Arriving in Sudbury in the pitch dark didn’t allow us to really check out the town. After settling in for a late dinner at the Holiday Inn, we settled into our rooms and plugged into our laptops to catch up with emails we didn’t get to on the road.

Cat and Mich managed to have a lovely uninterrupted sleep, but when Toaster rocked up for breakfast, disturbingly looking more disheveled than usual, we learned Dave kept him up most of the night with a pretty serious session of snoring. Poor Toast.

We set out from the hotel into a foggy morning, although not without Dola first attracting her usual crowd of curious admirers and made our way to Sudbury’s Big Nickel. And Tips, following her previous evening’s aversion to completing her duties at hand, seemed to be back on board in supporting us in finding the Big Nickel – not that it was that hard to find. Well, it would have been if we were going in the right direction…

Once that small issue was resolved, there she was – proudly perched on the side of the highway. And with the fog finally lifting, we got to view her in full shining pride… Dola really wanted to get up close and personal with the Nic, but we could only get within shouting-distance. The two Canadian icons did, however, manage to exchange greetings, and Nic provided Dola with some handy tips on how to deal with her newfound status of fame. This was a mission worth accomplishing…

Jumping back into the car to escape the brisk Sudbury weather, we all felt the imminent transition of weather in the air… Winter is nigh. The mere thought made us feel all warm and fuzzy, and with the warm feeling really overtaking our imaginations, for a brief moment we dreamt that it would be great to change direction and head south the California for some sun and surf. Tips was happy to provide some direction…but we had a task at hand and tour manager Michelle wasn’t having any of it.

Being on the road with Mich provides for its share of entertainment. She has a penchant for encouraging truckers to pull their horn – and her success rate in achieving this is sitting at about 99 per cent. The 1 per cent non-participant thought it would be better to encourage Michelle to pull her shirt up. He was scary. I now understand why Toast and I have been delegated to the back seat at all times in a safe, fully-decaled and child-proof setting…

We now find ourselves at what we have unanimously decided to be our best lunch yet – stationed in a small town of population 1200 – Massey, ON. The Dragonfly is the most charming cozy place with a huge, sophisticated menu. It’s the first time yet that Dave has not been able to completely finish his meal, and Cat has been satisfied enough with her choice in food that for the first time she didn’t steal from someone else’s plate… This is what we refer to in Tourland, a successful day – thus far…

Share on Facebook