The SOO: Surprising Sault Ste Marie

After a good 4-hour drive from Manitoulin Island, we arrived at a campground in Sault Ste Marie, or "the Soo" as people call it here, a little before sunset. And after dreaming about it ever since we left Quebec City, I was finally able to make FIRE! And with that, of course, came marshmallows. 😁 It was lovely, with very few bugs flying around and a cute little pond right in front of our site with a couple of frogs singing.

It was off to a good start, let me tell you. After a refreshing shower the next morning, we were off exploring. Our first stop was the Canadian Bushplane Heritage Centre, where we parked the car for the day. The museum had quite the collection of bushplanes and related items, and we even got to see a documentary about wildfires and flying bushplanes. Although there were a few technical problems (still early in the season, I guess), we had a great time wandering about the place.

Walking along the canal, we saw the Museum Ship Norgoma, which was unfortunately closed to the public, and from what I've read on their website recently, it's simply gone now, so we were lucky to just see it. Such a shame! The walk along the canal was super nice regardless, and it was such a warm sunny day, too. Joel also got to work out his abs on the fitness machines in the park. 💪

As I said before, I had looked online before we left on this trip to find unusual activities, and I detailed the opening hours and everything for all of them. Well, sometimes, you get nice surprises, like Entomica, which happened to be open on Wednesdays too starting the day we were there! It's an unusual insectarium where you get to actually handle the insects while your guide teaches you more about them. And this is where Izzy conquered her fear of spiders! 😱🕷️ A big thanks to Rosie the tarantula, who was a real sweetie and was very, very careful not to scare me. 🥰 Joel also got to handle her of course, and we both had a loooot of fun and learned a bunch of stuff. Can you believe cockroaches can suffer from depression if put alone in an environment? We were flabbergasted! 😯 This was an eye-opening experience for a ridiculously low price.

After leaving the insectarium, we walked over to the locks to watch a boat come in. We got to see all of the workings of the locks and waved at the kids on the boat tour. It was quite lovely and quiet, and you can see the whole thing from dock level, from the roof of the visitor centre, or from the bottom of the locks. We did all three and got an excellent view of the process!

With such a big day of discovery, we had to reward ourselves with a nice refreshment. It just so happened that there was a nice terrace on our way back to the car, the Fluid at Delta Hotel. That meant a nice, cold beer, a cocktail, and just a little dessert to help with the next bit of driving. Just wonderful. 🤤

And with that, we were already on our way to our next destination, Thunder Bay. Since it's over 7 hours of driving between the two cities, we decided to divide it up into two days, with some smaller stops along the way. But you'll get to know more about those stops only in the next post! Stay tuned, folks! 💜

TL;DR: Sault Ste Marie was really a lot more fun than we originally thought it would be. I finally got my campfire, and we got to see so many different planes at the Canadian Bushplane Heritage Centre. We caught a glimpse of the Museum Ship Norgoma, and we walked along the canal. Our favourite was Entomica, the insectarium where you can handle the insects, and where Izzy conquered her fear of spiders! We watched a boat go through the locks, and we topped everything off with a cold drink and dessert on a terrace. Lovely city!