Thunder Bay - Day Four

Sunday turned out to be another pretty crazy day. We tried to do as much as possible before our flight out at night. Our first stop was the Hoito, which is one the better known restaurants in Thunder Bay. Being a hotspot, the lineup to sit down was probably around 30-45 mins. Unfortunately, being a little strapped for time, we decided to go elsewhere and eat at an Irish pub. I ended up screwing up my diet 'cause I had a 'Traditional Irish Breakfast' which consisted of grilled ham, sausages, bacon, toast, 2 eggs, & potato cakes. I can still feel the grease trying to make their way through my system. Ugh.

Anyway, the afternoon was spent at Fort William Historical Park. It's pretty similar to Black Creek Pioneer Village in Toronto. Everyone was dressed up to depict life in the area in the 1800s. They also remained in character as we went around the site touring the various buildings. Everyone had fun pointing out Tim's unwise choice of wearing sandals on the rainy afternoon. They warned if he didn't fix the holes in his 'moccasins' that he would get foot rot and get it amputated. haha. Although the weather wasn't very cooperative, we still had lots of fun posing with the various tools and furnishings of the era... Boy, I really feel like I was at another school field trip. :)

For dinner we met up with Dom, who was on his way to Longlac #58 for a missions trip--a team from our church are heading up there to evangelize to people in the Aboriginal community. He was stunned to see me and wondering what the heck I was doing there when I went to greet him at the airport. Of all the places, who would have guessed that we would get a chance to meet up in Thunder Bay? :) The four of us really had a good dinner together talking about our stay here, Tim's work experiences up here and also Dom's concerns about his missions trip. Anita mentioned how amazing God is in that He gave us a chance to meet up with one another in Thunder Bay. You could tell that Dom was a little stressed after a long evening at his cousin's wedding and all the preparations he still had to do for the trip. Also, I think Tim was glad to finally see some familiar faces over the past couple of days. Even though our time was short together, God is good for providing us such valuable fellowship.

After dropping Dom off at the bus terminal, it was our turn to say goodbye to Tim and Thunder Bay. (Un)fortunately for Tim, it was not the last that he'd see of us. At the check-in, we discovered that our flight back had been delayed 2+ hours due to severe thunderstorms in Toronto. There's only so much you can browse through at the souvenir shop, so we gave Tim a call and he was nice enough to come back and hang out with us a bit longer. Amazingly, we packed in some more fun stuff with our extra hour here. First, we went down to the Marina and enjoyed some homemade ice cream. I had 'Apple Pie' and it was quite good 'cause it actually had real apple and crust in it. Then we headed out to Hillcrest Park where there was an incredible view of Sleeping Giant, so I was able to get some more great pics. Finally, we drove around a bit checking out more of the biking/hiking trails--too bad we didn't get a chance to actually go on them... I think if Toronto actually had the nature and scenery of Thunder Bay, I'd actually go walking/biking so much more often...

We finally flew out of Thunder Bay at around 9:45, but even after we landed there were still delays. With the back-ups still lingering from the afternoon, they couldn't find a gate to drop us off. haha. Thankfully, my mom was patient and nice enough to still pick us up from the airport. Anyhow, I finally got home at 12:30...

Well, it's been an exhaustive weekend, but tons of fun... Time to get some rest... :)