Day One: Leaving Waterloo

It took at least 2 hours to load the car up with all the crap that was left in the townhouse. What a friggin nightmare not to mention the winter that started very late in Ontario surely must be a record for snowfall. It really REALLY sucks walking to your car 20 times in -20C shoving stuff in an overfilled back seat. On the way out of town, I stopped at Angie's Diner to have breakfast. Angie's Diner is a landmark in Waterloo, it's a bit small sometimes, and it's hot inside, but it's very cool. Least that is what I think.

Stopped for gas at the Petro Can on the 401 near Highway 6. Due to a fuel shortage in Ontario, you were limited to 75 litres of gas. I drive a Toyota Echo Hatch, so it's not really an issue. Pretty easy drive until I got north of Toronto where it started to snow. The Ontario Snowplow Crew seem to have this very annoying habit of putting 3 plows across the 3 lanes of the 400 series highways in Ontario. Then they slow down to 50 kms per hour and you and 10,000 other very impatient people have to drive behind them. On the way to Barrie this happened twice. Then I ran out of window wash fluid.

North of Barrie, stopped for gas and again the station was almost out of fuel and rationing. It's wierd that 140 kms north of Canada's largest city there are so few people out driving anywhere. I also ran into another wave of snowplows, further slowing me down.

The trip up to Sudbury was pretty uneventful, thank god for Satellite Radio in the car. Once you leave the Toronto airwaves, there isn't much to listen too, unless your a fan of radio pablum. Coming into Sudbury, it's not much different for radio, just the addition of a bad station that played bad 80s music, and a stoner rock station called Q92 FM.

The drive from Sudbury to Sault Ste Marie is even more boring, there isn't alot to see, and it was VERY windy. And freaking cold. Stopping for gas in some small remote village, I kept wondering what the hell do these people do for work & excitement? It's admittedly pretty nice looking up near Blind River....provided you like trees and water.

As I got closer to Sault Ste Marie, I turned off the Sat Radio to listen to what was playing locally. It seems like every station up there is classic rock, but I found a Top 40 station called Yes FM to break the monotony. Something truly warped about being in the middle of the bush hearing Rihanna & Sean Paul.

After driving for most of the day in the woods, I was happy to see Sault Ste Marie, just to see human civilization. The Sault isn't that large, maybe 100,000 people but feels very remote. Like it's the end of the world of sorts. I can't help but notice the number of trucks on the road. What a boring job that must be to do this day in and day out.

As I left the Sault, it immediately gets very desolate. 10 kms outside of town, you feel like you are in the middle of nowhere. This feeling increases exponentially as you continue driving. The scenery is very nice, Lake Superior on one side, forest & rock on the other. Around Batchewana Bay, you start climbing what seem to be huge hills which overlook Lake Superior. It's around this area that all signs of humans disappear. There are literally NO houses at all, just this empty road. No place to stop, no gas stations, no traffic. Nothing. By this time my car was covered in road salt, so my headlights were dirty, and the high beams did not work. There are alot of moose in this area, and I really didn't want to run into one. They usually win the battle.

219 kms from Sault Ste Marie, I arrived in Wawa. It's a very small town, perhaps 3500 people, obviously once the home to a mine of some type. If you're worried about a lack of hotels, don't be. Go downtown Wawa on Broadway (heh), you'll find many of them, all come with wireless internet & they're CHEAP, about 65 bucks C$ a night. There isn't alot going on in Wawa, so if you're hoping to go out and enjoy yourself, you might be disappointed.

I got to the hotel, fired up the laptop, had a few Waterloo Dark beers & went to bed.

Temperature -26C.