Ivanhoe Lake Provincial Park, Foleyet, Ontario
Well, we made it from Ottawa to Ivanhoe Lake Provincial Park without incident. Leaving Ottawa before sunrise made for a pretty early wake-up call but would also allow us time to stop a long the way more often and also allowed us time to get the tents set up before dark. The new lake side boardwalk and docking area in Temagami was nice to see and as good as any a reason to stop and stretch our legs. After a short leg-stretch stop, we were on our way again soon to reach Timmins in time for a short lunch break.
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Quite a bit of road construction along the way but, for the most part, the skies were blue and the winds were light – no fog, no rain, no snow! Along the way we saw moose at two different locations along the highway and black bears at two other locations. When I see moose and bear grazing along the ditches in broad daylight I usually assume that the bugs are plentiful in the woods. Such was the case. When we stopped at the campsite to set up our tents, the mosquitoes and black flies were quick to find our bare skin – out came the DEET before we went for a short walk along the shoreline. The Bonaparte’s Gulls were along the shoreline again and park staff indicated that they had seen some birds picking up sticks along the roadway so that it would appear that these gulls are in fact breeding in the area. Other wildlife spotted during our short walk included Tiger Swallowtail Butterflies, Red Squirrels, Cedar Waxwings, a Yellow-Rumped Warbler (a.k.a. Myrtle Warbler), many fast flying Dragonflies and a small blue butterfly.
Since it was Friday night, the restaurant at Ivanhoe Air was open, so, with tents set up, it was off for supper before getting into the sleeping bags for a few winks before the 4AM alarm would go off.
