Travelling Past Time: Entry 2

Entry 2 - Friday 4^th to Sunday 13^th August 2017

The weather forecast for our last night at Algonquin Provincial Park was for thunderstorms. We decided to pack the dry tent and sleep in our hire vehicle for our last night.

Leaving around midday we made our way to Judith’s & Corey’s place at North Bay about 150 kilometres north. Our first stop was at the local Tim Horton’s (Canadian franchised coffee shop,) recommended by Penny for a good hot chocolate drink. We utilised the free wi-fi attending to our immediate internet needs (internet / phone access is far more restrictive than provided in Australia) and we enjoyed a magnificent hot chocolate drink, thank you Penny, we will be (have been) enjoying Tim Horton’s hot chocolate drink during our Canadian travels.

We met up with Judith after work at Walmart, where we obtained a few more camping items like a dust pan and brush to complete our required gear list. We enjoyed another great evening chattering with Judith and Corey and got to know 5 month old pup Brixton.

Our arrival coincided with a 3 day long week-end where Corey’s parents, Jeff and Tammy also made themselves available to spend copious time with us even with their commitments organising the annual North Bay “Summer in the Park Festival” encompassing many different types of events spread out over a week continuing into the long-week-end. Tammy and Jeff were fabulous hosts, also providing a couple of marvellous evening meals for us at their home on the week-end. Steve had put together some photos titled “show & tell” from our Australian travels publicizing Australian scenery which was viewed on the big screen at Tammy and Jeff’s home. Steve’s publicity photo’s were appreciated and he was a bit caught out with questions like; we are going to Australia and what would you recommend for our viewing?

Judith had taken the rest of the week off from work to spend time with us. We spent a wonderful week hanging out with our daughter enjoying one another’s company. We found the Serran family (Corey’s family) to have a similar outlook on life, for us a beautiful family whom we would welcome into our home and the rest of our extended family would delight being in their company.

The Canadian landscape was so different to Australia. One thing that stood out to us, no water storage tanks were sighted anywhere. The below picture for one of our travel routes probably best presents the Canadian landscape.

Judith and Corey lived at North Bay, about 400 kilometres north of Toronto with a population of around 50,000 located on the shores of Lake Nipissing, 65 kilometres by 25 kilometres which is one of the ten largest lakes in the province of Ontario of 10 provinces in Canada. During winter all the water ways and lakes freeze and people drive their vehicles onto the frozen lake surface.