A Good Night’s Sleep & Lucky Breaks All Around / Cold, Wet, Hungry and Miserable / Did I Just Cheat?

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A few disclaimers off the top

#1 For some reason this blog “requires” that I put a location with each post. The problem is they (the blog people) have very few locations to pick from. Point is if the location does not make sense you know why.

#2 Somehow I screwed up my subscription list and most of you did not get the first two blogs. Follow these simple instructions to view them. Click on "Bloggers" at the top of the page. Then click on "S" and then click on "Sa". Then scroll until you find me "Safari Arie". Use this method to look into the archives at any time. Sorry for this.


Tuesday June 21, 2011
A Good Night’s Sleep & Lucky Breaks All Around

I think it goes without saying that as a hitchhiker one prays for safety, lots of good rides and no rain. My biggest prayer was for a place to sleep in Tobermory. My experience from my road trip in 2004 was that finding a secluded place to sleep in a car was even next to impossible let alone in walking distance. The area is just so built up.

I spent my evening in a restaurant (working on the laptop) until the inevitable would happen, (closing time). As I walked to the lonely picnic table where I thought I would be spending a miserable night, two young guys approached me and asked me if I was also looking to set up a tent. They had been biking from the East Coast and had already been kicked out of any (local) area for camping. Upon further conversation I inquired as to where their bikes were. (Obviously they were without their bikes at this time). They said they had them well hidden in some trees. I convinced them that should take me to their bikes as if they were that well hidden it would probably make a good camping area and three tents were better than one or two tents.

Needless to say they had found the perfect place, I got a good night’s sleep and in the morning they found me the half dozen eggs I had been looking for. Who sells half a dozen eggs anymore!

Now I just need to pray the rain that has started goes away. (Currently typing this on the ferry and there are rain drops on the windows).

It took 2 rides to get me off Manitoulin Island. I got my first (short) ride right off the ferry. Lucky too, just started to rain. My second ride brought me right to the Swing Bridge at Little Current which is the island exit. My third ride of the day practically got me to the Elliot Lake turn off. He saved me from getting wet. He dropped me off at a trading post along the side of the highway where I made myself some lunch.

After lunch I moved on and no one wanted to pick me up. Then it started to rain. Then it started to rain harder. I walked about 2 hours and now I am wet. I notice what looked like an abandon trailer on the side of the highway. I am cold and wet; I need to see if the trailer is truly abandoned. As I get closer the door opens and an old Indian waves me in. He offers me shelter. The trailer is in very poor condition, but I am out of the rain. He offers me the run down camper that is parked nearby for the night. I accept, but the sun finally comes out at 6 pm. I told him that I was going to stand by the road and try one last time to get a ride. If no ride comes I would stay the night in the camper.

Shortly after standing at the road a car pulls over coming from the other direction. It is an older Indian lady with some passengers. She hands me $4 and some change. I don’t know why I took the money. I guess it would make for a good story someday. I decline the package of opened Twinkies though. She wished me luck and said that it was her cousin “Pete” who let me stay with him to get out of the rain. Wouldn’t be spooky if she said he died 20 years ago?

Shortly after I got picked up and got a ride all the way to the outskirts of Sault Ste. Marie. A lot of my rides have taken me further then their turn off. I must say I really enjoy this hitch hiking thing. Should have done this 20 years ago.


Wednesday June 22, 2011
Cold, Wet, Hungry and Miserable

I woke up this morning to rain. I read for a few hours and then fell back to sleep. I woke up at 11:30, the rain had stopped, I broke camp and then it started to rain again.

I spent the whole day in 2 spots. Minutes into my start of the day I found a little shelter under a church veranda. Whenever it rained I kept my bags there while I stood in the blowing rain trying to get a ride, whenever the rain stopped I brought my bags to the road side. After 3½ hours I finally got a 10 minute ride. I got a ride about 25 km outside Sault Saint Marie. I tried for the next 4½ hours to get my second ride of the day. At 8:00 pm I gave up and set up camp behind a Bell maintenance building.

One 10 minute ride in 8 hours and I stuck to only 2 spots because of rain and/or fear of being rained on. But I can’t be sticking around waiting tomorrow. Tomorrow I must keep moving.


Thursday June 23, 2011
Did I Just Cheat?

I had camp packed up by 7:30 this morning, it was still overcast. I walked about 15 km with absolutely no luck. It took three hours with a heavy pack. No one was picking me up. I usually took a small break at the top of each hill and a small break at the bottom of each hill. I can’t keep doing this. I came to a hotel/restaurant on the side of the highway. I inquired about the Greyhound bus that I had seen the day before. I found out that NO ONE gets picked up on this highway between Sault Ste. Marie and Thunder Bay and that this section of the highway was famous for hitch hikers being stranded. And I found out that the Greyhound would not pick me up on the side of the road. The pick-up spot was exactly where I started three hours ago! And Thunder Bay was over 600 km ahead of me and the bus was coming by in a little over an hour. A very nice retired couple offered to drive me back to where I had started my morning. They probably saved my life.

As I sat waiting for the bus it occurred to me that I was sitting in the exact same place not 23 hours earlier. How’s that for progress?

The stretch of highway between Sault Ste. Marie and Thunder Bay is amazing. I had forgotten how nice it was since my 2004 road trip. Being cooped up in a bus for this part of the trip was a total shame. I could have taken 100 pictures. It also occurred to me that being cooped up in some else’s car through the Rockies will also be a total shame. I am not sure how I will swing it but I think a bike is a necessity once I get to Calgary.

If taking the bus was cheating, know that I paid the price. The price of the ticket - $167.92 including the taxes! Greyhound knows how to stick it to you when you are stuck in the middle of nowhere. I also got stuck in the isle seat across from the crazy bag- lady off her meds who talked to herself for most of the 8 hour bus ride.

So this afternoon’s big prayer was a place to sleep tonight in Thunder Bay. It’s getting on in the early hours of the morning; I am in a city I don’t know; somewhere in the middle of the city. The bus station borders a commercial area with an industrial area. I noticed a (small) clump of trees across from the bus station that runs along the railway tracks. Thanks for trees, now I just need to find a shower.

Tomorrow I will head to a truck stop. After such bad luck east of Thunder Bay, the west looks very isolated also. So my hope/plan would be to try to get a trucker to give me a lift.

I apologize for the lack of pictures. Will try to fix that in the future. 2 am, very tired.

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Photos

Manitoulin Island Appears
A quick shot of Manitoulin Island from the ferry

Swing Bridge
The Swing Bridge at Little Current where you leave Manitoulin Island. The bridge swings for sail boats

Comman Sense Is Not Comman
My lunch stop. A little comman sense.

My Refuge
The trailer that I thought was abandoned. An old Indian gave me shelter.