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So here we are in Thunder Bay, giving camping a break, we booked a night in a hotel. It was nice not having to worry about organising the campsite and setting up the tent. Most times I find this to be difficult to adapt to constant changes of new surroundings. It has been many days since we have watched tv, and boy, we really haven’t missed much. The news seems to get more ridiculous and shocking. We would rather enjoy sitting outside next to each other talking about nothing, something and everything. Even in the hotel room we had the tv on and not paying much attention to it, well in fact, Chris fell asleep while I was catching up on social media. Driving can be so exhausting for Chris. We were ready for our next venture, heading East - Wawa, ON. A long day ahead of us, forecast was, WAIT FOR IT….RAIN! It seems like all we get is rain since we hit Ontario. First comfort break was just outside of the city, we visited the Terry Fox memorial. We stood there in awe, of how one person can make such an impact, I don’t think many of you know that Terry Fox helped me get through my first marathon. It was the Royal Victoria Marathon (my first, in 2008), I ran out of gas, my body decided I had enough, I was ready to give up. Then, Terry came into my mind, I thought of how he ran 42 km (26.2 mi) every day - I told myself, if he ran this distance every day, I can finish this one, and ‘my can’ do attitude found its way back into my body and made it to the finish line. I thanked him for getting me through it. As I looked up to the statue of Terry, my eyes started to sting and some tears fell. How can you not admire a young man who ran this distance for 143 days, 5,373 kms in total till the cancer forced him to stop - and lost his life. Because of him, 650 million dollars have been fundraised in his honour at the annual Terry Fox Run since 1981. Powerful. After our visit at the memorial, we hit the road, munched on trail mix and fruits while enjoying the beautiful scenery. Then we saw this sign, Thessalon - lots for sale, Chris made a spontaneous decision and turned off the highway and into Thessalon. We drove through a new little development, the view of Lake Huron took our breath away. We stopped at a park that was nearby. While Chris was feeding Dudley, I went to the washroom, and on my way, I saw a couple of families having a picnic. So I stopped and asked them what was it like living in this town. Community was the key word here. Whilst we made some friends in Nanaimo, we never felt it was a warm community. Maybe we could live in Thessalon, put up with the cold winters, maybe become snowbirds. Finally, after several hours of driving we hit our destination - Wawa. WA..WA..the heck is this town?! I feel like we were the last man standing in an old 60’s spaghetti Western movie. It was kind of spooky, not a soul stirring in the streets, businesses shut down, we were just waiting for a sundown duel springing into action..nope, no excitement here. Our next stop was in Chute Provincial Park in Massey ON. We pitched up our tent here for 3 nights, a welcome break for Chris. This is where I had my best runs (did 2 here in the trails using my #RunGo app and #applewatch. This time I made my own route because the trails were wide and well maintained. It was a hot day but running in these trails had a beautiful canopy of spruce, birch and cedar, and the edges of the grounds were bursting with colourful wildflowers of deep purples, yellows, oranges and whites. I felt so lucky to still be able to see such colours, such beauty. I will never forget this place, nor shall I forget my most embarrassing (to self) incident. Our first day here, maybe within the first hour of staying here, I went to the washroom. I walked into the disabled toilet, did what I had to do, grabbed the toilet paper and then I noticed the kiosk door was on the wrong side, I seem to remember that the toilet paper roll was on my right and it is now on my left. AAACK! there is a URINAL in here!!! At the moment of awareness, a man walks in, so I wait, I look at my shoes, good, I am wearing my birkenstocks, men wear them too so I can pass as a man from the shin down. But, not with nicely shaved legs and pink toenails. OI Vey! So I keep waiting, I am NOT going out there until I know it is safe to leave the toilet to wash my hands ever so quickly to dash out. A song popped into my head, so I sing (in my head, not out loud, that would be a dead giveaway that I am not a man) 100 bottle of beer on the wall, 100 bottles of beer…. After 79 bottles of beer on the wall, I escaped and ran all the way to our campsite laughing. From there on, we had a nice relaxing time here except for the last night. At around 1am, a loud crackling boom jolted me out of a deep sleep, I realized we are having a thunderstorm. The flashing and rumbling lasted for a few hours and the rain was pouring so hard that I actually heard it. I have never heard rain without hearing aids before. I kept thinking to myself, “I can’t believe I can hear the rain!”. We woke up to a very very wet campsite, and have no way of drying our stuff out before putting it into our car. We packed all the gear, dog and us as quickly as we could and drove off. it seemed like we were inside a snowglobe, minus the snow and the whole car smelled like wet dog. Onward East - after many hours of driving we finally hit Nobleton, ON (about ½ hour from Toronto). We stayed at a family home for 3 days and it was our first experience with AirBnb. Most of our time here we visited our friends in King City and enjoyed our time catching up with them in real time rather than in the chat room. The place we stayed at was next to some wonderful trails, so I took advantage of it and did 2 runs. With the cooler nights and wet weather, we decided that AirBnb might replace our camping, unless weather goes in our favour. We are on the road again, this time we are heading to Peterborough, ON. We plan on staying for maybe a couple days...which turned into 6 days! We enjoyed our time staying with family (and some also visiting from the UK). Chris and I both caught a nasty head cold which kept us from doing much exercise. While staying here, we thought it would be nice to get ‘hitched’ with family around us. So off to the city hall we go. Without hesitation we filled out our forms, handed it to the clerk, she checks it, I give her the form stating recent divorce. She said, “I’m sorry, that is not acceptable, we need the original copy.” Okay, we have a plan, we called Nanaimo Court house to explain the situation and the clerk there said it is here on file for some reason it was not sent out. Okay, no problem, we will call Purolator and have them send it to us here in Peterborough. After a few very long frustrating calls, we got it all set up and will be sent to us by noon the next day. Ten-thirty am rolls around and the courier truck showed up in the driveway, by this time I was feeling more relaxed. We make our second trip to the city hall, and apply for our license once more. The clerk, checks our application, my certificate was approved! Then she said, “I’m sorry, we need to have Chris’s original divorce certificate.” She didn’t even bat an eyelash, as if she enjoyed giving us bad news. Chris was then trying to explain why hadn’t they told us yesterday about this. It would've saved us money and a 2nd trip to the city. At this point I had to walk out, feeling discouraged, I started to cry. We drove back to Chris’s sister home in the countryside, They welcomed us as if a wedding was about to happen. After telling everyone what had happened, Chris’s sister created a mock wedding for us and presented us with a floral bouquet and boutonnieres - this moved me to tears. She made it all okay, I really felt that I was part of this family, which is something I miss so much since losing my dad recently. With the long weekend coming up, we decided to hit the road and try another AirBnb, this time in Carlsbad Springs, QC. I will sign off for now...toodle loo! Au Revoir! VIP: Buy a good quality flashlight and keep it with you all the time (use a carabiner and attach to to your belt loop so it doesn’t fall out of your pocket).
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