Sleeping Giant Provincial Park

We are now at Sleeping Giant Provincial Park and that is the Sleeping Giant as viewed from the boat ramp at the main campground on Marie Louise Lake.

Our site is another fairly narrow pull through, like at Rainbow Falls, although this site is tighter than that one with less vegetation to screen us. It was nice with the folks in the next slot gone, but about an hour after they left another camper pulled in, so now the driveway you can see on our left has a trailer in it.

This is a huge park. This morning we set out early to hike a short trail. We were a bit dismayed to find the parking lot fairly full at the trailhead. However, there are several trails here and on the spur trail we took we only saw one other hiker.

The main trail was quite wide. This is the south end of Kabeyun Trail which runs 23 miles around the south end of Sibley Peninsula and then along the west side to a point about 2/3 up the peninsula. The park takes up almost the whole peninsula.

Just about a half mile down the main trail we turned off on the more rugged and narrow Sea Lion Trail.

It led just a short way past this lovely little cove on Lake Superior…

to this natural arch called the Sea Lion. The formation, which is made of crystallized magma called diabase, used to have more rock that made its head. The head fell many years ago but the name stuck.

And in the background is the Sleeping Giant.

From pictures I’ve seen there are some stunning views in this park. Unfortunately the best are from these trails, the shortest of which is 10 miles, so we won’t be seeing those.

Instead, after our short hike we drove along Marie Louise Drive, a one way, dirt road along the far side of Marie Louise Lake.

There are a few very nice tent sites back here,

each with its own lake access.

Further down the road a porcupine crossed in front of us. Although he went slowly, he blended so well with the forest floor I could not get a good picture.