Cascades Conservatory

Driving into Thunder Bay, we somehow missed our road and ended up down along the bay and docks.  We worked our way back up the hill and turned on High Street.  By chance we drove by the Hillcrest Park and Sunken Gardens area and pulled in.  We got a great view of Sleeping Giant and the bay.  Sleeping Giant is a Provincial Park and a large peninsula that looks like a man sleeping on his back.  The legend is that Naniboujou would turn to stone if his Ojibwa people ever revealed the located of Silver Island.  When white man entered the area and found the silver, he lay down in the bay and turned to stone. 

I wanted to find some geocaches in Centennial Park, especially the Cascades Earthcache (some location with interesting geology).

  We somehow found Cascades Conservatory, parked and hiked in.  It was 700 meters to the cascades.  The area was filled with rocks to climb over.  The river cascaded through a 40 foot drop in elevation over a quarter mile.  Lots of people were out enjoying the river and rocks.  Some were even swimming in a little backwater area - with little kids!  I'd be afraid the kids would be swept away over the cascades.  We spent a little time here walking on the rocks and sitting by the river before heading back.  It was getting late and we still had quite a drive back to our campground.

We made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for the drive home and took off.  We didn't see any charging moose on the way home.