12 May - Fort Frances to Schreiber - Day 8 of TCE

I wouldn’t have missed the sunrise even if I had to sleep out in the open. I kept peering from the bedroom window when to jump out of bed to walk across to the gazebo across the road. From there I would relax and soak in the experience, I told myself. The first lights on the sky had me scrambling out of bed in shorts and on to the road. The slivers of light had turned into a fireball far away in the horizon. That’s when I realised that I had started shivering. I was not clothed for the outdoors. I set up a phone camera to capture the sunrise in hyperlapse and ran indoors for additional clothing.

I need not have worried about someone whacking the phone for there was no one about on the Sunday morning and I had good sight of the it from my room. The views were magical, at the cost of sounding clichéd. I did not want to move from where I was. The brilliant sunrise, I said to myself, was perhaps the Sun’s way of greeting all the mothers in the word on Mother’s Day. I warmly remembered my own and many others I had the privilege of being related to and acquainted with. Mothers are the most selfless humans in the world, the fulcrum of a family and society. They are the glue that bind the universe of mankind and, maybe, all living beings. She is irreplaceable and she is the ultimate caretaker, giver and teacher. Salutes, many times, to mothers all over the world.

Losing my sense of time viewing the sunrise, I was later than usual getting on to the highway this day for the drive to Schreiber. Breakfast was muesli and milk with a hot cup of coffee. The drive was fairly uneventful with that up to Thunder Bay on undivided roads and 90 kph speed restriction. Rainy Lake was everywhere and it dominated the landscape for quite a while. The Rainy Lake flows into the Rainy River and both the countries harness its waters for generation of power. Fuel stations were just not there up to Thunder Bay. Even though I had enough to last me for the day I was worried lest the situation remain the same even in Schreiber. I need not have worried. I tanked up in an Esso outlet in Thunder Bay, manned by a boy of Indian origin.

A few km out of the city and glorious views of Lake Superior greeted me at every turn. The route almost hugged the coast. I stopped at a few places for the sights and photos. Some parts of the world’s largest freshwater lake was still frozen. Along the way there was snow still on the side of the roads. The landscape changed from close to Thunder Bay. In a distance I caught sight of a large escarpment of rocks and what looked like laterite. The colour of the rocks changed too; from grim grey to right ochre, orange and light red. Trees looked healthier too with them being greener and lot more foliage. A little short of Shabaqua, ahead of Thunder Bay, was a sign that said that from that point the Eastern Standard Time would be applicable. That meant a loss of another hour in my schedule.

Lake Superior is one of the five Great Lakes of Northern America, the others being Huron, Ontario, Michigan and Eire. These interconnected lakes is the largest collection of freshwater lakes on Earth by area and occupies 21% of the world’s total freshwater by volume. By volume Baikal Lake in Russia is the largest with 23%. Lake Superior is also the largest freshwater lake by volume. The Lake found expression in the epic poem of Longfellow, The Song of the Hiawatha, written in 1855, which was part of my non-detailed text in school. Glancing sideways for all the views that I could have of the Lake, I drove on listening to classic Hindi songs which seemed quite appropriate for the time. There was poetry, melody, soulful orchestration and excellent rendition in both the songs and the Lake.

Schreiber looked like a one horse town – its population was announced as 1100! Fortunately, the Villa Bianca Inn and Restaurant was on the highway. While I checked in I also found out a couple of places I could be in the few hours before nightfall. The latter I need not have worried about at all. Even when I hit the sack at 9.30 pm I had to ensure that the blinds were drawn, for there was light still about. I was keen to see the Railway Museum in Schreiber as it had been an important junction for the Canadian Pacific Railway. Unfortunately, it was closed due to Mother’s Day. However, I don’t think I missed much as the museum functioned from inside a passenger coach that had been long in disuse. An old diesel engine and a few other exhibits constituted the museum.

The Aguasabon Falls and Gorge was about 15 km from where I stayed, in Terrace Bay. The Aguasabon River empties into Lake Superior through the falls and gorge. A short boardwalk to a viewing platform affords magnificent views of the falls, the gorge and the Lake at a fair distance. The thundering falls is over 100 feet high and gushes excitedly through fractured rocks and follows a gorge on the way to meet the lake. The spray from the falls felt refreshing on the face. The sound of the falls is exaggerated due to the pristine environment and without any other external noises to drown the thunder. It was quite cold there and I retreated to the warm confines of my car in a short while.

The Schreiber Beach was another recommendation. The beach is reached through the town and an underpass below the CP railway track. The beach is more pebbled than sandy and it is the shore of the massive Lake Superior. I found the stones on the shore, of different colours, sizes and shapes, quite intriguing. How many millennia it would have taken for the waters to shape them as such, I wondered. I picked up a few stones for keepsakes. I even found a slightly large stone which looked like the profile of Hanuman. It was too heavy to lug back, else I surely would not have parted with that piece.

The Inn has three restaurants attached to it – KFC, Pizza Hut and Donuts. I thought of having a pizza for dinner. As I got to the counter the lady told me that she had run out of pizzas due to the large orders on Mother’s Day. Back to the room it was time for spiked Root Beer and the regular dose of noodles and spam.