Canada, Solo 1978

I decided to head north, away from the crowds, and, of course, into the cold.     My goal was to get to Moose Factory, an old Hudson’s Bay Company outpost on Factory Island, at the mouth of the Moose River where it empties into James Bay.     Moose Factory is almost directly north of Toronto.     I take Highway 69, through Sudbury, stop for the night at Half Way Lake, and then carry on the next day to Cochrane, from where I catch a train to Moosonee.     The travel keeps me busy enough that I write in snatches, or not at all.   driving through the Muskoka  munching thoughtfully on an apple savouring its flavour, its juiciness  experiencing Canadian apple-ness   the stars are wondrous bright tonight the crickets are singing.   on Highway 69, the road to Sudbury a brilliant sunny, absolutely cloudless day I stop often to gaze at the changing landscape The beginnings of the famous (infamous?) Canadian shield a sea of gla...

From Esker Lakes I decide to head east instead of south, and just like that, I’m in Quebec, on may way to Rouyn-Noranda and val-d’Or.    Quebec has a different look and feel from Ontario.     Perhaps it’s just that I’m in Northern Quebec which, like Northern Ontario, is mostly mining towns.     But the place looks poorer even than Northern Ontario, rougher and less finished, less cared for.    Bleak unfinished houses set in equally bleak landscapes - I feel depressed just looking at them, can't imagine living in them.  Or living here at all.  But this is another slice, another glimpse of the reality of life in my great nation, Canada.     The roads here are in worse condition than anywhere else I’ve been so far – lumpy, rippled and patched, sometimes falling off (literally) abruptly and without warning into pot-holed gravel tracks. Road shoulders are narrow and soft, so not good for stopping, which is a problem as there are so ...

On the highway heading south, it has started to rain.   The first rain in quite a while.   I turn the windshield wipers on. They leave great streaks on the windshield. Bug bodies! Oily bug bodies!  I contemplate throwing powdered soap on the windshield to counter the slime.  Instead I stop and deal with the mess with soap and sponge and elbow grease (not oil). I observe three bugs on the passenger side window.  They appear of the same kind, but one is large and the other two small.  About the size of a mosquito. Winged. Light transparent beige.  The two little ones are on the bigger one's back – either attacking it or mating with it, I can't tell.  The bigger one seems rather annoyed, shaking and doing cartwheels on the window.  Aha! Another menage a trois just landed on the window in precisely the same state: two on one.  The large one's abdomen is much bigger than the smaller one’s. And appears to grow larger as they mate...  Now ...

After spending almost a week in Toronto and Ottawa, I am finally back on the road again. And... I have a new traveling companion!  Dusty is an eight month old, fawn-coloured lab-retriever cross.  I got him at the Ottawa Humane Society.  He’s got a wonderful temper – affectionate and responsive,  But also independent and keen to explore.  Today we didn’t travel far, stopping early so Dusty could get out and run around a bit.  He's been in a kennel for two weeks (or more).  He runs around with no leash – as free as a bird. Ears flopping and tail sticking straight out like a broomstick behind him.   Stopping to sniff at something, then head up again and running, racing every which way.  Running up to a plant, a post, a piece of garbage,  Examining it absorbedly, but only briefly, quickly losing interest and moving on.  Chasing grasshoppers, flies, bees.  It was fun to watch him enjoy himself.  To witness the sheer joy, e...

We made a quick overnight stop in Montreal to visit friends, remarkable mostly because Dusty first rolled in a dead fish, so was banished to the car, and the next morning vomited up something he’d eaten (the dead fish?), presumably the day before. We beat a hasty retreat from the city, and headed north and east through Joliette.  Fortunately we came across a stream just before there that was deep enough for me to give Dusty a bath with liberal amounts of dish soap.  Even more fortunately he was happy enough to be bathed, or maybe, feeling sickly, just didn't have the energy to protest.  So at least he smelled better.  But he refused to eat anything, and looked at me pathetically as we continued our journey east towards Quebec City.     We traveled on through a peaceful rural landscape.  Fields of hay, uncut and now dry, their seed heads nodding in the breeze, or cut with new green growth, perhaps a promise of another late crop. Appl...

Yesterday we ventured into Quebec City and wandered for hours in the old section of town – along the little streets, some paved with cobble stone, peering into ‘olde shoppe’ windows, deciphering the names and ingredients of Quebecois cuisine in restaurant menus, reading plaques on monuments, and enjoying the very active street life.    Quebec City is quintessentially French – Quebecois – and for me a wonderful place to get a glimpse of yet another piece of the great mosaic masterpiece that is Canada.     Interestingly, I fared much better in French with the shop-keepers than I had with the gendarmes.     It was actually enjoyable.     Amazing what anxiety can do to our thought processes, seizing up our synapses, interrupting the flow.   Anyway it was good to know that, in more relaxed situations, my learned French wasn’t quite as hopeless as I had thought.   Last night I’d done my usual perusal of maps both national and provincial (...