According to Ontario politics columnist Jim Coyle, in the Toronto Star this past Monday, today is (more or less officially, it seems) Lake Superior Day. (“A few months back … Algoma-Manitoulin MPP Mike Brown won unanimous support in the Legislature for his resolution to establish the third Sunday in July …  as Lake Superior Day.”)

Mr. Coyle (quoting Mr. Brown) made a number of points about why Lake Superior so richly deserves such an honour. It is, e.g., “the largest body of fresh water in the world by surface area.” My own memories of this natural wonder go back to camping out on the pebble-beach shore of Alona Bay, about an hour and a half’s drive north of Sault Ste. Marie, for a week in the middle of the summer more than 45 years ago.

One day we climbed the great clump of rock you can see off in the distance in the photo here. Much closer to the present, I am indebted to the wonders of the Internet for this photo. I found it on the flickr site, and it is a composite of three photos beautifully taken by ann j p only a few years ago. She has taken many other recent photos of Lake Superior. Browsing through them is one good way of celebrating Lake Superior Day.

I can also testify that her photo of Alona Bay here nicely captures the mood of the place, as I remember it. (I can almost taste the hot porridge sweetened with corn syrup and thick campfire coffee that we had for breakfast back in the earlier 1960s.) Happy Lake Superior Day to Mike Brown and everyone else anywhere who loves the beauty of the northern North American wilderness – so much of which is happily still with us, despite the worst instincts of our species.