys Provincial Park but they had the gate locked so we parked on the other side of the highway and walked in. Didn't know how far it was though, so turned around after a km and a half or so. In hindsight, we should have got the bikes set up because it would have been a perfect bike ride. Will remember that for next time.

Found a beautiful roadside rest stop that I think they left open by accident. Most of the rest stops are closed for the season, and they actually lock the gates. You'd think they would leave them open for as long as weather permits, but I guess that would make too much sense. And, we've decided that paying between $28 and $32 a night to camp in a provincial park is simply too much money. In fact, we think it's a rip off. So the government is not going to get our money. Too bad. I'd have paid a reasonable fee of $10-15. Now, they get nothing.

A rest stop on Lake Superior about 150 km east of Thunder Bay

Ruth looking at the Terry Fox Monument.  This was the spot where Terry had too give up on his run, due to his cancer returning.

Into Thunder Bay now, and parked near the waterfront in a "horseshoe club" parking lot in between the main lakefront road, and the railway tracks. Not the nicest spot, but it's a step up from Wal-Mart, and the casino here is located downtown so there's no parking there. Will head for Dryden Ontario tomorrow, and then it's into Manitoba! Looking forward to that because neither one of us has been to Manitoba or Saskatchewan for about 25 years.

Looks like we're averaging the typical 10 mpg motorhome gas mileage. It's easy to manage on the highway, but I find it really sucks the gas down when you have to do any city driving at all. Oh well, that's our lot in life. We look forward to getting out to the west coast where we will stay in one spot for more than a few days. Our fuel costs so far are high, but it will average out when we are parked for a while. Hopefully we'll have a tailwind going across the praries!

Our internet antenna is working really well. From where we're parked, the nearest possible source would be an apartment building about a kilometer away...but it's a clear line of sight from where we are, and we can pick up about 6 networks, of which 2 are unsecured. So we're really pleased with that.

Total Nights Sleeping in the RV... 8...

October Fuel $ 487.79

October Grocery $ 121.05

October Overnight Costs $ 0