Tuesday 13th June – Exploring Grundy Lake Park

This helpful display meant that we could identify the suspect that had woken us up this morning!

It was our first night on the ‘bunk bed’ above the cab of the RV last night and I’m glad to say that it felt comfortable.  We slept well and it appears that the in-laws did as well, apart from being prematurely awoken by a noisy woodpecker neighbour.

As the animal life was limited, here's some flora instead!

After breakfast, we went to visit the park rangers to ask which hiking trail they recommended for us and also to stock up on bug spray as we had emptied all we had onto our bodies last night to put off the swarms! We chose the middling-length walk along Gut Lake Trail, which was thankfully prettier than it sounds! The trail guide estimated about an hour and a half to complete the walk. We had planned to do a longer hike but we also had a long drive to reach our next booked stop for tonight.
 
It was another very hot day but there was some shade available.  We took two hours in the end, mostly due to stopping for many photographs and exploring across some rocks.  The scenery was lovely but with limited wildlife to enjoy (Though there's a chance the wildlife may have heard us coming, of course!).

Pretty pleased with this close-up dragonfly shot though

Ray ventured out onto the rocks, encouraged by Simon who strangely stayed on dry land...

The trail climbed to give us a view over adjoining wetland

This turtle was one of the very few animals we saw.... right by the car park!

We ate a well-deserved lunch but agreed that everyone would have to wait to have showers this evening as the satnav was estimating 5 hours and 10 minutes to reach our next stop, Saute St Marie!

Simon and I swapped over driving a couple of times.  We were heading west on route 17, the Trans-Canada highway.  Despite regular signage warning of moose, the search continues!  We filled up the petrol tank for CAD$200 (ouch, that's about £120!) and arrived at Bells Point Beach independent camp ground about 715pm.  Simon had booked this for two nights to give his parents a taste of an independent park in contrast to the provincial parks we would be staying in the rest of the week. Sadly, on arrival we were told that the beach-front full hook-up site we’d booked was unavailable!  With no real explanation.  Still, we all just wanted to get showered and have something to eat so we got hooked up and had a quick pasta dinner. 

It may not have quite been what we'd booked but we made it feel like home anyway.

We were now camped along the St Mary’s River which runs between Lakes Huron and Superior, the land on the other side of the slim stretch of water being part of the United States (below):

We enjoyed another campfire and finished a game of scrabble that been abandoned late last night due to bad light stopping play.