Bikeforums.net is a forum about nothing but bikes. Our community can help you find information about hard-to-find and localized information like bicycle tours, specialties like where in your area to have your recumbent bike serviced, or what are the best bicycle tires and seats for the activities you use your bike for.Frith
07-28-05, 09:20 AM
Hello. I've noticed a good number of posters on this forum are either from Ontario or have some knowledge of touring here.
My rough plan was to drive up to Tobermory (or thereabouts) on friday after work, camp overnight and then begin my tour the next morning by taking the ferry to Manitoulin.
I'm not one for over planning so with that rough sketch I kind of left the plan open ended until recently when I discovered at my usual 80km-120km per day I could cover most of the south and north shore of manitoulin in two days... That leaves me with about 5 days (I have to be back in Tobermory to meet some friends on the evening of the following friday) so I began looking for routes to extend it. Once I exit the north part of the island via hwy 6 my dilemna begins. There's not much that excites me east or west of there (Sudbury one way and some little towns along a very busy trans-can the other way). Looking North there seems to be a whole lot of nothing. This intrigues me and at the same time frightens me. I could take a two day one night out and back along some of these roads but I'd have to make sure I was prepared with lots of food and water as there doesn't seem much of anything like towns. Still the idea of taking these remote roads through the wilderness is an experience I might never again have.
I will be stealth camping most if not all nights so my gear doesn't change too much regardless of my route.
I'm just wondering which of these roads if any would make for good touring. From the maps there appear to be two main roads heading north... hwy 553 and another road marked as privately owned public use. Google earth (a very cool application for route planning by the way) shows a bunch of secondary roads as well "firehall road" and "camp 50 road" among others.
does anyone have any experience with any of these roads regarding they're condition for touring and what I might find along the way? I suppose safety could also be a concern. If these roads are desolate and something happens to me or the bike It could be a while before help arrived.
Conversely I could stay on manatoulin and just take my time, taking a rest day, and leisurely exploring the area more throroughly.
Thoughts? opinions? obscene gestures?
here's a couple maps of the area I'm talking about.
http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/traveller/map/northindexpdf.htm (click on map 12)
http://www.nt.net/~getin/ontario_map_section2.html
http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=46.334603,-82.139282&spn=0.398142,0.924980&hl=en (zoom in)
My rough plan was to drive up to Tobermory (or thereabouts) on friday after work, camp overnight and then begin my tour the next morning by taking the ferry to Manitoulin.
I'm not one for over planning so with that rough sketch I kind of left the plan open ended until recently when I discovered at my usual 80km-120km per day I could cover most of the south and north shore of manitoulin in two days... That leaves me with about 5 days (I have to be back in Tobermory to meet some friends on the evening of the following friday) so I began looking for routes to extend it. Once I exit the north part of the island via hwy 6 my dilemna begins. There's not much that excites me east or west of there (Sudbury one way and some little towns along a very busy trans-can the other way). Looking North there seems to be a whole lot of nothing. This intrigues me and at the same time frightens me. I could take a two day one night out and back along some of these roads but I'd have to make sure I was prepared with lots of food and water as there doesn't seem much of anything like towns. Still the idea of taking these remote roads through the wilderness is an experience I might never again have.
I will be stealth camping most if not all nights so my gear doesn't change too much regardless of my route.
I'm just wondering which of these roads if any would make for good touring. From the maps there appear to be two main roads heading north... hwy 553 and another road marked as privately owned public use. Google earth (a very cool application for route planning by the way) shows a bunch of secondary roads as well "firehall road" and "camp 50 road" among others.
does anyone have any experience with any of these roads regarding they're condition for touring and what I might find along the way? I suppose safety could also be a concern. If these roads are desolate and something happens to me or the bike It could be a while before help arrived.
Conversely I could stay on manatoulin and just take my time, taking a rest day, and leisurely exploring the area more throroughly.
Thoughts? opinions? obscene gestures?
here's a couple maps of the area I'm talking about.
http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/traveller/map/northindexpdf.htm (click on map 12)
http://www.nt.net/~getin/ontario_map_section2.html
http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=46.334603,-82.139282&spn=0.398142,0.924980&hl=en (zoom in)