T-Bay to Toronto

---

On Monday (June 01), I had an apple cinnamon instant oatmeal breakfast, packed my backs, and left with Al at 7:30AM. Scott had insisted he deliver us to the outskirts of Thunder Bay himself, so that we'd have a great place to start from. We walked from an outer intersection for at least an hour, possibly another half-hour. Things were looking pretty bleak, and the difficulties of getting out of Thunder Bay which we had heard about from others was an approaching reality. What we hadn't know of at the time, was that most of the time we had been walking on a stretch of highway where hitching was illegal.

At that moment, a First Nations stopped to give us a ride. He must have been about 65, looking sort of weathered and retired. For the next hour or so, we listened to him complain about immigrants in Canada, his neighbors who didn't know how to spend their money wisely, and the government. He dropped a lot of F-bombs and I even noticed that he had a self-labeled CD-R in his deck, titled "Fuck Off." When we arrived in his home-town, Nipigon, he dropped us off at a truck stop where people stopped before passing through and further East.

We took a washroom break and pushed forth. The morning has been a slow start, and it was nearly noon by now. We'd have to keep riding along if we were to meet out projected destination of Seault St. Marie by night. I wrote up a new sign for the next town and stood at the truck stop's exit onto the highway. We had hardly stood there 15 minutes, when a truck pulled out and stopped just ahead of us. We didn't know just how far he was going, but semi-trucks always take you a good distance.

Trucker was the prototypical and classic truck-driver. He wasted no timing talking trucker talk, which is to say he told us more about trucking and how it works than we ever asked about. At one point he asked "You boys like blues??," and after our passive mumbles proceeded to put on some blues music. At no point did he stop talking for more than a minute, as the silence was always broken, often by a story that began with "Back in the 60s (70s or 80s)" or "my wife says" or "the new guys." He yelled ferociously at other vehicles and truckers sentences about how they should not be allowed on the road, generously peppered with F-bombs, and in a tone of pretense. He obviously thought he was the best thing since cheese. He had a few stories to tell, which neither I or Al wanted to hear, due to their personal nature. He also spent a great deal of time trying to convince us that he knew the secret to the construction of the Egyptian pyramids, and explained it to us at least 3 times. He was overall a nice guy, but with fatigue running through our bodies, me and Al had little personal desire to hold steady conversation, especially a one-side conversation to which we could only mumble and "hm" "OK" to. Before we had even hit Seault Ste. Marie, he told us he could probably take us as far as Sudbury legally, before he had to park himself for the night. This promise of a drop-off further than expected enticed us, and we put up with the chore of curteous conversation that any hitch-hiker owes the driver for a few additional hours.

As we looped on an overpass leading to Sudbury, Trucker showed us the overpass beneath which hitch-hikers slept regularly. He took us to the truckstop, where we parted the ways after a short break. We walked back to the overpass and a bit further down the highway, hoping to catch another late-evening ride to take us ever further. We had agreed that although we were both very tired, we favored pushing East hard over sleep. Afterall, we could always crash in the next city.

After thumbing for an hour, we walked back to the overpass and set up for the night. Under one of the lanes, we found some abandoned boots, a blanket and other items. I used the old blanket as a layer between a concrete pad and my sleeping bag. I crawled into my bag around 10pm wearing 4 layers on my torso, and fell asleep while cars whizzed by along the highway.

I awoke to Tuesday at 5:33 AM. The sun was already so bright and had forced me awake, that I had expected it to be 8 or 9 by now. But an early start is a good start on the road, so we packed up our junk and went to the truckstop for a pee & poop break. I decided to invest in a pair of work gloves to keep my fingers warm, clean, and protected from various adventures. I took some dried-out buns from my backpack and dipped them in a can of veggie chili for breakfast., and then walked back to the highway pass the overpass.

We walked and walked for about 2 hours, through a slightly populated settlement, and then past. Nothing. More walking. Nothing. Nothing. Until something: a guy dressed rather nice and driving an SUV picked us up en route to a meeting at a police station. He wasn't a policeman, but worked more with "the EMS," which I have no clue about. He gave us some good info on things to do in Toronto, and how to get around during our 1-hour ride with him, and then let us off at a Tim Horton's at a truck stop in Parry Sound. We took the usual poop & pee break and I dumpstered some cardboard for a new sign. We were energetic and in great spirits, so we held our sign just accross the highway from T-Ho's and danced for a while. Within the half hour, a woman back on the parking lot motioned for us to come over there so she could give us a ride.

She was awesome. She must have been about 25 or 26 like I, and was a professional cartoonist, and dance instructor on the side. We talked about cartooning, indie music, trends in Toronto, places to be and how to get around. She took us right into Toronto, and let us off at Yorkdale Mall, with a transit station attached. It was very early afternoon, and the excitement of having reached Toronto at last was very much present. The place was massive, so distant and far-reaching, and hear we were, at some glitzy mall where we brushed our teeth in the washrooms and discarded of our "T.O." sign.

We tried to call a few friends by payphone, but could not reach them. We decided we'd just go to Markham and show up at a friend's door. After a few wrong buses taken, and a long wait for another bus, we decided we'd head to the downtown of Toronto instead. Once in the subway, Alan lost his weekly transit pass and went to look for it. As I was looking at my free transit map, some girl stopped to offer her help. I should have declined right there and then, because the next hour consisted of her giving us every little detail about how to get where and when as we rode in the subway to downtown. When we got out at the downtown, she started to tell us where certain things were, more directions (all of which I had no chance of remembering, just like the rest), places to go, etc. We broke her off kindly by insisting we figure it all out ourselves.

One of the greatest excitements of traveling, is the new city experience. The city itself is not that unique overall, or in appearance. However, one gets lost in each new city he finds himself in. In our case, we wanted the experience of being lost and wandering around until at last, we had gotten some grasp of where we were. We wandered a couple of streets north, and with the use of a map, started heading towards a friend's apartment. We made a phone call after about an hour and a half, and she said to come right on over. In another half hour, we knocked on door and met with excitement.

---