Sweet Willie
Jun 10, 03, 5:23 pm
<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Beyond the end of the road in a land of moose and beluga whales
Holy Canada! A week exploring Northern Ontario by plane, train, and automobile (and boat) where $950 covers most major costs, from airfare and car rental to tours and six nights of lodging
By Reid Bramblett
ARTHUR FROMMER'S BUDGET TRAVEL
June 10 — Just 450 miles north of cosmopolitan Toronto, the frontier of the 17th century is still alive and well in Northern Ontario. We’ve unearthed a six-day journey that takes you into this heart and soul of Canada, a place where the roads don’t go, towns have poetic names like “Moose Factory,” the local Cree tribe has turned a 330-year-old trading post town into an eco-lodge experience, ancient fossils scatter the surface, and the gold lies buried deep.
CANADA IS always a fantastic Budget Travel destination—if for no other reason than, at CAN$1.34 to US$1, our greenbacks go so much further up north. But aside from discreet bargains such as the VIA Rail pass (read a recent story about that here), we rarely see a packaged holiday or tour at a decent price—oh, some may look promising, until we realize that you must provide your own airfare, rental car, sight admissions, etc. That’s why this deal really caught our attention.
It’s a weeklong vacation in Northern Ontario with departures every Friday until the end of August, and it includes roundtrip airfare from the States on Air Canada or United, a car rental, tours and cruises, an historic train journey, several meals, and six nights of lodging—two of them in an native-run eco-lodge.
For all that, prices start at $950 for departures out of most major US gateways in the Northwest and Midwest, including New York, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Philadelphia, Washington and many more. For departures from Atlanta, Nashville and most Southeastern cities, add $50; from Miami and other Florida cities, add $105; from Denver or Phoenix, add $110; from Dallas or Houston, add $125; from San Francisco add $180; from Los Angeles or San Diego, add $230.
But enough about prices. Let’s take a peek at this journey that can take you to the once and future frontierland of Canada, beyond where the roads end and the moose begin.
330 YEARS OF HISTORY IN 186 MILES
You touch down in the old mining town of Timmins, where you shack up for two Nights at the Cedar Meadows Resort (http://www.cedarmeadows.com), on the Mattagami River with its own 175-acre wildlife reserve, or you can opt for the central Senator Hotel (www.nt.net/senator).
Next day, you get a free tour of the Timmins underground gold mine (http://www.timminsgoldminetour.com) set up in the old Hollinger Mine, which was founded in 1909 and for a time held the title of richest gold mine on the Western Hemisphere. When all was said and done, it produced around CAD$400 million—which, at today’s gold prices, would be worth CAD$4 billion, or roughly US$3 billion.
Move on to Cochrane for a night at the aptly named Station Inn (http://www.ontc.on.ca/english/04pass/04coch.html), run by the train company and located at the station itself. After all, Cohrane’s claim to fame is terminus of the Polar Bear Express, which you board the next morning for a 300km train journey following an old native canoe route along the Abitibi and Moose rivers and through boreal forest and clay plains to the edge of James Bay. After 4.5 hours of clanking along to the James Bay lowlands, you arrive in the settlement of Moosonee, a community of 2,000 accessible only by air or, in summer, by railroad or canoe (or, in winter, a really long walk).
A $5 water taxi’s ride away in the midst of the Moose River lies the island of Moose Factory, Canada’s oldest permanent English settlement. It was founded by the Hudson Bay Company in 1673 as a trading post, hence the funny name, which has gotta be one of the great Canadian place names, right up there with Medicine Hat, Echo Bay, and Flin Flon. While it conjures up wonderful images of the enormous antlered critters being put together on an assembly line to be crated and shipped from some massive industrial building, the truth is far more prosaic. The dude in charge of a trading post was called the Factor, so the place he ran was a “factory.” “Moose” was just the name of the river and this general area where it empties into James Bay.
These days, the little island with the silly name is primarily known as a visitor-friendly outpost of the Cree Nation—and no, not just because San Jose Shark’s forward Jonathan Cheechoo came from here (earning his jersey a place in the Hockey Hall of Fame before he even got to put it on, merely for being the NHL’s first Moose Cree draft pick). I’m talking about the Cree Village http://www.creevillage.com and its Moose Factory Eco Lodge, where you spend two nights. Whilst based at this indigenous interpretive center, you get an island bus tour, a trip to explore the 350-million-year-old remnants of the Devonian Age on Fossil Island, and a cruise up the river and into James Bay aboard the M.V. Polar Princess, looking for shipwrecks, waterfowl, and the occasional beluga whale.
After two days, you chug back to Cochrane for a final night at the Station Inn, then continue on the voyage home. Also included in the trip price is a wild game dinner in Moosenee, dinner on the train ride back, lunch on Moose Factory island bus tour, and two breakfasts in Cochrane.
For more information, prices from other US and Canadian gateways, and bookings, visit http://www.destinationscanada.com. For more information on the region, head to http://www.ontariotravel.net and, for even greater focus, http://www.jamesbayfrontier.com. (http://www.jamesbayfrontier.com.</font>[/quote])
http://www.msnbc.com/news/923206.asp?0sl=-12
Holy Canada! A week exploring Northern Ontario by plane, train, and automobile (and boat) where $950 covers most major costs, from airfare and car rental to tours and six nights of lodging
By Reid Bramblett
ARTHUR FROMMER'S BUDGET TRAVEL
June 10 — Just 450 miles north of cosmopolitan Toronto, the frontier of the 17th century is still alive and well in Northern Ontario. We’ve unearthed a six-day journey that takes you into this heart and soul of Canada, a place where the roads don’t go, towns have poetic names like “Moose Factory,” the local Cree tribe has turned a 330-year-old trading post town into an eco-lodge experience, ancient fossils scatter the surface, and the gold lies buried deep.
CANADA IS always a fantastic Budget Travel destination—if for no other reason than, at CAN$1.34 to US$1, our greenbacks go so much further up north. But aside from discreet bargains such as the VIA Rail pass (read a recent story about that here), we rarely see a packaged holiday or tour at a decent price—oh, some may look promising, until we realize that you must provide your own airfare, rental car, sight admissions, etc. That’s why this deal really caught our attention.
It’s a weeklong vacation in Northern Ontario with departures every Friday until the end of August, and it includes roundtrip airfare from the States on Air Canada or United, a car rental, tours and cruises, an historic train journey, several meals, and six nights of lodging—two of them in an native-run eco-lodge.
For all that, prices start at $950 for departures out of most major US gateways in the Northwest and Midwest, including New York, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Philadelphia, Washington and many more. For departures from Atlanta, Nashville and most Southeastern cities, add $50; from Miami and other Florida cities, add $105; from Denver or Phoenix, add $110; from Dallas or Houston, add $125; from San Francisco add $180; from Los Angeles or San Diego, add $230.
But enough about prices. Let’s take a peek at this journey that can take you to the once and future frontierland of Canada, beyond where the roads end and the moose begin.
330 YEARS OF HISTORY IN 186 MILES
You touch down in the old mining town of Timmins, where you shack up for two Nights at the Cedar Meadows Resort (http://www.cedarmeadows.com), on the Mattagami River with its own 175-acre wildlife reserve, or you can opt for the central Senator Hotel (www.nt.net/senator).
Next day, you get a free tour of the Timmins underground gold mine (http://www.timminsgoldminetour.com) set up in the old Hollinger Mine, which was founded in 1909 and for a time held the title of richest gold mine on the Western Hemisphere. When all was said and done, it produced around CAD$400 million—which, at today’s gold prices, would be worth CAD$4 billion, or roughly US$3 billion.
Move on to Cochrane for a night at the aptly named Station Inn (http://www.ontc.on.ca/english/04pass/04coch.html), run by the train company and located at the station itself. After all, Cohrane’s claim to fame is terminus of the Polar Bear Express, which you board the next morning for a 300km train journey following an old native canoe route along the Abitibi and Moose rivers and through boreal forest and clay plains to the edge of James Bay. After 4.5 hours of clanking along to the James Bay lowlands, you arrive in the settlement of Moosonee, a community of 2,000 accessible only by air or, in summer, by railroad or canoe (or, in winter, a really long walk).
A $5 water taxi’s ride away in the midst of the Moose River lies the island of Moose Factory, Canada’s oldest permanent English settlement. It was founded by the Hudson Bay Company in 1673 as a trading post, hence the funny name, which has gotta be one of the great Canadian place names, right up there with Medicine Hat, Echo Bay, and Flin Flon. While it conjures up wonderful images of the enormous antlered critters being put together on an assembly line to be crated and shipped from some massive industrial building, the truth is far more prosaic. The dude in charge of a trading post was called the Factor, so the place he ran was a “factory.” “Moose” was just the name of the river and this general area where it empties into James Bay.
These days, the little island with the silly name is primarily known as a visitor-friendly outpost of the Cree Nation—and no, not just because San Jose Shark’s forward Jonathan Cheechoo came from here (earning his jersey a place in the Hockey Hall of Fame before he even got to put it on, merely for being the NHL’s first Moose Cree draft pick). I’m talking about the Cree Village http://www.creevillage.com and its Moose Factory Eco Lodge, where you spend two nights. Whilst based at this indigenous interpretive center, you get an island bus tour, a trip to explore the 350-million-year-old remnants of the Devonian Age on Fossil Island, and a cruise up the river and into James Bay aboard the M.V. Polar Princess, looking for shipwrecks, waterfowl, and the occasional beluga whale.
After two days, you chug back to Cochrane for a final night at the Station Inn, then continue on the voyage home. Also included in the trip price is a wild game dinner in Moosenee, dinner on the train ride back, lunch on Moose Factory island bus tour, and two breakfasts in Cochrane.
For more information, prices from other US and Canadian gateways, and bookings, visit http://www.destinationscanada.com. For more information on the region, head to http://www.ontariotravel.net and, for even greater focus, http://www.jamesbayfrontier.com. (http://www.jamesbayfrontier.com.</font>[/quote])
http://www.msnbc.com/news/923206.asp?0sl=-12