Whitby Getaway – Day 2

We got up and took the dog for a walk this morning at 7:30. It’s always funny walking someone else’s dog and encountering the other dog walkers who recognize the dog but not the people with her.

We returned to the house for breakfast and checked the weather forecast to find that the day looked pleasant until about 2pm at which point rain was forecast. We dressed In layers to be warm enough when starting out, but have the ability to easily make adjustments as we warmed up. We also packed rain gear.

Over breakfast I planned the route. We decided to ride the Waterfront Trail East to Oshawa, and then to a loop around Oshawa which was shared by Durham region to promote cycle tourism in the area. I used Ride with GPS to create a route from where we’re staying, south to the Waterfront Trail, and to connect to the Oshawa loop. Ride with GPS is a great tool for planning rides and navigating them , as it provides turn by turn directions when you purchase a basic account.

We left at 9:30 and had to cross the 401, but the traffic wasn’t too bad. We often try to plan our highway crossings for roads that have no on and off ramps, but that wasn’t convenient this morning.

Whitby has a pleasant waterfront which is connected by the Waterfront Trail to the east and west.

Like yesterday there were many areas where we felt quite far removed from civilization and given the time of year we didn’t encounter a lot of other people using the trail.

We encountered some nice new paved sections. It’s hard to tell in this picture, but this was quite a hill to climb and you can see that the woman is standing on her pedals as she reaches the top.

Oshawa is building a new park named for Ed Broadbent.

Oshawa has two nice trail systems showcased on the route. We went north on the Harmony Creek Trail. We left the trail briefly for lunch at Coffee Culture adjacent to the trail.

The trails went through tunnels under the roads so it was a seamless experience.

We deviated slightly from the route to visit Parkwood. Parkwood was built starting in 1916 for Sam McLaughlin of the McLaughlin Motor Car Company, which was the first major automobile manufacturer in Canada. It became part of General Motors in 1918 and McLaughlin became president of the Canadian company and a vice president of the American corporation. He was a philanthropist who provided funds to build the McLaughlin planetarium and buildings at Queens University. The home was left to the Oshawa General Hospital upon his death.

The gardens were impressive even with the fountains off and pools emptied and plants just starting to bloom.

We then headed south to the Oshawa Valley Botanical Gardens.

A local high school class made these mushrooms and donated them to the gardens.

The route was unexpectedly routed through a parking lot, prominently marked as private which belonged to a car wash, but we continued anyway.

We continued south along the Joseph Kolodzie/ Oshawa Creek Bike Path and detoured slightly to look at Oshawa City Hall, the McLaughlin public library, and McLaughlin Gallery.

They had a piece of art by Douglas Coupland on the outside of the gallery. Coupland is a Canadian novelist, designer, and visual artist. His first novel, Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, popularized the terms Generation X and Mcjob.

This path went under the 401, which is always welcome, compared to riding over highways with or without ramps. Hopefully it will be cleaned up when construction finishes.

Shortly after getting south of the 401, it started to rain. right on schedule. We stopped and put on our rain gear and rode the last 20 km back home in the rain.

Our Slickers were covered in dirt as neither one of us have fenders on our bikes, but we left them on the porch to dry out and were able to brush it off once it dried.

We got in and made hot tea and snacked on nuts and raisins. I was so hungry. I don’t think I ate enough yesterday. We move straight from that to making and eating dinner, and ice cream for dessert.

There’s quite a bit of rain forecast overnight, but it’s supposed to clear by mid morning tomorrow, and the rest of the week is forecast to be quite pleasant.