From Pukaskwa to Emo

Today should have been pretty uneventful with the plan being to just drive all day and get as many km’s under our belt as possible before we were too tired/bored to go any further.

Well about 10 km into the drive, we had just turned onto the main highway and a black bear comes strolling out of the undergrowth and straight in front of us. Just our luck that this is probably the first time so far that we didn’t have a camera handy. Anyway this is our first proper bear sighting of the trip (we saw one a couple of days ago but way in the distance and disappearing into the trees).

Then later in the day we were driving along and just standing at the side of the road was a moose – again our first. We’d spent ages in Algonquin hunting for one.

Towards the end of the day we decided to try and stop in Fort Frances – in a Walmart – I know, but it is free. Anyway we got there only to find signs up saying “No Overnight Camping”. Bugger – it was getting dark – a bit prematurely we thought but we had changed time zones during the day.

We drove about 20km’s out of town and got to a small village called Emo where we found a friendly petrol station who are happy for us to stay in their lot. Just as we parked we discovered the reason for the darkness. The wind rose from nothing to gale force in seconds, rocking the camper from side to side, the heavens opened and lightning criss-crossed the sky. This was one of the biggest storms I’ve ever seen. Mr Bulos – if you were here it definitely wouldn’t have been your thing. Half an hour later it had seriously calmed down and the setting sun came out and a beautiful rainbow formed over the Beast.