Mitas E07 tire report at 6,000km

As a near-record wet season comes to a close, I've been squeezing in a few last rides and reflecting on  what kind of bike and set-up works best for me. Since the most obvious wear item on my WR250R has been tires, I've been experimenting with different options aimed at completing a month-long adventure ride.

Last May I installed a set of Mitas E07 50/50 tires on a new set of wheels I built up myself. Having run knobbies (MT21 front, D606 rear) for much of last year, my plan this year was to let the pendulum swing back the other way and see how well a more road-oriented set-up would perform on a long, dirt-oriented route (see my Round Algonquin Park report for 2017). Call it a test ride in preparation for a more ambitious attempt at riding the Trans-American Trail in 2018.

Anyone who's played with different tires knows there's no one perfect choice for all-round adventure riding. Bike type, riding style, load, route distance, and of course route conditions all factor in to selecting appropriate rubber. On my WRR I've previously run the original Trailwings (horrible on pavement and dirt); Scorpion Pro FIM front and K760 rear (K760 wears fast and can break loose unpredictably in the dirt, and the Scorpion can wander in gravel); Heidenau K60 Scouts (overall decent on pavement and gravel, but useless in mud); the classic combo of MT21 front with D606 rear (the best handling and wearing knobbies I've tried). Sure, knobbies are great in loose gravel and dirt, but they vibrate and wear out fast in the rear--especially on hot pavement and with a loaded bike. They're a poor choice for longer rides involving slab unless you can change your rear tire every 3,000-5,000 km. So, what to choose?

Having had a generally good experience with the K60 Scouts, I thought that perhaps a "better" version of the 50/50 concept could offer extended wear life and a slight improvement in dirt handling, opening the door to longer adventure rides on rough terrain where a small bike shines. Various forums raved about Mitas tires, and particularly the E07 which is rated as a 50/50 tire with exceptional wear due to Kevlar fibers incorporated into the rubber. Having now ridden almost 6,000km on these tires (much less than planned, thanks to all the rain and mud this season), it's clear they've held up well in terms of general wear:

The front appears hardly scuffed, and although the rear has squared off a bit, there's still a good 5mm or so of tread above the central rib and lots of tread depth below that.

Now with more kilometers on these under my belt, my overall impression has shifted since my first review. They still handle well in gravel, but as my speed and skills have naturally improved over the season I think I quickly reached the grip limit of the front tire and got a little frustrated with my front wheel drifting and washing out in the loose stuff. At the same time, as the already low tread in the rear wore away, I found traction in the wet stuff noticeably diminished. Altogether, it quickly became tedious navigating any kind of mud, where holding a line was almost impossible with the low lateral traction. This can be forgiven in the rear (as long as you can maintain momentum), but having the front constantly slide around because a serious liability.

Interestingly, the tires performed much better overall when my bike was fully loaded with bags and gear. Indeed, the combo worked surprisingly well in loose sand with a loaded bike, although it was sometimes a struggle to keep a line. Perhaps the lack of knobbies prevented the front from ploughing in and dumping the bike, which is a risk if you can't keep your weight back and throttle up. The enhanced performance with a loaded bike is likely because the E07s are tremendously stiff--especially the front, which is the even stiffer "Dakar" version. The unloaded weight of my bike and rider simply isn't enough to form a decent contact patch without almost deflating the tire. In fact, after one short ride I discovered my front tire was completely out of air and yet it was almost unnoticeable when riding! On the other hand, the stiff sidewalls offered great pinch protection in the rough stuff, although somehow I still managed to put a minor ding in my front rim.

My conclusions on running these tires on a small bike are as follows:

• The E07 front (especially the stiff Dakar) isn't worth it unless your bike is fully loaded. It  would be a strong contender for a heavier bike like the Africa Twin, where you're probably not as likely to ride much rough single track and so the lower traction in those conditions isn't as much of an issue.
• The E07 rear is so heavy and hard to change (easily the hardest tire I've tried!) that it too is not one I'd recommend for lighter bikes. A K60 Scout would probably offers reasonably comparable performance and wear, at significantly lower weight and cost, and would be much easier for a tired rider to change trail-side. 
• Having switched my front tire back to an MT21, I have to say it makes a great combo with the 50/50 rear: all the front traction you need to corner and maintain a secure line (loaded or unloaded), with the smooth-rolling wear and acceptable traction of a 50/50 rear.

You could agonize forever about what tires to run, but at some point I think it's just splitting hairs and it comes down to rider skills. As long as my tires are in the right ballpark, I'll continue to focus on building my riding skills so I'm less reliant on the rubber and can just "run what I brung".

T7 or not T7?

This past summer I hoped to tackle the first half of the Trans-American Trail, and even had a month vacation lined up, but unfortunately it didn't work out this time and I ended up doing a solo 6-day adventure ride north as a consolation prize.

Next summer offers a real possibility of ripping the whole TAT from east to west, but I'm debating heading straight for Colorado and riding the second half only, if time is tight. (And looking for a riding partner, hint-hint.)

The real question is should I do it on my WRR? Yes, others have ridden this bike the length of the trail, and mine is nicely modified for exactly this purpose. However, after this summer's riding on some long, lonely pavement (a likely scenario on my TAT route), for the first time I began wondering if maybe it's time to consider a bigger bike. Shortly after I returned, I got the chance to ride my dad's 1200GS. Holy crap, that thing's got power! Surprisingly nimble too--much easier to turn than my WRR, in fact. Although way too big for my needs, it planted the seed deeper.

Then along comes rumors of the new Yamaha T7, nearing production-ready form and more practical than the concept bike shown below. The engine has proven to be excellent, the chassis and suspension have been designed to be state-of-the-art for dual sport, and the size, weight, and power are a decent bump up from the WRR without being overwhelming. It could be a good 75-100 lbs lighter than the Africa Twin, also a solid option but too heavy for my needs and out of my price range.

Looking forward to seeing what's announced at EICMA in November!

Garmin Montana 610 review

A dedicated GPS is an invaluable tool for dual sport riding. Since backcountry routes are often far from cellular service, using a cell phone mapping app may not be possible if it relies on network access for map data. There are apparently ways to use some mapping apps offline (like Google Maps), but I don't have much experience with this mode of operation and have found it unreliable. If you need to download data for your route ahead of time, you may end up being stuck if your route needs to deviate outside your planning zone. Of course, when plans fail in the boonies, true adventure can be the consolation prize.

Garmin makes a bewildering array of GPSes for different applications, often with overlapping features that can make it hard to choose the right model. For the past 15 years I've relied on models in the handheld series, including the eTrex, GPSMAP 60csx, and GPSMAP 64st which is the newer version of the 60. Unfortunately, two years ago my otherwise trusty 60 began suffering intermittent power failures, which motivated me to upgrade to the 64. Unfortunately, my brand new unit had a button fail after a couple days of use. The warranty replacement suffered from a flaky power problem a year later, finally bricking the device and losing all my data from my 2017 RAP trip. The next warranty replacement unit, which I just received about a month ago, has started showing intermittent power problems as well. Apparently I have a knack for making electrical things fail. Either that, or I need to check my USB charging port on my bike, which otherwise works fine with my iPhone.

Despite these reliability issues, I bit the bullet and sent Garmin even more money, this time to upgrade to the Montana 610 purchased from GPSCity. The 610 is significantly bigger than the 64, but my aging eyes immediately appreciated the improved readability of the larger screen.

The 610 is also a beefier unit overall, and incorporates a power connection method that is ideal for mounting on a motorbike or ATV using a RAM system. While the old 60 I started with used a rugged four-pin connector for power and data, the 64 replaced that with a micro-USB port. This is fine for charging indoors, but is simply not durable enough for exposed use on a bike. The Montana mount is a vastly superior design and it's really not worth considering anything less.

Since there's lots of info online about the Montana 610's specs, I'm not going to repeat them here. I will say that the touch screen works very well with gloves on and overall the unit is far more usable (and therefore safer) than the 64. Setup and pages are essentially the same on both units, so if you're familiar with one, it only takes a few minutes to get used to the other. And of course, Garmin's free Basecamp software makes it relatively easy to create routes and manage data on and off the device.

If there's an obvious beef with the Montana, it's the crappy basemap that comes with the unit. Yeah, you can fork out a couple hundred bucks for a better map, but already this is an expensive device and my Nuvi 2455 (also a Garmin), which cost $100 at Canadian Tire, came with lifetime map updates (and they're frequent, too!). I don't mind paying for quality maps, but not over and over again--especially for topo maps, where updates generally occur on a geological timescale.

I installed the Canada Topo 4 map on the Montana and added the Backroads Map for Eastern Ontario on SD card, but I was initially confused by why the topo map didn't appear. Then I remembered that while Garmin allows you to activate multiple map sets on the device, it only displays details of the topmost layer. Details of any other maps are obscured. The only hint they're actually there is the occasional blip you see when the screen redraws a layer and then the next layer over it. To avoid this problem, you should only activate the one map layer you actually want to see.

Installation on my bike was fairly straightforward using the Garmin power mount. Don't forget to order the RAM plate for the rear so you can attach the mount to any standard RAM arm. I decided to wire the unit directly to the battery rather than through a switched circuit like for my last GPSes. I've found it a nuisance to have to constantly ensure the device remains on when switching off the bike, e.g. when stopped to check something on a trail or refueling. There's now an increased risk of the unit draining my motorcycle battery, but this should be minimal in daily riding when the Montana's internal battery is already charged. For longer off-periods, I'll need to remember to remove the device from the cradle.

Overall, I'd say the Montana 610 is an improvement over the 64. The cradle and power system are robust and designed for motorcycle or ATV mounting. The touchscreen is highly usable with gloves on, and the features are comprehensive and easily customizable to different scenarios and preferences. Cons are price and poor basemap. The Montana 610 is essentially unusable unless you buy some sort of optional map for your riding area. Also, the UI is sorely outdated, slow, and somewhat clunky compared to mobile phone UIs from even 10 years ago, but it does work.

Exploration: Round Algonquin Park 2017 via TCAT and Cobalt - Part 3

Part 2

Frozen. That was my first night's experience sleeping in my Hennessy Hammock. Not the fault of the hammock, but rather a combination of my own inexperience with the rig, a chronic problem of my rectangular Thermarest pad slipping sideways and sproinging on top of me throughout the night, a sleeping bag that was too light, and temps that dropped to single digits. With nothing to push off of in a free-hanging hammock, trying to adjust the pad and my sleeping bag--or putting on every bit of dry clothing I had--resulted in spasms of wriggling and cursing to try to make the best of the situation. It was a good thing I was camped far from neighbours.

Such is the reward for last-minute planning without a real opportunity to test my sleeping arrangement under more realistic conditions. On order now is a bubble-style pad that conforms better to the unique requirements of the hammock, so I'll give the whole setup another shot and probably upgrade my summer bag.

On the plus side, being uncomfortable in bed is fantastic motivation to start early, so I was packed up and ready to go with my still-wet gear on by around 6:00 a.m. I will admit that breaking the RV park's dawn silence with the putt-putting of my bike felt like mildly wicked retribution for last night's unwelcome reception.

The TCAT picked up on the rail bed which passed in front of the RV park. More loose, squirrely gravel and a steep drop-off to the river below, plus frigid air on my hands face, and wet gear, made for challenging riding that demanded all my attention.

Crystal skies and mist over the water made for a spectacular sunrise. Besides some croaking ravens and a couple of otters that scooted across the trail ahead of me, I had the views to myself.

Soon the rail bed opened up with glorious sunshine. Moments after I took this picture, a giant yellow Volvo mining truck loomed on the far horizon and lumbered towards me.

A few minutes later I reached a formidable rail bridge: long, high, and unguarded on the sides. The TCAT route carried over this bridge, but hazard tape across the entrance led me to look more closely before starting across. No way I was going to try this: several of the ties were completely rotten and ready to collapse, and about 25 metres out at least one tie was missing altogether, creating a gap of at least 3 feet that opened into thin air some 70 feet above the river. Probably not a big deal for sleds when everything's frozen and snow bridges the gap, but I wasn't about to evaluate my trials skills on a loaded bike.

Since the bridge was a no-go, I turned back to a road crossing and embarked on a major detour southwest to try find a way around and either reconnect with the rail route, or re-join the TCAT at Capreol, where I had planned to find breakfast. However, as to be expected when large rivers need to be crossed in remote areas, there are few bridges and roads to provide direct options. Meanwhile, massive storm clouds were gathering in the southwest and heading my way. After making some wrong assumptions about roads thanks to naming discrepancies in my GPS, I ended up riding closer to the north end of Sudbury than I intended, and resorted to hitting the pavement to try to get around the storm front that was sneaking up behind me. This proved to be a good plan, and I arrived in Capreol after experiencing just a few fat drops of rain. 

Capreol is a down-trodden but active rail and mining town with few services and no cafes or restaurants that I could see after a go-around of the main street.     

It's a must-stop for gas and groceries though, as the next leg of the journey is long and passes through one of the most remote sections of my loop where you're really on your own. After breakfast and gas at the Timmy's, followed by stocking up on snacks from the grocery store, it was time to hit the Portelance Rd.

The Portelance Rd. starts out as a wide gravel road that gradually becomes a narrow, rough, and steep dual-track over some 120km until it merges again with active (and more improved) logging roads to the north. In several hours of riding this section I saw three people. Much of the route follows a river valley, with several fine campsites and swimming holes along the way. This was wild country with many signs of bears and wolves on the road.

The logging roads posed hazards of Mad-Max drivers of fully-loaded rigs and choking dust. Caution required!

There's some ambiguity on the TCAT site about whether gas is available at Shining Tree, which at one time was apparently a good place to camp, eat, and fuel up. Most of the settlement appears to be closed up now or at least not offering public services. I didn't see promising signs of activity so I didn't stop there for long. Spruce Shilling Camp a few kilometers further east down the 560 was open with gas and a general store. Since I planned to gas up in Gowganda, I skipped this option and gunned it down the smooth pavement which I had all to myself. 

Gowganda sprang up around a silver mine that got its start when prospectors from the rich Cobalt area began to look further afield. Today there's little left of what was once a bustling community besides cottagers and a general store. While gas was available, no premium as I needed.  

My only option for fuel now was to press on another 40km or so east to Elk Lake (originally another bustling mining town), where I was stymied once again because the only fuel in town, at a self-serve card lock tank as I arrived, didn't have premium either. By this point I'd already burned through 250km in my tank, and had already added my 100km reserve. This would have to get me to New Liskeard, for a total distance of about 330km since leaving Capreol, on what I knew was a 350km range. To add to the excitement, once again storm clouds were chasing me, and the long stretches of flat pavement on the upper flats area northwest of New Liskeard required me to pin the throttle to stay reasonably in line with the occasional kamikaze trucks that blew by. Since leaving Capreol about 5 hours earlier, I'd hardly seen any people or traffic. 

New Liskeard arrived with a downpour and slim margin in my tank. But it was good enough to get me to a hotel on the shore of Lake Temiskaming, where a decent (and lively) attached restaurant provided a much-needed break to dry out and some tasty fettuccini carbonara and craft beer. 

The next day proved to be perfect weather for exploring the historic mining town of Cobalt, a planned highlight of the trip.   

So much can be said about Cobalt that it's hard to know where to start. Anyone familiar with mining history in Canada will know of the town's remarkable story, but given its huge significance in the growth of Ontario, it's shameful how little of this history and its importance is more broadly known or even taught today. Matters aren't helped by our federal and provincial government departments who've done basically nothing to help preserve this unique and rich chapter of frontier history in North America.

So here are some factoids to help put Cobalt in perspective:

• The Cobalt silver strike in the early 1900s is the fourth largest in the world and the largest in North America, with narrow seams of almost pure silver forming "sidewalks" at the surface of the bedrock, and massive nuggets lying on the ground. Some 330 million ounces of silver were extracted from the area (thousands of tons), worth over $5B in today's dollars. This was more value than generated by the California or Klondike gold rushes. 
• The vast wealth that Cobalt produced was a major source of funds to drive the economy and growth of Toronto, resulting in the financial capital of Canada shifting from Montreal to Toronto's Bay Street.
• A 13 square kilometer area including Cobalt was home to some 100 active mines. Although the town today has dwindled to about 1100 people, during its heyday it had a population of 30,000 (compared to some 250,000 in Toronto at the time) and was one of Canada's largest cities.
• The Toronto Stock Exchange originated in Cobalt. When Cobalt mining stocks were offered in New York City, police there spent three days trying to control the masses of people scrambling to buy shares.
• Cobalt was home to one of the hockey teams that led to the formation of the original NHL teams. The Montreal Canadiens played their very first hockey game against the Cobalt Silver Seven.
• A water-driven compressor built at Montreal River 25km from Cobalt delivered compressed air that ran many of the mining operations. It was the largest compressed air plant in the world.  
• An electric tram service connecting Cobalt to Haileybury and other small communities served 30,000 riders in its first week of service and was the most northern electric tram in the world. 
• Cobalt was home to one of the first two Ontario Provincial Police posts created when the service was founded. 
• The unique geology of the Cobalt area and its silver deposits facilitated the rapid development of hard-rock mining methods and technologies, pushing Canada to the forefront of capability in the world and creating an entire new mining economy where none was thought to exist east of the Rockies.    

Today Cobalt is a decaying shadow of its glory days over a century ago, with reminders of its mining heritage literally everywhere you look. In fact, you sometimes have to be careful where you walk because the whole town was part of the mine site and still poses hazards. 

Below is one of the landmark head frames you see when arriving in town.  

This is an example of one of the "smaller" silver nuggets (it's over half a meter long) that was basically found lying on the ground by prospectors. It now lies casually at the front desk of the Mining Museum on the main street. 

The best way to explore Cobalt is to start at the Mining Museum. Run by dedicated and under-resourced volunteers, it provides a glimpse of the geology, artifacts, and life of the mining community as it exploded in growth. From the museum there are three must-do tours to take: a self-guided walking tour of the town; an underground tour of one of the mines; and a self-guided driving tour of the immediate area around town, in which you visit some 19 of the original mine sites. All three options are highly recommended and will fill much of a day. 

The underground tour visits the Colonial Mine site, which is accessed by an adit at the base of a ridge and is some 350 feet underground. It's wet and cold, and entirely representative of the actual conditions as this was a working section of the mine, with many kilometers of tunnels. In this picture, you can see a faint white mineralization in the rock, which is calcite and a sign of where to look for silver. It's hard to see even with the benefit of modern lights. Even harder by candlelight.

In the early days of mining here, all the drilling was done by hand: one guy held a drill bit (seen in the hands of the tour guide), another guy hit it with a sledge hammer. Working this way, it took some 12-16 hours (a full shift) to drill one hole deep enough (about 6') for blasting. Some 29 holes needed to be drilled like this in a particular pattern before they could be stuffed with dynamite and blasted. All of this was done by candlelight, and there were no safety glasses or other protective equipment. Only a few well-financed miners could afford the costly carbide lamps that provided slightly better light, and electric light wasn't available yet. The guy holding the drill had to put a lot of faith in the guy swinging the sledge.

With the advent of compressed air, it was possible to mechanize the drilling process, such as with the drifter (for drilling horizontal holes) shown here. The early versions of these drills created clouds of choking dust until someone invented the hollow drill bit which allowed water to be injected into the hole to cool and lubricate the drill while quenching the dust. The noise must've been deafening: no ear protection existed.

One guy had the lucky job of thawing the dynamite and distributing it under close watch to the miners. He sat all shift at a desk in front of a short tunnel where the dynamite was stored securely, and was paid the same as the miners (about $2.50 a day). The miners tended to hate him as a result of his relatively cushy job. 

Frozen dynamite was inserted into the tubes in this box, and then hot water was poured in the hole on top and circulated around the box to thaw the dynamite. Frozen or partially frozen dynamite was found to have unpredictable detonation. Sometimes after a section was blasted, not all of the dynamite would explode. Miners mucking out the rock could hit unexploded remnants with their tools and cause it to detonate.   

The wooden box behind the thawer was originally a dynamite shipping box, but used by a miner as a portable toilet. While you could basically pee anywhere in the mine, the box was more practical for a #2 and got emptied at the surface after a shift. 

Below is the "Glory Hole", a massive excavation at the edge of Cobalt at the Town Mine Site where you can see a drift (tunnel) in cross-section. 

Here's typical scene, this one at the Little Silver Mine: a narrow vein of silver a few inches wide was chased down from the surface hundreds of feet down and across in the rock, leaving a scar still propped by timber shoring.

There's also an open adit (tunnel) you can step into a short ways. Icy air breathes out from the frozen tunnels which extend kilometers into the rock.

Yet another mine site, yet another scar from following yet another a narrow silver vein. Everywhere you look around town, it's like this.

Here's the landmark head-frame of the Right-of-Way Mine which you first see when you arrive in town from the north. Reiner Mielke, a member of the local historical society and former geologist in the mining industry, happened to be doing maintenance here when I stopped by. He was very kind to unlock the building and show me around inside.

The interior was reconfigured many times during the operation of the mine, so it's not clear exactly how the process flowed from the two-compartment lift and down through the screening, cobbing, and sorting operations. Volunteers have made great strides in cleaning up the interior, making it safe, and mounting an original 1-ton ore cart where one was probably used to trundle ore from the hoist. 

At the Kerr Lake Mine site is a lift that was used to lower miners and raise ore carts down the shaft beneath a head frame. Kerr Lake is remarkable in that the entire lake of 600,000,000 gallons of water and silt was drained to access rich veins of silver that continued down 800 feet below the bottom of the lake. Operations like this would probably not pass today's environmental regulations. 

  

And here's what it all was for. The top left rock is a typical cobalt-bearing ore, the cobalt mineral having developed a purple bloom when exposed to the air. This was a telltale sign of a valuable ore body. The sample on the bottom left shows a smudge of white calcite, and immediately on top of it a thin sliver of silver ore that has blackened as a result of natural tarnishing. Many of the massive silver nuggets lying on the ground were not recognized as such in the early days of exploration because of their tarnishing. The bottom left sample was a gift to me from Dwight Brydges, another member of the local historical society and a former miner as well. I met Dwight and one of his friends, an old-timer from the local mines, across from the Townsite Mine and glory hole, and had a great chat with both of them.

This whole description barely scratches the surface of Cobalt's history. The best way to learn more is to go visit the town yourself, and be sure to stop in to see Deborah Ranchuk at White Mountain Publications, a bookstore located in one of the original mine head frames on the main street. It's in the grey building on the right in the photo below. 

There you can buy (or have shipped to you) some great books on mining history in Ontario, including the book below (ISBN 978-0-9680354-7-4) which is a definitive, thoroughly researched, and highly entertaining study of the town's history and significance. Of note, the building with the peaked roof in the middle of the book cover still stands (it was the Canadian Imperial Bank). I took the photo above in front of this building, looking further up the street. So much has changed! 

While I could happily spent months or years exploring and researching Cobalt, there was still more to see. The next day I headed out to look for the lost community of Silver Centre, some 30 km south of Cobalt, where some old foundations are visible in Google Earth. However, when I got close I found it had been revived as an active mine prospecting site and was barred to public access. Whether or not there's still viable silver to extract remains debatable: everyone I talked to suggested that the only thing being mined now was investors hoping for a handsome profit.

With more storm clouds moving in, I headed back up to New Liskeard and then through more torrential rain at the top of Lake Temiskaming and then down on the Quebec side to see an old fur trading post built by the French in 1649 and later ceded to the British (and Hudson's Bay Company). While nothing of the original or even later buildings remains today, the site has a Parks Canada visitor centre with some evocative displays of life in the time of the Coureurs de Bois. Well worth a detour.

The road from Temiskaming to Mattawa was an idyllic roller-coaster for carving on a motorbike, and sparsely traveled. Highly recommended to break up the monotony of regular pavement. 

Although I passed through Mattawa on my RAP tour last summer, I didn't fully appreciate its significance in Canadian history and decided to spend the night here before heading home. Here the Mattawa River meets the Ottawa River, the former being the historic gateway to the Canada's west during the early days of the fur trade and exploration. Pretty much every explorer of note including Samuel de Champlain passed through this unassuming intersection en route to Lake Nipissing and the Great Lakes beyond. 

The historic Voyageur Hotel captures some of the original frontier spirit and offers clean, inexpensive rooms, as well as authentic and delicious Thai dinners.

With more time I might've grabbed a movie next door, but instead I had an illuminating and entertaining discussion with a fellow traveler who told me about his former life as an international drug smuggler, doing time in prisons around the world, and running a hash oil operation in the mountains of North Pakistan in the 70's. Way better than Planet of the Apes.

Finally it was time to head for home. With my GPS fried, I couldn't follow the Algonquin Dual Sport route which runs south from Mattawa; too many ways to take a wrong turn based on memory alone,  and end up back-tracking. So I left at dawn the next morning and had the Trans-Canada Highway to myself for the next 170 km as I booted it down to Petawawa where I could get onto back-country roads I knew well.

Old Killaloe and the Opeongo Road offered up a few abandoned gems suggestive of their former glory as vibrant communities, but now just settling back into the overgrowth from which they were originally hewn. 

  

And that was that. Home again, in one piece, hands sore from the buzz of one 250cc cylinder over 6 days and 2500 km. Finally dry, yet glad for the adventure despite the rain and mud. Lots of time to think about riding the Trans-American Trail next year, but perhaps on a slightly bigger bike.

GPX files and other goodies can be found here.

Exploration: Round Algonquin Park 2017 via TCAT and Cobalt - Part 2

Click here for Part 1.

One good thing about rain when adventure riding is it tends to firm up loose surfaces -- especially sand -- making them a lot easier to ride on with a loaded motorcycle. So the previous day's rain was actually welcomed in hitting the TCAT leaving north from Huntsville, where the trail consisted of long sandy stretches of glacial till that last year proved exhausting to ride when powder-dry.

One section near Novar (an optional gas stop) just outside Huntsville was a popular ATV trail, heavily eroded and washed out in places, with sections of melon-sized rocks rounded smooth by glaciers. Last year, the ledgy and steep rock climb shown below ate my bike. Having hit it too slowly after exiting a long and steep boulder field, I tried to shift quickly from 2nd into 1st and didn't notice I'd only hit neutral just as I lost all momentum and balance. The bike toppled over and slid down, bending a foot peg. Fortunately no other damage was done other than to my dignity, and I was able to bend out the peg. This amateur-hour goof-up weighed on me this year as I repeated the section--especially since now I was riding with only 50/50 tires and on wet, slick rock.  

Funny how we build things up in our minds when riding for long hours alone. This time I zipped up the rock with no problems whatsoever (that speck is my triumphant bike at the top). My retuned suspension most certainly helped by eliminating the constant bucking action and loss of traction in the rear end that WR250R's are notorious for. 

Soon the route turned onto the Seguin Trail, another old rail bed along a once well-travelled and populated route that now consists of scattered cottages and ghost towns. The trail itself is mostly sand with long stretches of quad-burning whoops and a few deep water crossings thanks to all the rain, but I was again glad for that rain because at least it held things together for my tires.  

Many great views as the early morning sun tried to break through the mists over the swamps. 

The TCAT follows the Seguin Trail for much further than I took it. Paralleling the trail is freshly paved highway with no traffic; it was pure joy carving along this until it reached the storied Nipissing Road heading north.

The Nipissing Road was one of the more famous colonization roads pushed through the glacial moraines separating southern Ontario from the northern frontiers in the mid-1800s. Until the advent of the railways in the late 1800s, life revolved around these tenuous wagon trails through the bush. The explosion of railways changed the cultural dynamic completely from what we see today, as this map of Ontario railways in 1875 suggests.

Today, almost nothing remains of the small communities along the Nipissing Rd. as a result of the rail lines requiring alternate routes. Some settlers moved to be closer to the new commerce that rail enabled; others left altogether--many of whom were drawn to the comparatively magic growing conditions of the Prairies as the west opened up. Magnetawan remains one of the few communities that survived the depopulation. The railways in turn became casualties of new roads built to serve the rise of the automobile, hastened by the unsustainable economics of rail posed by poor soils for agriculture, forests depleted of timber, and mineral deposits that proved limited. 

Some of the personal stories of loss are heartbreaking. In a small cemetery near Dufferin Bridge, nothing remains of the church or its community except a few headstones. On one is inscribed the names of six young children who all died--probably of typhoid fever--within days of each other. Another headstone told a similar tale of another family.

Further on at the site of North Seguin (now a ghost town), and down a couple kilometers on the side road to the west (I believe Orange Valley Rd.; the exact location was lost with my dead GPS) is the old schoolhouse for the town. Nothing much else remains. 

Continuing north was more of the same theme, eventually arriving at Magnetawan. If you need to gas up, the only place in the area to get premium is at the marina just before the bridge into town.

Further north, the Nipissing Rd. devolves into a rough double-track in what's called the "Lost Trails" area. This section is probably more representative of the original wagon trail and it's a beautiful and fun ride, moreso when the sun emerges as it did briefly for me. Pure adventure riding, classic Ontario scenery. I even got to ride it twice because I forgot to secure my wet shorts which were drying on my bike, and they blew off. 

After several kilometers is "Bummer's Roost", the site of a once-famous hotel that hosted travelers from far and wide. 

While there's nothing much to see here now, further north lies the ghost town of Commanda and the promise of a photogenic old building that's now a time-capsule of a general store. Unfortunately, intermittent rain were leading to darker skies and the threat of something more serious, and the trail ahead looked to be pretty rough. I should've reconsidered. 

Sure enough, this section proved to a very rough ATV track (probably the roughest trail along the whole 2500km route) with deep washouts, boulders, and mud holes. Despite navigating most of these successfully and carefully probing with a stick before entering the more iffy holes, my luck eventually ran out. I slid off firm ground and dropped my bike into one particularly deep hole, just as a thunder storm broke all around me. An adrenalin-fueled panic had me off the bike and up to my thighs in water and sucking mud, but I managed to stop and hold my bike before the air box submerged. But I was now completely waterlogged, stuck in the mud, and poorly situated to get out.  

After much cursing and prying, I was able to lever my bike out by alternately lifting it sideways by the wheels, finally dragging it up onto the edge of the mud hole as pictured. Would it start? I had no idea. Worse, there was a lot of trail ahead to Commanda, and going back meant having to pass through this mud hole and a few others again. 

While Commanda was now off my agenda, as a consolation prize there's some info here about the general store I wasn't able to see in person (photo credit to highway11.ca web site).

Going back seemed more sensible: I knew what to expect. Fortunately my bike fired up without hesitation although the turn signal was fouled with muck. I was able to pick a line back along the edge I'd previously slipped off, this time gunning it for momentum. By now the rain was torrential, the trail was a running stream, and my boots and pants were squelching with muck, and my visor and glass were completely grimy and fogged, reducing visibility to a smear of vague light. This is the double-edged sword of waterproof gear: it's just as effective at keeping water in. 

Wet, cold, hungry, and on the verge of shivering into hypothermia, it was time to grit my teeth and aim for warm food. Last year I'd made a pit stop at Eagle Lake nearby, where there was a golden sand beach and at the general store up on the hill, gas and good burgers. While I watched my bike get a free power-wash, I sat on a picnic bench under an umbrella and entertained the other tourists sheltered on the porch by stripping down and dumping an impressive amount of water and mud from each boot. This alleviated the worst of the discomfort. Soon the storm front rumbled off into a direction away from my destination, and I headed back out. 

Leaving the town of South River towards the backcountry trailheads and put-ins of Algonquin Park (a.k.a. "Subaru Country", with a lot of young couples wearing flannel and Tevas, with beards on the guys and canoes on the roofs) was a profusion of plump serviceberries and raspberries beside the road. Another bonus of a wet season.

After Powassen, the TCAT route I had intended to follow entered a forest service road that started out well but soon reached a heavily flooded area about 100m long where it crossed a swollen creek in a low-lying swampy area. The geography suggested it would be a deep crossing in the middle. I didn't want to test my luck again after my earlier escapade, so I retraced my path and after a few mistaken turns through a fogged up visor and more torrential rain, eventually found my way into North Bay via secondary roads. The view across Lake Nipissing was expansive and dramatic with side-lit storm clouds rolling away south in the distance, but I was scrambling to shed my rain suit and make it to somewhere I could camp for the night.

When planning my route, I'd identified a campground at Beaucage Point just west of North Bay off Highway 17. However, upon reaching this spot, I found it was closed up, and worse, the gas station at the exit didn't have premium. It was getting late in the day, but the next section of the route appeared to offer some stealth camping options. However, it was also remote and I needed to gas up, which meant backtracking 10kms along a fast section of the TransCanada highway, which my little 250 is too underpowered to ride confidently. There's a fine balance between taking gas when it's available (especially when premium is harder to find), and minimizing the weight penalty and delay of frequent top-ups.

Sure enough, this next section of the TCAT consisted of another rail bed, but I missed it the first time because the TCAT GPS track was nowhere near the actual cutoff. As the sun emerged I faced golden light and a seemingly endless stretch of incredibly loose and squirrely gravel ballast that demanded all my attention to avoid a wipeout. 

Along the way were some bridges with panoramic if vertiginous views, including this one crossing Smoky River, but I was hesitant to linger because there were no good places to camp--the side of the rail bed dropped steeply into swamp and dense bush. 

Salvation arrived in River Valley, where the local campground/trailer park is home to a long-running bluegrass festival which had just wrapped up over the weekend. My arrival was not welcomed by campground staff: I had not noticed that a large sign at the entrance included the words "no motorcycles or ATVs", so I blithely followed the instructions I'd received earlier at the general store in town and rode up to the main building. There I was greeted by a crowd showing looks of horror and waving arms at this filthy motorcyclist, telling me I couldn't be there. Apparently my little putting 250 represented unacceptable noise pollution to the owner of the place, but the hundreds of massive RVs, generators, and Bro-Dozers to pull everything there did not. 

Soon one of the staff kindly showed me down the hill to a very nice location on an island where, for $10, I was able to set up my Hennessey hammock right beside the river, just as the sun dipped below the trees on the ridge. I had the spot to myself, and a choice of three portaloos.    

After a meagre dinner consisting of two Clif Bars (having discovered I'd completely forgotten to bring any utensils to cook with, and with the emerging mosquitoes I didn't have time or inclination to find some wood I could whittle), I took a walk around the park and passed by some old-time bluegrass musicians playing upright bass, banjo, and guitar beside a campfire. It was a magical scene, much like the one in this video from a prior festival year. 

Then it was time to finally test my hammock, having bought it at the end of last season and not getting a chance to camp until now. Clear skies meant dropping temps, so it would be a challenging test! 

More to come in Part 3.