G.A.S.P.

(Great Adventures to Scenic Places)

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June 4, 1999

The rest of that afternoon of 6-3 and most of the next day (6-4) I rode southwest along the Lake Superior coast. The road was good, and there were a number of enjoyable views of the Lake. On Friday, only about 10 miles out of Grand Marais (my stopping point the night before), I encountered a fortuitous thunderstorm that drove me to the closest refuge – Cascade River State Park. That early in the day, I probably would have ridden right by it, but once at the gatehouse I discovered the scenic beauty. When the rain let up somewhat, I walked the half-mile to the river. There I found a spectacular gorge of cascading water rushing toward Lake Superior. I walked a half-mile or so along either side of the gorge and took several photos. (Photos 43 - 45) No kidding, if this State Park were in Ohio, it would easily be the most scenic place in the entire state.

Click on thumbnail to see full photograph

I passed a number of other scenic rivers, the best of which was a wide cascading wall of water. I just got a glance at it as it was right smack dab in the middle of a construction zone and I couldn’t even slow down.

For those who like a good deli, don’t miss the Coho Deli in Tofti.

When I reached Little Marais, I turned inland and immediately ascended a tough two-mile hill (just getting ready for Colorado) and headed for the Finland State Forest Campground. It was a pleasant campground except for the town rowdies who drove through twice in the middle of the night whooping it up. As I was setting up my tent, a green pick-up truck drove slowly by, then stopped just past the entrance to my site. Thinking it was the Ranger, and knowing that I hadn’t paid yet, I went out to the truck. No Ranger. Instead it was a 40ish woman who called out something about where was I headed. She later said intuition had caused her to drive through the camp (she was going another 50 miles North) and intuition that caused her to stop (she doesn’t usually talk to strangers). Anyway, she had lost her job in Dallas a couple of months ago and was taking a six-month sojourn across the Northern US and Southern Canada before she got real serious about finding another job. She had just spent two weeks on Isle Royale. We talked for awhile and exchanged e-mail addresses. We parted both believing we had found a kindred spirit, and her (Jayne Uerling is her name) planning to think up a good name for her sojourn.