Monday, 9 September 2013

A Day Trip to a Place That Was Once Nearly Home

Last Thursday morning we decided it was a perfect time to head out of town for the day. We’ve been talking about taking a random road-trip somewhere since we got our car two years ago and so far have never done it.

Not really caring where we went Nick left the destination up to me. I picked a town 1 1/2 hours east of Toronto, called Cobourg.

The reason I wanted to check it out that particular place was that I very nearly moved there once, when the man I was seeing at the time was offered a good job in that small town. We had both just finished university (where we had met) and still hadn’t settled in on a definitive life plan. We had gone back and forth trying to figure out the pros and cons of making the change, and in the end decided that moving there was not really for us.

But as with all significant life decisions, you think about the choices made and how our lives are changed this way and that as we go along. Over the years I have wondered what my life would have been like if I had traded in big city living for a more quiet life. Would I still be there now, a totally different person than I am today?

I have had no reason to return to Cobourg in the years since then, and kind of forgot what it was like except that it had nice old buildings and was located right on the edge of the water (Lake Ontario, which also borders Toronto). So I was keen to see it again, armed with the gift of hindsight and able to evaluate exactly what I had passed on.

On our way we first stopped at the town right next-door called Port Hope, where we couldn’t find easy parking in town, so just took a quick stop at beach.

Then we continued on to Cobourg. What we found was a pretty place for sure.

We took a look at the waterfront and walked along the main street, stopping in at a couple of shops, one of which was called The British Pantry where we were in search of a snack that Nick remembers fondly from childhood, called Twiglets, that we can’t find anywhere in Toronto. They had some and they are good!

I don’t want to sound like a complainer about the lunch experience but in my mind I had envisioned us having a nice meal somewhere quaint and outdoors, along the water. We couldn’t find such a place so either it doesn’t exist or we were in the wrong area. We ended up going for fish and chips, eaten in a cavernous room that had no windows and an annoying large-screen tv turned on with the sound off. Basically, it was not the charming little restaurant we had envisioned having lunch in on our road-trip but thankfully the food was good.