Our First RV Trip to Canada – Exploring Southern Ontario, Border Crossing, Internet & Money

Can you believe that in our 16 years of full timing we have never RV’d in Canada?

Yeah. We can’t either.

We have however visited Canada many times by cruise ship, train and car.

So this summer, we decided it was well past time we finally crossed over with an RV as well for a proper extended visit.

After days of preps making sure we had whittled down our reserves to meet the alcohol and food allowances for legal entry, we used the ArriveCAN app to upload our vaccination cards and all other needed details – and we got in line in Buffalo at the Peace Bridge to cross the border.

It was time to explore Ontario!

Here is the video version of this journey:

Stop 1: Boondockers Welcome – Cedarway Farm

After crossing the border (see our tips for a smooth crossing later in this post) we drove by Niagara Falls to see them from the Canadian side (awe-inspiring). And then we stopped for a quick lunch at – Tim Hortons (which seems to be a Canadian thing to do?).

Next, we were seeing countless road signs for wineries – so we had to stop. We randomly picked Foreign Affair (seemed appropriate) for a tasting visit, and bought a couple delicious reds.

And then, since we are doing new things anyway – we had booked our first ever Boondockers Welcome stay. We had been gifted a membership years ago by the original owners, but up until now had just never felt the need or call. We generally have more driveway surf invites than we can accept, and we were always unsure about the social expectations.

But since Boondocks Welcome is now integrated with Harvest Hosts, finding options to consider is much easier than ever before. One map shows all your options, and there is easy online booking at many locations. We found a Boondocks Welcome driveway that allows 2-night stays near Lake Ontario on a farm, with a note that owners are rarely around. Sounds like a perfect first experience for us.

It was a delightful stay, and we did get to meet the sweet owners. And we thoroughly enjoyed the tranquility of bike along the vineyards, and walks on the lakeshore.

It was a perfect stop to catch up before heading off to our next adventure .. which we knew was going to be abundant in activity, eh?

Stop 2: Newmarket, ON

Next stop on our Ontario tour was some suburban moochdocking in Newmarket – just north of Toronto.

Visiting our dear friends Margot & Michael was a major impetus for crossing the border. In the winter, they usually RV in Arizona – where we have met up many times before.

Margot is Canadian, and was back to renovate one of her rental properties. Which is her primary income source to fund her travels.

We were so thrilled they could take a few days to play tourist with us. Newmarket has an amazing bike trail system with access to a darling downtown. We also took a drive to Barrie to check out Kempenfest – a holiday weekend art festival along Lake Simcoe.

We also were able to meetup with Keith, the North American General Manager for Peplink (a popular cellular router we cover over at MIRC) for an amazing sushi lunch.

While we had intentions to catch a train to spend a day in Toronto too – we just never found the time.

Thanks for a lovely visit and tempting us north of the border! We had so much fun!

Stop 3: Bare Oaks Naturist Resort – Gwillimbury, ON

Since we recently had our first nude RV park experience, and Bare Oaks (caution, page has lots of naked people) was right near Newmarket, we decided we had to check it out as a quick next stop.

This resort was a bit different than Avalon in West Virginia – most notably in that’s it’s strongly a naturist resort, where being nude (and not just clothing optional) is expected except for protection from the elements. It’s also very family focused too.

It was a very lovely facility with an amazing swimming pond, pool and hot tub.

The transient RV spots however left a lot to be desired. The sites are packed close together, and when we arrived our chain smoking neighbors were hosting a large social gathering spilling right into our designated spot, and they made us feel like we were intruding on their party (which went all day and until well after midnight) by parking in the site we were assigned.

Since we were there for only an evening, we made the best of it – and instead of hanging out in the campground, we focused on swimming and exploring the beautifully landscaped grounds.

Stop 4: Mara Provincial Park

Next up – we tried our first Ontario Provincial Park. Mara Provincial Park (our review) was not far away – on the north side of Lake Simcoe, outside Orilla.

It was a lovely stay to decompress after several days of social with friends, and we really scored by grabbing a site with lots open spots around it. So our section was pretty quiet compared to the rest of the campground.

It turns out we had booked the only site for ‘Under 25 Foot’ trailers amongst a whole bunch of sites for under 18’ (we are 21’) – which weren’t in demand. Ontario categorizes sites assuming a trailer plus tow vehicle – and it turns out our van can actually fit just fine in most of the smaller RV sites. Realizing this opened up a whole bunch more availability as we plotted our stops ahead!

All and all – we really like the Ontario provincial park system. Their online booking is top notch (we noticed Michigan uses the same software), offering tons of info on each site (giving photos and information on privacy, quality, dimensions and slope). And all the staff we encountered has been super friendly and helpful.

Stop 5: Awenda Provincial Park

For our next stop on our Canadian tour, we were able to grab a spot for a night at Awenda Provincial (our review) This campground is gorgeous – with huge private sites, and lots of them!

From the campground it’s about a 3mi / 5km hike/bike to get to the swim beaches along the Georgian Bay – but so worth it for an amazing refreshing dip in the lake.

We wish we could have gotten a couple nights here – but cellular signal was pretty poor. And there were way too many trees for Starlink. So we played cards instead.

This stop also coincided with my birthday. We picked up some grilled gluten free burritos (yes, that’s a thing in Ontario that definitely needs to be everywhere) and a gluten free cake at the grocery store on the way.

It was a lovely way to celebrate my 49th year around the sun.

Stop 6: Harrison Park – Owen Sound, ON

Finding spots over summer weekends can be a challenge most anywhere that it’s not blasted hot. So we were thrilled when we could snag a site at Harrison Park (our review) – the city campground for Owen Sound, Ontario.

The campground was bustling with activity and full of families out enjoying the camping lifestyle, and the sites were a bit packed in.

But overall – a pleasant experience with easy online booking.

The park is great, we had a nice spot along a creek, and there are many hiking trails (to a waterfall!) and an easy bike ride to the cute downtown and the shoreline of the sound.

Stop 7:  Harvest Hosts – Rural Rootz – Wairton, ON

As we make our way up the Bruce Peninsula – we spotted an intriguing Harvest Hosts in Wairton, Ontario. Rural Rootz Nature Reserve.

Run by former RVers Tom and Dee – this place is, quite simply, magical.

Tom got us parked in an amazing secluded spot (with 30A power – which we didn’t need) and then introduced us to the preserve’s many dragons and the labyrinth walk.

And then there are more ambitious hiking trails. And let me tell you – if this man hands you a hiking stick, take it! There were no easy trails, but we loved it. They were some of the most intensely beautiful hiking trails we have ever explored!

We ended the day shopping Dee’s art store and selected a butterfly piece perfect for the foot of the bed in the van (or it may end up at our lot in AZ one day). She then proceeded to tell us the story – it was made to inspire hope after 9/11. This piece has been there over 20 yrs waiting for us.

I wish we had snapped a pic with these two amazing human beings.

This was one of our most memorable Harvest Hosts stays.

Stop 8: Bruce Pensiula, Tobermory, Ferry Ride

From Rural Rootz, we left just after dawn to catch our 8am pre-booked parking time at one of the main attractions on the Bruce Peninsula, and part of the Bruce Peninsula National Park.

The Grotto. Everyone said we must go. It is such a popular spot that parking needs to be reserved far in advance. Forget about getting a last minute campsite.

While the hike to the Grotto was very lovely (about 3-4km round trip) – the grotto itself?

Hmm. It’s just a semi-submerged cave, in a cliff.

It’s pretty, especially for a fresh water lake. But not nearly as impressive as the hype, logistics and crowds would seem to indicate. Maybe we are jaded having traveled extensively along the Pacific and Maine coastlines, where sites like this are to be found at pretty much at every scenic overlook?

We spent the rest of the dreary rainy afternoon checking out Tobermory – which is pretty much like most any other coastal tourist town with ice cream & trinket shops (not our thing), scarce parking, and way too many people.

The highlight however was finding gluten free vegetarian poutine at a food truck .. and oh my goodness, it was yummy!

Overall, wish we had spent more time exploring less touristy parts of the Peninsula, taking the scenic routes and checking out some of the other small towns.

We were happy when it was time to board the Chi-Cheemaun Ferry across the Georgian Bay to the Manitoulin Islands. The scenic ferry ride was a lovely 2–ish hour trip that made us miss Y-Not. We can not wait to get her up here to cruise these waters (next summer?).

Unfortunately – as best we can tell, during the ferry crossing is where we picked up our stow-away. Our very mild case of COVID presented just 3 days after. Boarding the ferry was the one time we were around lots of people, even though we kept masked indoors and primarily rode on deck outside.

Stop 9: Providence Bay Tent & Trailer – Manitoulin Islands

After crossing the bay, we had selected Providence Bay Tent & Trailer park (our review) for a two night stop – as there are slim pickings for RV parks in the Manitoulin Islands.

The park and tiny town was at a lovely location right along the shores of the island, looking out across Lake Huron. There’s a long boardwalk along the sandy beach to an ice cream shop (Huron Island Time) that serves some amazing Jamaican food.

If it wasn’t for the locally made Haw Pop soda made from native hawberries – you might swear you were in the tropics. Well, until you dip your toes in the refreshing water.

The park itself is lovely, especially the seasonal sites – nicely spread out and wooded.

We however selected a spot in the overflow lot which has a wide open sky. The cellular signal here was sort of scarce, so we were able to rely on our Starlink satellite system to get us online to host a pre-scheduled webinar.

After our 2-night stay we headed north towards Little Current on the northern tip of the island to cross the single lane swing bridge back to the mainland. But not before stopping along the shores of Mindemoya Lake to see Treasure Island.

Why, you might ask?

Chris had discovered this is the world’s largest island inside a lake on an island that is inside a lake.

Yeah, try to wrap your brain around that!

Stop 10: Chutes Provincial Park

Our next stop, after finding amazing Indian food in the middle of nowhere, was Chutes Provincial (our review) – named for the logging chutes constructed to move timber around obstacles like this waterfall.

The park had huge beautiful campsites, and a lovely hike along the river and rapids that felt pretty darn strenuous – which should be been my first clue we were coming down with mild COVID symptoms. We pushed through and even filmed a total of 5 mobile internet videos that day.

The next morning both our throats were itchy – which we attributed to campfire smoke and talking so much on camera.

We enjoyed our stay here – another absolutely lovely provincial park with huge private feeling sites. We’re gonna get spoiled.

Stop 11: Bruce Mines Campground

Chris planned a stop at the Bruce Mines Campground (our review) – a small city park along the Trans-Canada highway. It was one of the few places to stop near the lake between Chutes and Salt Ste Marie – so we scheduled a quick overnight to break up what would have otherwise been an overly long driving day.

The campground was ok, but had a very weird check-in process that required walking quite a ways from the campground to the city marina to actually pay for our site.

And there was not much to do in Bruce Mines. We got in a bike ride out to the Kissing Rock and an old lighthouse.

I did feel the call towards a nap that afternoon, which I can now chalk up to COVID coming on.

Final Stop 12: Pancake Bay Provincial Park

Our final stop in Ontario was along Lake Superior at Pancake Bay Provincial (our review). We just couldn’t pass up the opportunity to enjoy this huge gorgeous lake.

It was so crystal clear, and the long sandy beach could have passed for a tropical shoreline.

We hiked, biked and swam here and really enjoyed the stay.

With our lingering scratchy throats and mild fatigue, we decided to test and we both came up positive for COVID. Staying isolated is pretty much how we have operated for most of the past couple years, so really – not much to adapt to, just thankful for very very mild symptoms.

We were able to keep pretty isolated on the trails (wearing masks where appropriate) and still get out exploring, being active and enjoying the area. We just took a slower pace and used more electric on the bikes to allow our bodies to fight it off.

This stop marked the end of our stay in Canada, and thus crossing back into the US at Sault St. Marie nicely coincided with what we were sure was at least Day 5 after our symptoms started, which met the CDC guidelines to be back in public with masks. And we already had a longer stay booked in Michigan where we could be hunkered down until we were back to testing negative.

And that ends 3 wonderful weeks of exploring Ontario! We can’t wait to go back!

Logistical Tips

When we shared about our Canada trip on Facebook, we got a lot of questions about the logistics, so here are some quick tips.

Border Crossing Into Canada

We did a lot of research in advance of our crossing to make sure we were prepared.

As of this summer. being COVID-vaccinated is required (which makes it all the more ironic that it was Canada where we caught it). We had to upload our vaccination cards (along with passport and general travel info) to their ArriveCAN app up to 3 days in advance of our crossing, and pre-select our border location and time.

We checked Canada’s website a couple weeks before crossing so we could see what the current regulations are, and make sure we consumed everything on board not allowed. Their regulations are far more permissive than we thought they would be, so it turned out we really only need to use up the last of our eggs for which we didn’t have their original container.

We also found our friends Marc & Julies blog post on Tips for a Smooth Canada RV Crossing, which was helpful in making sure we were prepared for the questions we might be asked.

When we nervously got in line at the border, ironically, we got in line behind another Travato GL – and our border agent was quite amused to see twins crossing one after the other, especially when we told him we were not traveling with the folks in front of us.

Our crossing was super easy – we were asked the typical ‘where are you from’ and ‘where are you staying’ questions. But the agent didn’t even wait for our well rehearsed answers.

Instead – he had dozens of question about the Travato. When did they first start getting made? What year was ours? Do we like it? Does it have a full bath? How long does the battery last? He stuck his head in the door and said hi to Kiki (he didn’t even ask to see her rabies vaccination, which is the only form required for bringing pets in).

Turns out, or so he said – he’s shopping for a van – and he was really intrigued by the Travato design.

He gave us our passports back and wished us a lovely trip after noting we should check one of our rear tires as it looked a little low (it wasn’t).

Crossing Back into the USA

When we shared our easy crossing into Canada, several others confirmed theirs had gone just as smoothly too. But we had several people share horror stories about getting back into the US – deep inspections, grilling questions, and threats of fines for bringing across produce.

So we again were diligent leading up to our return crossing, making sure we used up all of our produce – fresh and frozen. We also had purchased a good amount of Canadian wines and beers at the LCBOs (which is a super fun shopping experience), but knew we could only bring two bottles back.

Our biggest concern was the alcohol as we had purchased just enough to enjoy before our crossing – but of course with COVID, we really shouldn’t drink. But, we did a bit anyway to get us down to the limits.

Our crossing at Sault Ste. Marie couldn’t have been more easy. No line, and our agent was super friendly. He asked where we are from (Florida) and what brought us to Canada (visiting friends and vacation for my birthday). He asked how he could get a job that would allow him to take multi-week vacations, and that was it.

Oh, before he handed our passports back, he did ask ‘Oh, do you have any produce to declare?’.  ‘No sir, we ate it all’.

And with that, we were back in the USA.

Mobile Internet Tips

Mobile internet is of course our day job, and we’ve tracked for years options for Canada, Mexico, Bahamas and beyond. But it’s always fun to put our own tips into practice.

Before we left, we went through all of our plans (we have a lot, since we test this stuff) and moved all SIM cards that didn’t have international roaming into storage. We verified if we needed to enable any international settings on our plans and devices.

The plans we used:

• AT&T Unlimited Plus hotspot plan that includes unlimited Canadian roaming (a sweet plan that retired back in 2018).
• T-Mobile Mobile Internet 100GB plan, original, that somehow in the past few months had the Canada/Mexico roaming mysteriously increased from 5GB a month to 100GB. (Also a retired plan, the current mobile internet plans don’t include this perk.)
• Verizon unlimited smartphone plan with .5 GB of roaming a day (which goes super quick with a little photo library syncing).
• Starlink, which includes up to 2 months of roaming into countries on your home continent.

All and all, we kept well connected – mostly from our AT&T plan roaming on the Canadian carriers. For $40/mo (still $20 for consumers), that plan is a gem!

We hardly used Starlink – as many of our campsites were deep in forests and we did a lot of dry camping without power hook-ups (and it’s a power hog). Like most of this van trip this summer, Dishy has mostly been excess cargo. But, the few times we need it and it works reliably enough – it’s worth it.

While in Canada, we did film an International Connectivity Tips video and it’s now available over at MIRC in our International Resources page with much more in-depth content.

Spending in Canada Tips

Before we crossed the border, we also checked the international fees for all of our credit cards. We put aside those that have fees and prioritized those that don’t in our Apple wallet.

We had three cards that don’t have international fees – Amazon Chase, Capital One and Citibank Costco. Which made the trip super easy, especially with the US dollar still being strong – most things were 20-25% off of the sticker price for us.

Most everywhere we went easily took Apple Pay right from a tap of our watches. We only encountered one place that didn’t take credit cards, and they were happy to convert to American dollars for us and accept that.

So we ended up not getting Canadian cash, except we did end up with a looney and toned given to us as souvenirs by a friend – which came in handy for a downtown parking meter. If we were over more than a few weeks, we probably would have picked up some cash too.

Fuel is a touch more expensive – just keep in mind it’s priced in liters, not gallons. Before we crossed the border, it was costing us about $76-86 to fill the tank. Our fills in Canada (in US dollars) were about $85-96. Of course, gas prices were falling during our time there – so it’s not a direct comparison.

Real Time Update

We crossed back into the US on August 15th, and tested negative for COVID a few days later. We enjoyed some time wandering around new to us locations in Michigan (we skipped the UP, since we’ve done it multiple times).

We’re now actually in St. Louis for a couple weeks visiting with family.

After we wrap up our time here, we’ve decided to head back to Sanford to Y-Not by end of the month.

While we’re definitely bummed to miss seeing Zephyr and our lot in Benson, Arizona this year – it was going to be a lot of driving for just a few weeks in October there. We had already decided we wanted to be back in Florida for the holidays. So the miles and time just started to feel like a chore without much of a purpose. And that’s just not the point.

Besides.. we need to get Y-Not ready for some extended cruising starting next spring. We are setting intentions to set off on the Great Loop, for real, and likely be back up in Canada by boat next summer.

We have a lot of boat projects to attend to before that can happen, so more time to spread those out is better for our sanity.