Cycling through and beyond Hastings County: Slow travel offers cyclists an eco-friendly and unique vacation experience
/By Heather-Anne Wakeling
Tourists travelling through Hastings County always mention the magnificent views. However, with interest in reducing carbon footprints and participating in eco-friendly excursions, vacationers are opting to trade their vehicles for bicycles. As they pedal along Heritage Trails and the TransCanada Highway, otherwise known as Highway 7, people create wonderful memories as they re-discover just how slow travel can unveil our area’s natural beauty in intimate, physical detail.
Lister’s rig. An Axiom rack and way too big Axiom bags worked famously and a $10 on-sale tent was his shelter. Photo credit: Andrew Lister
Long time cycling enthusiast and Hastings County tourist, Andrew Lister is an advocate of the slow travel approach to an Ontario warm weather vacation. As a seasoned rider and competitive veteran of tours throughout Ontario, Lister realized about seven years ago that he had never actually ‘toured’ through an area. He explains, “What I mean is, that to me, touring means to stop, smell the roses, so to speak.
“One day when I was searching a map, I said to my partner of many years that I always wanted to ride to a certain National Park on Lake Erie. She said, ‘So do it.’ Astonished with the realisation that I really did have the time to do this, I booked some holiday time. As it turned out she was planning to attend a PowWow in Peterborough around the same time I was thinking about setting off. So, I reviewed the map and the Hastings County area seemed perfect. I gathered my inventory of gear. I mounted a rack to my bike and loaded panniers for what was to be the first of many personal cycling adventures. I was dropped outside of Peterborough and she watched me set off east on Highway 7.”
Cyclist Andrew Lister is an advocate for the eco-friendly travel. Photo credit: Andrew Lister.
Since that first journey, Lister has made two excursions through Hasting County, three if you count his trip to Ottawa, and has cycled over 2,500km pushing pedal through the county which has become a particular favourite route. These trips begin in Peterborough, cycling through the towns of Norwood, Havelock, Marmora, Madoc, Kaladar, even going a little bit (25km) off route to Northbrook to purchase food and water at the local Foodland. This stretch of his journey ends by camping at the Woodland Park in Arden. For cyclists, “the TransCanada Highway offers a wide, safe shouldered route, and that there are plenty of rest areas and scenery along the way. Also, unlike cycling in congested city traffic, rural truckers and passenger vehicle drivers tend to be very considerate and give riders lots of room. In fact, a particular thank you should go to all those Giant Tiger truck drivers who always provide me with ample space, and I’ve noticed that when it’s safe to do so, they actually go into the opposite lane to offer me a full one.”
Slow travel also offers glimpses of wildlife not previously noticed. “When travelling at 100km/h car speed one barely notices how many animals we share our world with. ”Cycling in a relaxed manner allows the realization that “the forest is alive. The birds, they sing and greet you as you cycle closer. I’ve seen deer, a moose, even a bear with two cubs, which I made sure to cycle quickly in the opposite direction from. Over the years I now have a strategy to out-cycle the farm dogs.”
One of the sites along the way, a flooded iron mine. Photo credit: Andrew Lister.
He notes that cycling through Hastings County is enjoyable as the trails are well-groomed and that the trail infrastructure is increasing with the Hastings Trail having been added to the Trans Canada Trail Network. Average cyclists can achieve rides of 500km and 300km by slow rolling through dual track and gravel. Best of all, the slow traveller can savour the scenery, and have encounters with fellow cyclists both foreign and domestic. In fact, Lister met and chatted with experienced Austrian cyclists with exceptional gear who were cycling around Lake Ontario. He said that they “were complimentary about our country, the nature and the warm welcome they received by everyone they encountered on the way.”
The owner of Woodland Park was gracious enough to leave Lister some firewood for a welcome evening campfire. Photo credit: Andrew Lister.
He remembers that his first trip was uncommonly hot that Victoria Day Saturday, but “I was travelling with a slight wind and soon was in Norwood and then Havelock stopping to admire the old train station. I continued on and soon the landscape changed, wonderous towering rock formations appeared.”
In awe of the “fragmented cathedral like iron valleys, as I was approaching the town of Marmora. It was lovely. My smell the roses moment was taking a side trip to an old iron mine, an open pit mine now flooded and I presume fed by an underground spring. One couldn’t help but marvel at the size and majesty. A reflective moment happened at the Marmora war memorial — so many lives, so many names, this town gave a lot of its sons and daughters in the name of freedom.”
After a rest in Marmora, it was back on the road where “Lovely tree-lined fields and sloping hills were my treat for the next 30 - 40 km as I approached Madoc.”
“In both Marmora and Madoc, I found the communities to be greatly hospitable and that these towns offer lovely older churches. Just as it was in Marmora, the Madoc memorial brought home to me just how much smaller towns honour their dead, the effect that WWI and WWII had on these communities. It is a sobering read when you see up-close the amount of name dedications on the monuments, easily a huge percentage of the men at the time. I realized that no home or town was without its losses.”
He adds that “Madoc had a surprise in store for me as my father, Cyril was a veteran and always held regard for those who gave their lives and that imprinted on me the sacrifice. A Victoria Cross was awarded to John Foote, a Presbyterian minister who tended to the wounded while being under fire at Dieppe. It gives pause.”
The slow travel of cycling offers spectacular views of the areas woodlands that are alive with wildlife. Photo credit: Andrew Lister.
Cycling also allows for a physical appreciation of Hastings County’s Indigenous and settler history. “It wasn’t always passable with a well-served highway or Heritage Rail Trail. Just think of the amount of effort it took for construction crews to blast through the rock. There was a time when cars did not exist, and people had to make their way either by canoe, on foot with a mule carrying their supplies, or even by horseback. And in reality, we forget this, but it wasn’t that long ago, really.” For Lister it is being exposed to these bites of time that are precious and he savours them by taking the time to appreciate his surroundings.
After a brief rest in Madoc, Lister continues on to his camping destination at Arden and Woodland Park. During his first night he became well aware of animal life in the woods, and during the day had a great forest bathing experience. In addition, the owner was gracious and offered wood for a fire so that Lister could relax after a long day on the road.
One of his 10-day excursions ended in Brighton, where laughing he said that he cycled onto the main street only to see it lined with people and a town crier in the middle of the road. “I must say that It buoyed my spirits, but I soon was amused to find out that I was ahead of a parade and so, I was not the local celebrity they had came to cheer on.”
Slow travel offers Lister an awareness of many things: freedom, a recognition of self sufficiency, submission to the weather, the necessity of sufficient bug spray and water. In fact, “Bring money as water is an expensive necessity,” with an added caution that freewater does not mean goodwater. He laughs recounting that while stopping in Plaisance National Park on the Quebec border one of the rangers seriously said “I fear for you,” because he had run out of bug spray.
Cycling along the TransCanada Highway offers a comfortable, wide shouldered road. Photo credit: Andrew Lister.
Additional advice. “Don’t overpack. I overpacked for my first ride. But the Axiom rack and way too big Axiom bags worked famously and my $10 on-sale tent was my shelter. Don’t wear ear-buds, it is important that you hear and be alert to the conditions, especially wildlife and vehicles.” Light-weight weather gear, bike repair toolkit, water, bug repellent, tent, matches, small hatchet to cut dead, dry trees for firewood. Pack easy foods such as granola, power bars and bananas; a good helmet, sunscreen and sunglasses. Other tips: “weigh your gear before you head out, and then reduce it to a comfortable weight. Keep your map, ID, credit/debit cards or cash and your cell phone and back up battery in waterproof bags. Shop local for anything you may need. Purchasing the CAA cyclist coverage is handy, because in the event of an irreparable incident, a cyclist can call for a pick up and drive into town.”
But perhaps the best reason for a slow-down cycling vacation was shared by an elder Lister met while resting in Kaladar. Striking up a cycling conversation with this man perhaps in his 80’s, what the gentleman most impressed upon Lister was this: How much he wished he had done a cycling tour when he had his youth’s strength to do so. But he just never got around to it. Lister thinks that a cycling tour through Hastings County is one sure way to ensure that the inner adventurer will never have to say, “Too bad I missed the opportunity, when the route was wide open, just waiting for a cyclist, or two or three, to experience slow travel and really experience in an immediate physical way the beautiful country that is Hastings County.”
