Liberal Wynne

Not my photo.

Ontarians voted in their provincial election today. They spoke loud and clear giving Kathleen Wynne's previous minority government a majority with 59 seats at Queens Park. Tim Hudak's PCs lost seats ending up with 27 and Andrea Horwath's NDP party stayed the course with 21.

I believe you could count it less of a win for Wynne and more of a loss for Hudak. His idea of cutting 100,000 government jobs in order to create 1,000,000 others didn't resonate with voters. Either that or they didn't have faith in his logic and/or believe the numbers he was projecting.

Numerous unions and other groups showed their displeasure in him in their many attack ads. Wynne benefitted greatly from this without even having to lift a finger. In light of his party's stunning defeat Tim Hudak resigned as their leader.

Another group that miscalculated voters sentiments were the pollsters. For weeks they had the election neck in neck between Hudak and Wynne. Some even suggested the NDP were up there with them. It was "too close to call", they said. Well, they couldn't have been more wrong. The Liberals blew everyone else out of the water.

Voters were willing to give Wynne the benefit of the doubt regarding the past Liberal scandals. Both Hudak and Horwath tried to pin the blame on her, but she emerged unscathed from beneath the shadow of Dalton McGuinty.

So a new era begins. Ontario has voted in their first female premier. And I believe she's the first openly gay premier in Canada as well. I'm proud of the fact that we as a province are so open and inclusive. I wish Ms. Wynne all the best and hope she can deliver on her promises and continue to make this a great province to live in.

Ziplining at Eaglecrest Aerial Park

Here are a couple of shots of us at Eaglecrest Aerial Park. It's actually part of the Santa's Village park in Bracebridge, Ontario. We bought discounted passes from one of those online coupon groups to go here.

I think a few people in our group were a bit disappointed with what we ended up doing. We only had two rides on the Big Zip, a 350-foot zip line there. The rest of the time we climbed up ladders and along wires strung between trees at the park. I think most people thought we'd be ziplining for most if not all of the day. In fact, we were only supposed to go on the Big Zip once. But, we didn't realize that and went twice. Oh well.

A few members of our group are afraid of heights. And some of them weren't prepared for the physical demands of climbing either. So they weren't that pleased when they found out that's what we'd be doing for most of the day. For me, it's all but second nature since I've rock climbed quite a bit in the past.

So I enjoyed myself. I thought it was fun. But, would I pay full price ($56.00) to do it? Not a chance. I know most of the guys wouldn't have done it for free if they knew this is what they'd be doing.

Cottaging in Bracebridge, ON

This past Friday and Saturday we went up to Bracebridge, Ontario. It's in the Muskokas a couple of hours north of Toronto. Cottage country.

We went up there because we were going to go Zip-lining at Eaglecrest Aerial Park in Bracebridge. Instead of just driving up there and back the same day, we decided to make a weekend out of it.

Thanks go out to Florianne who booked the cottage at Forest Rock Camp and Resort and Tom who prepared all the food. In general, I think everyone had a decent time out there. The weather wasn't great. It was cool and overcast for the most part. But, at least the rains stayed away. We also had to deal with the mosquitos. It could have been far worse. Everyone got a few bites, but that was about it.

On Saturday after the visit to the Aerial Park Virginia, Donny, Florianne and myself rented a couple of canoes for an hour to go canoeing on Three Mile Lake where the "resort" was located. It was fun. I like canoeing. Donny and Virginia had a bit of trouble making their way back from the half way point though. We had the wind on our backs on the way out. So, on the way back we had to, of course, go against it. Well, Donny had a bit of trouble with that. Their canoe kept getting pushed back to the far shoreline by the wind. After about 10 minutes of this repeatedly happening they finally got the boat pointed in the right direction and we eventually got back. I was a bit concerned we might be stuck out there all afternoon.

In the evenings after dinner we sat around the fire and chilled out. That was nice too.

My Trip to Sarnia

I went to Sarnia, Ontario recently. My aunt and uncle from New York were visiting, so we packed up the car and drove out there with my mom and grandma. My aunt and my mother spent their teenage years there. It was my first time there as an adult.

Our first stop on our trip was the cemetery. I know it's an odd place to start, but my grandfather and uncle (both of whom I never met) are buried there. Whenever my mom, grandmother and aunt go there I think it's the first place they head to.

After that we toured the city. First we went to Cantara Park. They have a beach there among other things. There were a few people sunbathing and some young people playing volleyball, but it wasn't too crowded. We had lunch at one of the picnic tables there then continued looking around.

Next stop was Point Edward Park and the Blue Water toll bridge to the U.S. I didn't know Sarnia was right on the border of Lake Huron and Michigan state. But, you could see the bridge over to Michigan from here.

After that we went into town. We found the church that my mother used to go to when she lived here. It's called St. Andrew's Presbyterian church and it's on Christina Street, right beside city hall.

Next we headed a bit south and found the spot where their family restaurant used to be. There's a parking lot there now. I guess that's progress for you.

Nearby Sarnia Collegiate Institute where my mom and aunt went to high school followed. Lastly we went to their old family home (where the above shot was taken). I believe they last lived there some 40-50 odd years ago.

All-in-all it was pretty cool visiting these places with my aunt, mom and grandmother. I managed to capture it all digitally with my camera for posterity's sake. I'm sure they were happy about that too.