Road Trip!

Us at the "Gateway to the North," which is now in a parking lot :)

Amy and I officially decided to go ahead with the trip four days before we departed for North Bay, Ontario. I love last-minute decisions—they’re so final. You have to follow through with them. We’d wavered on whether or not to go to Canada and decided not to after a couple friends who were thinking of joining couldn’t come on the day we wanted to leave. But, after Christmas, I wondered what I’d be doing for the rest of the break. Sleeping in, hanging out with friends, an occasional productive day due to an early breakfast date. It didn’t sound incredibly appealing. So, I called Amy up and asked what her New Year’s plans were. She didn’t have any, like me. How about going to Canada? She got her mom to let us use her Suburu Outback (my favorite car now) and we headed up to Buffalo New Year’s Eve. We spent the night with Emily, a friend I met in Yellowstone, then drove through Toronto and up to North Bay New Year’s morning. The highways were quiet and we found ourselves driving 25 mph and taking pictures of a surreal, dying but beautiful Buffalo on the right with Lake Erie on our left.

Four-wheeling with Ian

We were pretty ecstatic when we crossed the Canadian border, except for the rude border crossing lady who said we couldn’t get our passports stamped. Oh well—so much for a great first impression of Canada. The drive from Toronto was beautiful. The word “bucolic” came to mind—one of those SAT prep words lodged in my subconscious. The opportunity to use it doesn’t arise every day. Amy and I were both a little nervous as we waited for Ian to meet us in the doughnut shop parking lot (BY THE WAY, North Bay has the highest per capita doughnut shops in the world!). It had been a year and a half since I last saw him. I wondered if we’d get along like we had in South Africa, when we were the outsiders in a foreign place. I also wondered what his parents thought of two girls driving seventeen hours to see their son. We weren’t trying to sabotage his relationship with Kristina by any means! Being an outsider can be nerve-racking, but our fears were assuaged when we met his warm, funny family, who welcomed us with open arms.

Amy and me lying on the glass floor of the CN Tower

To make a long story short, Ian did and excellent job introducing us to Canadian culture. I tried a whistle dog (a hot dog split in half with bacon and cheese—not bad!), Amy and I both tried a poutine (french fries drenched in gravy with cheese curds on top—super unhealthy, but delicious), bought some clothes at Roots (kind of an outdoorsey Gap in Canada), cross-country skied, played ice-hockey, “snow-shoed” (ha—just long enough to take a picture, and in only two inches of snow), four-wheeled in the snow, hung out in Ian’s hot tub, ate Canadian chocolate bars, went to “the Moose,” a bar in North Bay packed out on a Wednesday night, and stayed up late hanging out with Ian. We drove Ian to Toronto on the fourth and took the subway into town to go up the CN tower, the tallest free-standing structure in the world. (We also met some pretty creepy characters on the subway, but that’s another story.) Walking on the glass floor of the tower and seeing the tiny play city below us was definitely unnerving. We got dinner and said our goodbyes to Ian, who would stay with his grandma in Toronto before flying out the next day.

The girls at Niagra

Amy and I spent the next two nights back in Buffalo with Emily and company. Our other Yellowstone friend Lindsay got a one-way ticket to Buffalo just to see us, so we had a lovely time remembering our days from the summer, wishing Pete and Joy were there to join us. We hit up Niagra Falls, walked from the American side to the Canadian side, which I agree is prettier, and got our passports stamped on the way over! That lady at the border was lying to us! Amy and I were delighted.

We left Buffalo at 6:30 the next morning, dropping Lindsay off in Baltimore and finishing off the trip with just the Amy and me. We started a cheesy Tom Clancy novel after Baltimore but stopped early to listen to Cake and fun Memphis mixes. Amy and I each ended up spending $100 for the whole trip, plus money for food here and there. Surprisingly, a very doable trip! Even for poor college students. If you haven’t taken a road trip, do it. Call me—I’ll probably come along.

Ian and me on the subway