We left Ottawa on August 3rd at the earlier than anticipated hour of 7:30am. The car was fully packed the night before, and it felt like Christmas morning! Antoine and I woke up at 5:40am, looked at one another and said “can you sleep?” “No, ok me either… let’s just go!”
The first 4 hours of the trip were very familiar to North Bay, but things got more interesting once we hit Highway 11 North. There was very little traffic despite it being the August long weekend, and this allowed us to make excellent ground on our first day. We stopped for a quick picnic dinner in Hearst comprised of all the leftovers from our fridge in Ottawa, and then hit the road with the remaining hours of daylight until we reached a secluded logging road somewhere before Longlac. Our screens kept us nice and safe from the onslaught of mosquitos in this area. We didn’t dare leave the car!
After this, it was just a quick 5 hours to our family camp at Mckenzie Lake, Armstrong. We stayed at camp for two full days and enjoyed every minute of it! We spent time with my amazing family, ate way too much food, went fishing and blueberry picking and even did a little work on the new camp. It’s incredible to see my Dad’s dream post-and-beam camp coming together!
Beau learned how to eat blueberries straight from the bush
Our comfy campsite behind the new camp
Antoine, Robert and Beau playing on the beach
Antoine helped seal up the camp, while I painted a preservation sealant on the wooden posts outside
There were so many ups during our two days at camp, but also a few downs including two tiny rocks stuck in our rear disc brakes and the loss of my bank cards and license. The rock problems were good practice for removing our tires, and now we know we have every tool we need for the Dempster. Despite a valiant 2 hour search by the entire neighbourhood for my cards, the case was not to be found! Luckily I still have my wallet and everything else is easily replaced along the way to the Yukon. We’re not letting this get us down 🙂
Next time you hear from us, we’ll be in the Prairies! We are finally inching closer to the Ontario-Manitoba border, with 350km left to go. This province never ends!!!!
Lots of love and thanks for tuning in,
Liz & Antoine