Taking Lake Superior (by Goldwing), Day 3
or, into each life some rain must fall
Anyone who knows anything about Lake Superior knows it controls the weather around it. As previously mentioned, it makes summers like October, makes Octobers like December, and so on. Perhaps lesser known is that it moderates winter temperatures as well — in downtown Duluth, it might be 20 degrees warmer than the “over the hill” temps. Google AI says there has been up to a 42-degree difference between the airport and the lakefront — someone wrote that somewhere, AI digested it, and here I am repeating it. meh.
But that’s not too crazy, overall. With that “crazy” lake influence explained above, the low temp predicted for Friday this week in the Twin Cities says 53, so all of Minnesota is subject to these weird weather whims. And as a rule, no matter how cold it is anywhere in Minnesota in summer, it will almost always be colder by the lake (this is also stated constantly in Milwaukee).
All of this is a lead-in to say that Day 3 provided us with cooler temps (hovering around 46-48 for a good part of the day), accompanied by a mostly steady rain. But as Longfellow wrote,
Be still, sad heart! and cease repining;
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining;
Thy fate is the common fate of all,
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.
The cold was a bigger problem than the rain, I’d say. Big Black had grip heaters, but I couldn’t feel them working. Both Graham and I had enough clothes to keep ourselves plenty warm, but the cold does leak in anywhere it can. It’s like winter bike riding … you find a hole, you plug it, and then repeat until the ride is over. I should’ve zipped the top half of my suit to the bottom half, but I didn’t. And if I didn’t feel an extreme need to do so, I know it wasn’t that bad outside.
I’ve not ridden in a lot of rain, which is another way of saying I haven’t been on many long motorcycle tours. Graham knows far more about this than I do, but with experience or not, it caused us no real problems, because as excellent as the Goldwings are at creating a calm air bubble around the rider on clear days, they are just as amazing on rainy days. If anything gets wet, it’s the back shoulders, as the air swirls around from behind.
As long as the roads drain well and the rain isn’t too hard, very little needs to change with regard to riding style. I freak out a bit when the road surface is fresh and it looks shiny, but there is no reason to fear. We were cruising at normal speeds, or maybe a bit faster, as there is little to see in this part of the Canadian route — the towns are mostly off the highway and the scenery is less … scenic.
What’s also true is that it’s more of a pain to stop in the rain than it is to keep riding, and so we just rode and rode. We did stop at the A&W in Marathon to get lunch, but after that we rode thru Terrace Bay, Schreiber, and Nipigon (which sounds like the name of a product to remove those pesky, unwanted nipples, we decided).
The sun finally broke free in Thunder Bay (the biggest town on Lake Superior), where we talked briefly with a group of guys from Minneapolis who were going north to do some fly-in fishing somewhere more remote. It’s pretty common for Midwest fishing trips to head north to find better waters, although opinions vary on the necessity of that.
The rain really did cut into our desire to stop for photos … so … we didn’t. We crossed the border back into the USA without any fanfare and made it southwest to Grand Marais more or less on autopilot. We were pretty much in lake-assisted fog and clouds on most of the Pigeon River (aka the border)→Grand Marais section as we went up and down in the river valleys along the lake. It looked a little bit like some sort of Lord of the Rings region, wispy fog hiding the hilltops, the lake, and occasionally, the road itself.
We were tired out in Grand Marais and wanted to stay over, figuring that Sunday night would offer some cheaper motel rates, but nothing looked good, and the weather was tight and grey, so we pushed on. We were on the fence about going all the way back to the Twin Cities, and that consumed most of our limited brainpower by this point in the day.
Going by Lutsen, Tofte, Silver Bay, Castle Danger(!) and all the rest let us know that we were really back in home territory. Like I mentioned earlier, most Minnesotans know the North Shore area, and everyone has their favorite spots. Gooseberry Falls is a must-see every time (except this one), the Temperance River is wonderful, the road tunnels are good for horn testing, the Split Rock Lighthouse is usually too busy, and Palisade Head is always worth a view (except when cloudy). Weather plays a huge role is what is available and worthwhile.
We finally ran out of motivation in Two Harbors, which is a town that feels like home. Our group of friends used to regularly go to Big Blaze campground (now built into the Larsmont Cottages, I read) just south of Two Harbors when we were kids, and we’d always drive into town for food when the fireside cooking failed. Miraculously though unsurprisingly, the fickle weather cleared again and we had some half-sun again by the time we took this picture down by the ore docks:
We also made a friend at the dock viewing platform:
And we found a nice place to settle in for the night:
I like old motels, so here’s another shot:
The bikes liked it here as well:
I also like neon signs:
This motel is right on Hwy 61, and I recommend it highly. It has the right blend of being clean, affordable and charming, and there is a motel dog named Stella who lives there who we liked.
We ate food from Culver’s, watched the Indiana Pacers fold in game 2 of the NBA finals, and then went to sleep.
Day 4 would offer some options to be considered after sleep.