How we were exploring the Manitoulin Island

Manitoulin Island which is the biggest Island in freshwater located on the Great Lake Huron and belongs to Canadian province Ontario. You can reach this place in four ways: by ferry from Tobermory town and via small rolling bridge near Sudbury city, by boat or plane. In both ways you must use a car.

We were prepared for short two days trip from Richmond Hill. We had decided too late and almost all hotels rooms were already booked. Fortunately we found one space in Martha's Inn Bed & Breakfast some very small room for 90 Canadian dollars (hotel prices in Canada sometimes ridiculously high. BTW I must say that not so many of hotels and Bed and Breakfast hotels are happy to have a babies or infants in their places. Can I describe it like some kind of discrimination or so?

Anyway we were happy and ready to go next day. I almost forget to tell that we have booked space in a ferry for us and our car. Guy via phone tell us that it would cost us 85 bucks, 15 for an adults and 30 for our regular sedan. We had booked one way cause we wanted to go back via those bridge, Sudbury and Muskoka areas.

So Saturday morning and we are ready to go. Our ferry's departure time was at 3 pm but we have to be there in an hour before. That's why I was little bit worried when I saw a traffic up north via 400 hwy. But our GPS turned us away from hwy soon and a lot of countryside's roads were layed before us.

I love countryside's roads more than highways.

We were driving through many nice places. I remember at least one town I would like to visit it is Owen Sound.

We arrived to Tobermory town on an hour earlier and we had some time to see this small village around docks. If you have a yacht or a boat this is definitely your place to visit often or to buy or rent cottage there.

There is not a lot to do and since we saw ferry Chi-Cheemaun coming we got in the car. Ferry was at right time but we were waiting for about half an hour in the car. Loading was quiet quick though.

If you have a stroller and small car as we had you should ask about it while reservation cause all standard sedans going on second floor where is you simply would not have enough space to take your stroller out. That is why we had to leave ours in the trunk.

The whole ferry trip was for about 2 hours. If you have a sea sick I would recommend to have some pills cause it might be not a quite pleasant two hours for you. It was not easy for my wife.

You can get some food in local restaurant if I can call it like that. I was not expected anything good there but I was hungry and those food was fine by me.

In two hours roughly our ferry Chi-Cheemaun reached the banks of Manitoulin Island in South Baymouth town. My wife was celebrating returning to the earth.

We have been in South Baymouth town but our hotel was located in Town of Gore Bay so we have to continue our trip yet for half an hour.

Quite tired yet we were driving through a real countryside. Sometimes it was boring sometimes we have seen very beautiful nature and landscapes. Don't expect to meet a lot of people or cars over there. Manitoulin is pretty deserted island.

As we discovered a lot of First Nation people live on this Island but unfortunately we had no time to visit some of their places.

We've arrived at the Martha's Inn Bed & Breakfast around 6 pm,

and as soon as we had a little bit unpacked we went to make some BBQ with our Weber and to see the bay.

How this Martha's Inn looks inside.

At morning we had breakfast with three more families who was staying there as well and after some time we were ready to go home.

My GPS shown that road from Gore Bay to Richmond Hill would take for about 8 hours.

Our way back through Manitoulin Island was pretty same. Sometimes boring, sometimes very nice. On this Island a lot of very beautiful lakes and landscapes.

We left Manitoulin via Little Current Swing Bridge we has to wait about an 15-20 minutes while boats were going through.

There is very beautiful road near Espanola town. It is going through lakes, forests and mountains, very very nice. We spend some time to have fun at some lake right near the road.

Sudbury city itself was not really attractive so we were going to our next destination which is was the Town of Parry Sound. BTW near to Sudbury we have seen under the hwy special bridge for animal migration. It was a pleasant surprise for us.

Parry Sound itself was not attractive as well but we've made a decision return and take a 30,000 Island tour.

For a couple of hours we were enjoyed small roads through parks and bunch of lakes and after that we had took a hwy and went forward.

The last stop before home was Barrie city. We parked in downtown Barrie at Heritage Park and while we were making BBQ our daughter had some fun running around and splashing in fountains.

After BBQ we were walking through downtown main street and I have to admit that Barrie is a very nice city.

We arrived to our home at 11pm. It was long but pleasant trip.

Useful links:

Tobermory website
Chi-Cheemaun Ferry schedule, prices and reservations
Manitoulin Island Accommodation