Canada from the highway

You get an interesting perspective seeing central Canada from the highway.  We started across the prairies – some of the warmest areas of the country, and the driest.  Big skies, golden grain, acres of sunflowers.  Then you enter Manitoba.  All of a sudden, it was moist.  Good for the skin, and good for the bugs.  They get bigger and badder.  But the land is green, and trees line the highway.

Then you enter Ontario, and everything slows down.  The speed limit was 110km/hr across the prairies, 100km/hr through MB, and 90km/hr (if your lucky) in northern ON.  And it also cools down, although it was still about 21C (70F) in Thunder Bay.  The roads become windy, and it’s now lakes, rocks and trees.  Check out our photo gallery for a picture or two of our stop by the massive lake, Superior.

But we’ve really spent our first days in Ontario baffled by the traffic practices.  Now you have to understand, we’ve both lived in Ontario, so you’d think the traffic laws would be second nature.  But first, we stop at a stop light, and it’s red with a green arrow.  Not a turning arrow, as you commonly see in many parts of the country, but an arrow directing us to go forward during the red light.  Which light do we obey?!

And since it’s still the season for construction, we’ve passed quite a few workers on the road, in town and out.  You know how they have some poor girl or guy who holds a sign with “slow” on one side and “stop” on the other?  Well, about 75% of the time, they hold up the “stop” sign and tell us to go.  They hold up the “stop” sign and tell us to go.  Do they do this in other provinces?  Is this an intelligence test?  Is it a trick question?  Anyway, we obeyed the person and not the sign.  If we hadn’t, we’d still be somewhere close to the MB/ON border at our first construction zone. 😯