Sudbury, Ontario, 9/8/97

September 8, 2007

Decided perhaps I'd best catch up straight away to let you know where I am, which is the sort-of-glorious town of Sudbury, Ontario, home of base-metal mining. I'm going to begin using the date when I'm actually writing at the top of the post and then back track as I can.

Basically, I've decided that Canada is rather bigger than I had imagined, to nobody's surprise I expect, except mine. Especially Ontario. After I left Suzann in Barnet (which I'll report on in another post), I decided I'd better bip, or it would be weeks before I got to the West Coast. I do have a bit of a deadline if it doesn't alter, which is my "new" cousin Elva may be wanting to get to Yellowstone, leaving on the 20th or so. She lives in Roseberg, Oregon. Otherwise, I prefer to go at my own pace. I've made a resolution (if not a vow) that I'm only going to go as fast as I can go, perhaps even dawdle from time to time.

So, after Vermont, I boogied along to the next border, which came up surprisingly quickly into Quebec at the unknown town (to me) of Stanstead. It was a surprisingly easy translation. The border guard was a rather cute Quebequer with spikey black hair and a flirty smile. He, too, like the border guard at the U.S. border (a short-haired blonde, all business, Marine type) seemed most interested in -- what I might be bringing into the country, especially cigarettes and alcohol (mostly what I bought in Canada and transported through the U.S. to him). Piece of cake.

It was fun, at first at least, to see all the signs in French -- that is highway signs, which could be a bit confusing if you have to translate in your mind -- par example: droite and gauche. Initially in my scheme of travel, I was going to stop in Monreal and then in Ottawa, but I decided that I'd better keep going and besides, it was like riding the Shoot the Chute. If I got off the highway, it might take me several hours, if not days, to figure out how to get back on, so that on this Thursday, September 6, I decided to keep going. Stayed at a Comfort Inn, as mentioned in last post.

Yesterday, Friday, September 7, I also decided to keep going. This section is definitely a spot where one realizes Ontario is rather large and the Great Lakes can be seen from space for a reason. I had to stop in Sudbury -- besides being rather tired, it all-of-a-sudden poured down rain like out of a bucket onto my car. Got slightly freaked -- not hard to do if it's late in the driving day and everyone else seems to treat it as if it's just another Sunday drive. So found another Comfort Inn. Kind of spooky, because my room looks almost exactly like the one in Ottawa. I'm not sure I need that much predictability.

(photos: some cool rocks I saw from the side of the road. I did see some cool cows and two great horses against a barn, but passed by too quickly to backtrack. Dang.)

Had lunch at Champlain Eco Center at the Gazebo at the day camp area. Also snapped two campers who I think didn't want their pic taken, but I wanted to give you a sense of how beautiful that park was.


Here, in Sudbury, I'm not quite to Lake Superior. I hope to traverse around it today, but heard it's 12 hours to Thunder Bay -- I must say I never thought I'd be going to Thunder Bay, having the impression it was way up there, and so it is. But there's no other path.

I received a nice invitation to stay in Winnepeg, so I have a place to land, but probably can't make it until tomorrow, Sunday, night (at least I hope so).

Technical Notes:

Gas was $0.95 in Ottawa, but rose up to $1.05/liter by Sudbury. It cost $110 to stay at the comfort Inn in Ottawa and $125 here (because it's a weekend -- what's that?).