O Canada

 

When I was growing up, we spent several of our family vacations in Canada. We went to at least seven of the ten provinces. Our trip to British Columbia and Alberta was my least favorite vacation just because of how many hours we spent in the vehicle even though we had flown out to Seattle from Maryland. My favorite place that we visited in Canada was Halifax, Nova Scotia. Several years ago, I thought it would be a good goal for us to see if we could visit all ten provinces with our children. We spent a little time in Ontario in 2018, and I had made hotel reservations for a more extensive trip through Ontario and Quebec in 2020, but naturally, those plans were all cancelled due to COVID. We ended up accomplishing the New England portion of that trip in September 2022, but I eliminated the Canadian portion due to COVID mandates that were in place at the time. Ironically, while we were on that trip Canada announced that the mandates would be ending as of October 1. Because our whale cruise in Maine was cancelled this past September due to Hurricane Fiona, I thought we'd take a whale cruise this coming September off the coast of Washington, but it turns out that the whale cruises on the northwest coast are FAR more expensive than the whale cruises on the northeast coast. Now that we are planning to visit the maritime provinces, I think we'll aim to go on a whale watching cruise in the Bay of Fundy instead. 

Canada has an Xplorers program similar to the Junior Ranger program in the US. The kids completed the Xplorers booklet at Fort George in Ontario in 2018. I don't expect them to earn anywhere near as many in Canada as they have in the US, but hopefully they'll earn at least ten over the next four years at places such as Banff, Lake Louise, Fundy, Green Gables Heritage, Cape Breton, Halifax Citadel, Alexander Graham Bell, Jasper, and Gros Morne. This week I decided to give more thought to making plans, which if they come to fruition would enable us to visit all of the Canadian provinces within the next 4.5 years. Here are some of those plans:

1. Spend one day in Toronto this July in conjunction with a music festival we plan to attend at Darien Lake (NY).
2. Spend two days in British Columbia this September. I deleted San Juan Island (Washington) from the current potential itinerary and lengthened the vacation by one day to add in this province.
3. Spend about one week on a trip to Ottawa, Montreal, and Quebec City in June or July 2024 immediately following a Bible quizzing competition in NY. On the way home we could visit the three National Park sites in Hyde Park, New York that we weren't able to visit this past fall. 
4. Take a vacation to New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland in 2026. Although Gros Morne National Park looks like it is very beautiful, I think the province that is the most likely to be eliminated from our travel plans would be Newfoundland given the time and expense it would take to get there from Nova Scotia. 
5. Visit Manitoba, Alberta, and Saskatchewan along with Glacier National Park and some sites in South Dakota in 2027. Those would be the final three provinces, and this trip would involve the most driving even though I'm thinking we would fly out to Minneapolis. Hopefully we will all have a good opinion of this trip even though we'll have to spend more time in a vehicle than we'd like. Canada is a VERY big country! 

Some of the gingerbread houses that the kids made.

I fully realize that this tentative plan is subject to change, but I also think there's more of a chance that we will achieve the goals to visit all 50 states, all (or at least 9 of the) 10 Canadian provinces, Ecuador, and the British Isles if we have some potential plans. I also want the kids to visit a third world country on a short-term mission trip (probably Guatemala) over the next couple of years. 

1. April 2023 - Nebraska, Kansas, Chicago, and Iowa
2. September 2023 - Lake Tahoe (Nevada), northern California, Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia
3. January 2024 - Ecuador and southern Florida
4. May 2024 - Virginia
5. June or July 2024 - Ontario, New York, and Quebec
6. September 2024 - Alaska
7. March 2025 - Texas and Louisiana
8. May 2025 - D.C.
9. September 2025 - Hawaii
10. Spring 2026 - D.C.
11. May 2026 - England, Wales, Ireland, Northern Ireland, and Scotland
12. August 2026 - New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland 
13. August 2027 - British Columbia, Manitoba, Alberta, and Saskatchewan as well as some sites in the US (Montana, South Dakota, North Dakota, and Minnesota)

Ian's bedroom after I took down the border and painted his walls at the end of December.