Central & Western Labrador

Here's all that's left of the town of Gagnon.  It was built to house workers for the Fire Lake iron mine, 90km to the north.

Originally there was a mine nearby at Lake Jeannine
just south of town.  That mine either ran out of ore or they found a more economic grade of crude ore north of town at Fire Lake.

The entire town was dismantled and moved away when the Fire Lake mine closed. They did a pretty good job - there's absolutely no trace left except the road and sewers (and the lack of trees).

There are photos of Gagnon when it was a real town on the "A Scoff an' Scuff" website, from Gary & Debbie!

There are no services whatsoever here.

For the next 90km (north to the closed mine at Fire Lake) the road is paved, and you can make pretty good speed on it.

Enjoy it while it lasts.....

When you come back the other way, after hundreds of kilometers of gravel road, it feels like you're flying when you drive this stretch of road.

That's one empty road, eh?

This is what the next 80km of road are like.  A much narrower gravel road that twists and turns all over the place.

For much of the distance it flirts with a railroad that ships out the ore from the Mount Wright iron mine, crossing and re-crossing the rails many times.

Take care along here.  There's not much room if you meet a truck, and be careful at the railway crossings - there's no signals.

There are many small lakes along here, with deserted sandy beaches.  Very little traffic.

Here is a picture of the enormous tailings dump.

To give you an idea of its size, it is about 2 miles away.