Tuesday August 21: Parry Sound

Georgian Bay - off of Lake Huron

We pulled into the marina at Parry Sound last Friday - it was definitely time to be in a marina and plugged into power for a change.

It was 8 days of anchored or tied to a lock wall using a combination of solar power and generator to keep the batteries charged. I really like anchoring out but it was enough :-)

Besides we needed to do laundry!

Parry Sound is 80 miles north of the Trent Canal - less than half of the distance to the North Channel if we continued traveling north.. Perhaps going further north will be on the agenda next year but for now it's time to turn back and go south to the Trent.

This is a panoramic view from the top of the tower to the southeast of the town of Parry Sound - one of the many places Steve visited this week. The marina we're in is barely visible in the center left of the picture.

Probably the best thing we found this week was a "new" bike as his was on it's last legs by the time we arrived.

He just happened to find a bike shop and asked the owner if he happened to have any folding bikes. To Steve's surprise the guy responded in the affirmative!

These little things are hard to find used and to have one from a bike shop was great as the guy tuned the bike up, swapped tires with Steve's old bike and adapted the fenders to fit on the new bike.

The handle bar is kind of weird and it doesn't fold the way the newer ones do but it rides and stops well. What more does Steve need?!!

And it cleaned up REALLY well! With some metal polish and a lot of elbow grease made the handlebars and the rims shine like new :-)

What a huge difference it made in the looks.


Check out the difference in the two sides of the handlebars!!

Plus it was an excellent thing to do today as the rain came early and stayed most of the day.

Still is raining tonight with more due in around midnight. We didn't intend to spend 5 days here but the with the wet weather predicted for today it just made sense to stay put.

A small bowl of War Wonton Soup!

Besides there is a very good Chinese Restaurant downtown :-) And a good breakfast place - Orr's Restaurant. Owned by the family of the hockey player Bobby Orr who grew up in this area. Check out his story by clicking here.

There's a nice bike trail near the marina that follows the shoreline for a couple of miles that is easy to ride.

Lots of rocks and cliffs as well as the town beach.

The shoreline is very similar to much of the area in which we've been boating recently - granite rocks that are very unforgiving :-)

There's a unique mural on one of the buildings downtown which celebrated the history of logging in the area.


This rail trestle built in 1941 was also very needed by the logging industry.













Amazing that it still stands. And trains are going across it every day - I think most of them when it's still dark in the early morning when most people are still sleeping - including us! It's fairly close to the marina :-)

There was an antique car show over the weekend with the main street line with a wide variety of cars and trucks. Some not so old - this is a 2013 Prinzing Roadster.

2013 Prinzing

For sale if anyone is interested!!

Tower overlooking Parry Sound

Native art on display at the tower

So ends a pleasant 5 day stay here at Parry Sound on a not so pleasant weather day.

It's good to be inside today :-)

And DRY thanks to Steve fixing a number of leaks which showed themselves during the rain and thunderstorm last Thursday night.

No pictures, but good job Steve :-)

Tomorrow we'll stop at Killbear State Park for a day and then back toward the Midland area and see if we can find friends Peter and Cheryl!