A Trans Canada Road Trip in Northern Ontario

Toronto To Manitoba

It’s been a busy few weeks and it all started with receiving an offer for a job in Vancouver. I was pleasantly surprised that this firm appreciated my engineering background and so I asked for a few weeks to close shop in Ontario and drive across the country.

One of my first long-term goals was to drive across the country after I graduated. The goal came about sometime in grade school decades ago when I thought it would be a wonderful trip — little did I know at the time that I would get the opportunity now, a year after graduating.

I was a little sad to be leaving the Lake House, especially after Jenna and her family’s wonderful hospitality but I was eager to get on the road. I figured that the sooner I left, the more time I’d have to travel and experience the countryside. I was already pretty much ready to go. Most of my things had already been prepared since I’d been applying to jobs for nearly two months — I just didn’t know if I’d be in Toronto or Vancouver. With this job in Vancouver I closed out my storage unit and sent my 7 boxes across the country via Canada Post. It’s the cheapest way to move boxes and freed up room in the Element to be able to still sleep in the back.

My first stop was the Bruce Peninsula National Park, about a three hour drive northwest. Rather than drive straight up from Barrie to Sudbury, I thought it would be nice to revisit Bruce Peninsula and hopefully see the main grotto which I’d missed on my earlier trip.

Unfortunately, like my previous trip, it was raining so while I caught a glimpse of the grotto I couldn’t safely descend on the slippery rocks. Still, it was nice to see a little more of the park, including the lookout tower while hiking around. Then I took the ferry to Manitoulin island and camped under pretty drewry weather that persisted in the morning and made me skip the hike I had planned. I did spot a short hike after the island which I stopped at to stretch my legs but there wasn’t much of a view because of the clouds.

There wasn’t much along the way to Sault Ste. Marie other than a giant Looine, one of the many larger than life trans-Canada highway roadside attractions. I tried to stop at most of these along my way for no other reason than to take a quick selfie.

Continuing on my quest to visit as many parks Canada sites as I can, I went to the canal locks but it was closed because it was the weekend or I arrived before June 1st. Several times along this trip in late May I ran into signs that said summer hours didn’t begin till June so I was out of luck. The grounds of the canal were still open to wander around and I tested out a used 35mm lens I’d bought but I didn’t see the exhibits. I was pretty impressed with the lens and started to look at textures and materials a little more.

Chippewa Falls along lake Superior is an interesting rest stop that’s considered the mid-point of the Trans Canada Hwy. It was apparently one of the last sections of the highway to be completed and also a place where the group of 7 painted.

More interestingly, not much further along in Lake Superior Provincial Park are the Agawa Rock Pictographs. The Indigenous red ochre paintings are centuries old and curiously on the edge of a sloped rock face. They seem incredibly well preserved but a little hard to see because of the narrow sloped rock.

The provincial park had some interesting hikes but I prefered the Pukaskwa National Park. It’s smaller but with more interesting rock formations and nice beaches. Plus, I didn’t have to pay day-use because I had the annual national parks pass.

The shores of Lake Superior were surprisingly northern to me even though I’ve seen many maps of the country. The ruggedness of the countryside was a surprise considering that it was the southern edge of the province and not even close to Hudsons Bay but it goes to show how much of Canada is truely remote wilderness.

As I continued on to Thunder Bay I made a few stops at Aguasabon Falls that was a torrent of water, Nipigon cable-stayed bridge which I’d done some engineering work on, and Ouimet Canyon Provincial Park which has a fantastic canyon along a very short walk. None of these stops were very long and I was soon on my way again.

Just outside Thunder Bay is Sleeping Giant Provincial Park. My friend had mentioned it during a roadtrip he’d taken so I thought I’d stop and hike around. At first I wasn’t that impressed. To get to the top of the giant was a long 8km hike which meant that it would also be 8km back along a road that was frequently covered in muddy puddles.

I didn’t know that at the every end of the hike is Ontario’s tallest vertical cliff until some other hikers asked me for directions. This was actually quite impressive but I didn’t get very good photos because I didn’t want to get too close to the edge.

Thunder Bay was as rough and rugged as I imagined it to be and I stopped in for the night at an AirBnB because I’d been having pretty terrible allergies for the past week. I thought having a clean shower and fresh bed might help. To an extent, it did, but I continued to have allergies throughout Ontario and into Manitoba.

My last stop in Ontario was Kakabeka Falls Provincial Park on the other side of Thunder Bay where a torrent of water poured over the side. I really thought there’d be more stops in Ontario considering everyone told me it takes 3 days to get through and I took a few more but there really wasn’t much other than long stretches of empty highway. I didn’t mind it too much because I was well stocked on audiobooks but it was still a bit of a surprise because I was in Mantioba earlier than expected.