Thunder Bay Part I: Downtown

My vacation began in Thunder Bay, Ontario (formerly known as Port Arthur and Fort William respectively). A small city, innitially important as a trading post for the coureur des bois. Later on, the city became an important shipping port for grain coming from the prairies through the great lakes. Little known fact: Thunder Bay has the largest Finnish population outside of Finland!

November is not exactly the perfect season to visit Thunder Bay, it's cloudy and cold and generally causes you to huddle up in warm campuses and coffee houses. At this point in the year, there hasn't been enough snow to go nordic skiing (a local obsession). Luckily the things that make a city great are the wonderful people you are visiting. I must thank my loving sister and her roommate Dudley (future nordic skiing olympian) for housing me. My childhood friend, Jeremy, for ushering me about town when I was dangerously nearing the end of my sister's wits. My parents for driving three hours in each direction to visit me. And finally, longtime family friends the Coulters' for the visit at the Nordic Festival.

If you are ever in Thunder Bay I would highly recommend some of the following activities:

Drink Fair Trade Coffee at The Bean Fiend
Eat authentic Finnish Pancakes at The Hoito
Shop for local arts and crafts at Fireweed
Juiced fruits and vegetables at The Juice Collective
Walk around one of the local parks
Catch a community theatre production, we saw The Importance of Being Earnest
Walk around Lakehead University campus, drink hot cocoa in the student lounge
Eat dinner at Ruby Moon 


 The following photos show a bit of downtown Port Arthur.