Weekend at Cottage, Part 6: Offroadin'.

In addition to the usual cottage activities, this cottage trip came with an old Jeep purchased and maintained specifically for drives through the bush. There are plenty of old logging roads, snowmobile trails, and hiking paths in the wilderness up there, so the fun-quotient skyrockets when you've got a Jeep you can use to explore, and engage in a little death-defiance.

Here's a fine shot of both Jeep and Significant Other (Do you come with the car?):

The Cousin, just 16 with a G1 that still smells new, was our chauffeur. He's been offroadin' for the last three years, at least, (if an unlicensed driver drives through the woods, does law enforcement care?) so he's a pretty confident driver. Here we are burning through the bush: During our ride, we came across a few uninhabited lakes - despite such a small percentage of landmass used for cities and civilization in this country, it is still breathtaking to realize how close the uninhabited wilderness lies to towns and highways. And, given the popularity of cottage-living, it is alternately amazing that there are still virgin lakes out there, cherry untouched by pre-fab and jet-ski. But, just when you think that you're the first to see this particular vista, you look down and see the rotted outline of a very old rowboat, and realize that there have probably been WAY more people here than you would ever imagine. We also drove past an old log fence zig-zagging through some old-growth trees and overgrown underbrush, outlining what must have been a clear-cut farmer's field that once stood where almost impassable scrub now grows.

So many trails run through the brush, they are still coming across new ones. We turned down a promising one, that eventually ended in a swamp.
More discoveries of civilization lost: a wee shack, slowing rotting away, that contains only a pile of chopped hardwood suitable for campfires. It had a Cheat-sized hole in the back, though, which make me wonder if the Homestarr character, like Wolverine, came from Canada. I can understand rowboats and shacks being left to slowly decay, but a Timberjack logging tractor? This was sitting in a clearing, piles of nicely cut logs surrounding it, and obviously untouched for years.
In the end, a lovely day for a ride in the woods, and a unique cottage experience had by us!