dinsdag 2 juni 2009

Huntsville - Algonquin provincial park

When you pack you always wonder whether you didn't pack too much. I can honestly say that I've worn every t-shirt and sweater that's in my backpack by now, what I didn't expect was that I had to wear them all the same day...
I left Tobermory somewhere between 4 and 5 with as general idea to get as far as possible in the direction of Huntsville. As I was outside all day, I was a bit tired so I decided to stop driving around 6.30 as I wasn't in a hurry anyway...
It was a good thing I did as the next day I was extremely tired. Lucky enough it wasn't busy on the road so I made it to Huntsville without a problem...
Huntsville is a nice but small town. First thing I did there was go to the library to check whether everything was still ok for a couch in Ottawa and whether I got answer for one in Montreal. Two times yes, so that's good news!
I visited a open air museum about how they used to live, about the first settelment there. Combined with the inside part of the museum, you got a good idea. I walked around a bit more but as I was tired, I wanted to go to a motel and sleep for a bit... As the days are long now, I still could go into town again later on. And it was a beautiful day, sun was out, nice weather. So after dinner I walked downtown again (10 min from the hotel) but it started to rain so I had a lazy evening in the hotel again...
Next morning I was going to Algonquin Provincial Park (Ontario's largest and oldest provincial park), to do some hiking. When I left it was around 10, pretty cold. But the closer I got to the park the colder it got 6-5-2 freezing! And not only that, I got caught up in a mild snow storm. Definatly not the weather I signed up for and I wondered whether it wouldn't be wiser to turn around. But as I had to pass there anyway on my way to Ottawa, I decided to keep going. Got my ticket at the enterence (you only need one if you want to do some hiking, otherwise you can just drive through it) with the idea I could visist the visitor center and the museum and do some walking around there. But the weather cleared out, even though it stayed cold. First did the 2 rivers trail, about 2 km, really nice and I had both snow and sun on my way. Next up was the Look Out, only 1 km, but a bit harder, as you had to climb to the lookout and of course the path was a bit muddy... Next stop the visitor center, where you have a look out, can watch a movie and there are several displays about the wildlife and things like that. Pretty intresting. I also wanted to do the Beaver point trail but missedd the sign for it so ended up doing the Algonquin Logging museum first, a 1 km track with some logging history, very intresting. 
As it was 5 pm by then and I was frozen, I decided to skip the Beaver loop. But on my way out of the park, I started to regret it so I turned back and did it. As my car was the only one parked there and I read in another travel report that bears were spotted there ones, I sang all my way to scare them of. Even though I was sure the bears went back into hibernation, I didn't want to take any chances. I didn't see any beavers but I did see a moose...
Spend the night in a place called Barry's Bay. First two motels I saw were closed but the 3th one was open and I took a nice and long bath to get warm...
I'm in Ottawa now, couchsurfing and I probably will share my couch with a nice cat, me happy...
And for those who don't know what couchsurfing is, check the website couchsurfing.com for more info!

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