This 2015 $20 fine silver coin is part of a series by the Royal Canadian Mint showcasing the uniqueness of Canada's Great Lakes. This coin is struck in one troy ounce of .9999 fine silver, and features a mintage of 10,000 coins. As a pure silver coin issued by the Royal Canadian Mint, this item is HST/GST exempt.
The Design:
Some key features make the reverse of these coins exceptional, such as the deep negative relief (incuse) used to indicate varying depths of the lake. The space is then filled with vibrant, translucent blue enamel that shimmers on the surface of the coin the way the lake would shimmer under the white light of the Canadian sun. The lake is surrounded by a high-relief topographical map of the land around it, and further encircled by the points on a compass, with an arrow pointing due north. The face value of "20 DOLLARS" can be seen to the right of the lake, while the bottom rim of the coin reads "LAKE HURON/LAC HURON".
Lake Huron:
Lake Huron is shared on the east by the province of Ontario and on the west by the state of Michigan in the United States. The name of the lake is derived from early French explorers who named it for the Huron people inhabiting the region. By surface area, Lake Huron is the second-largest of the Great Lakes, making it the third-largest fresh water lake on earth (and the fourth-largest lake, if the Caspian Sea is counted as a lake). Georgian Bay protrudes northeast from Lake Huron, while Manitoulin Island (the largest freshwater island in the world) is nestled within the lake, which separates the North Channel and Georgian Bay from Lake Huron's main body of water. More than a thousand shipwrecks have been recorded in Lake Huron. These purportedly include the first European vessel to sail the Great Lakes, Le Griffon, built in 1679 on the eastern shore of Lake Erie, near Buffalo, New York.
