Given the extrovert that I am, when we first arrived at Lake Vermilion park we talked to the camp host for a bit because the instructions on what needed to be posted to the campsite post were vague to me. We told him where we were headed the next day (Cascade River SP) among other things. This morning, while out walking his dog, the host stopped by our campsite to let us know that state highway 1 from Ely to highway 61 was closed due to a forest fire. That piece of information saved us quite a bit of frustration and doubling back on our route. The way we rode instead wasn’t much longer.
This must be getting boring to follow by now but today was more of the same – nearly empty Minnesota backroads going through forests and the countryside. Scenic route 61 up the north shore was somewhat disappointing since it ‘just’ more trees lining the road with lots of resorts either directly on the highway or set back in the woods. I was hoping for better views of the Lake Superior as we rode. No such luck. The pullouts, few as they were, were jammed packed with cars so no more parking for us. We did manage to find one pullout more by accident because according to our GPS we had already passed the Cascade River State Park. As it turned out, it was just another mile or so down the road.
Navigated a down hill gravel road to get to the campground with loose (big) gravel covering the entire street. No nice ‘driving lanes’ here. That short stretch was much more pucker factor inducing than the nine miles of county road we rode yesterday. Very unstable. Once we set up camp we went on a little hike to check out the Cascade River water falls. Some movement after all that riding and sitting in camp felt good.
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- leaving the campground
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- trail next to road, snowmobile and bicycle
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- pine trees again
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- yellowing trees due to lack of water and heat stressD
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- Diane says ‘Hi’
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- finally Lake Superior
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- short walk to the falls
