What do you do when it is -40 degree Fahrenheit outside? Ride a train of course!
OK, so that might not be what first comes to mind, but that’s exactly what my wife and I did for Valentine's Day weekend. To be honest, I don’t love trains, but have always been fascinated by them, the people who work them, and the areas they serve.
We rode the "Snow Train" from Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, straight up to what seemed like Santa’s front yard. Truthfully, it was only a couple hundred miles north to the little town of Hawk Junction, but bouncing down the cold rails through seven-plus feet of snow it seriously seemed like we hopped on the Polar Express. I was kind of waiting for Tom Hanks to start giving the tour!
Our trip was focused on using this portion of the old Agawa Canyon tour train to access the remote town of Wawa, Ont., where we were planning on snowmobiling for several days. We drove up from Milwaukee to Sault Ste. Marie, loaded our snowmobiles and gear on the train and then spent a short five hours with a dozen new best friends. Our ride consisted of all of us feverishly snapping photos of the absolutely incredible scenery that only a train through this type of desolate and beautiful country can provide. We saw ice climbers scaling 1,000-foot frozen waterfalls, trappers with snow shoes, ice fishermen in fur hats, wolves, moose, and just about everything that makes for a bad Canadian joke… it was fantastic!
Once at our destination in Hawk we unloaded our sleds, rode the hour to Wawa, and proceeded to freeze our aboots off for several days of snowmobiling in negative temps. Needless to say, the train was the warmest part of the trip, so by the time we returned to ride the train back to Sault Ste Marie, I had certainly learned to love trains just a little more!
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