Tidbits
Sleepover at Ikea - Maybe this is the only way to get to the $1 early enough…
A ramen bath - Japanese spa with special baths resembling instant noodles. I wanna play!
Old age homes for dogs - 1) Old dogs don’t like to be abandoned at strange places. 2) Playing with young puppies will probably cause the older dogs to die faster due to exhaustion.
A remote-controlled pigeon - Oh the poor thing…
An article on a brilliant method of teaching grade schoolers about bats and rabies. I smell a lawsuit.
Will trade beer for Crumpler bags. Tempted by the beanbag and messenger bags…
Photos
Taking the Waterloo Tourist Train
April 15, 2008, 3:12 am
So there’s a tourist attraction in Uptown Waterloo that’s essentially an old train station, located across the town square where the Perimeter Institute is. There used to be a tourist train that would take you from there to St Jacobs every weekend for the farmers market, but the train haven’t ran for years. When I went to the concert thing at PI that time, we did see a train parked at the station, but though nothing of it. Then Mike started reading some junk mail during dinner one night, and discovered that they were running the train to Elmira for their annual Maple Syrup Festival. As luck would have it, he read it on Thurs, and the one day festival was just that Sat. Yup, our weekend plans were set!
I’ve been to the Elmira Maple Syrup Festival two years ago, and wasn’t overly impressed. It was mostly just an over-crowded street market that barely touches on anything maple-syrup related. However, with the train running, how can I resist? Yes, it’s sad, taking the tourist train from Waterloo was pretty high on my to-do list.
The train took about an hour to get to Elmira. It left the Waterloo station, continued slowly through Waterloo Park, past the university, through St Jacobs and onwards. And I do say it went slowly, as we were overtaken by some jogger ladies when we went through Waterloo Park. However, it still beats driving. Last time we drove, and it was pretty much stop-and-go the entire way right after Hwy 85 ended past Northfield. And parking was brutal. So yes, taking the train was way more relaxing.
The train service is part if the Waterloo Central Railway. All the coaches and cars were old and restored, and was pulled by a diesel train. There was also a steam engine thing, and not knowing a thing about trains, I’m not sure what the differences are. So the train was pretty fun, and I’m glad I got take it at least once. They’ve since assumed running the train between Waterloo and St Jacobs every weekend, but I don’t think I’ll take that one. For starters, I live really close to St Jacobs now. In fact, it would probably take the train longer to get from the Waterloo Station to St. Jacobs than how long it will take me to bike there from my place. Though I suppose if one of you guys come up to visit and really want to check it out, I’ll go. 
As for the festival itself, it was pretty much the same as the last time I went, only more crowded and they started charging like $1-2 for everything (toy auction, Old MacDonald’s Farm, etc). At least it was a nice day, and navigating through the crowds was good practice for Mike to get him ready for China. Hehe, I was trying to get him to stop following the person in front of him and make his own path so we can move quicker. The number of people was pretty impressive, almost as crowded as Toronto’s festivals. Unfortunately, it seems some of those local people are not used to it. There were older couples complaining about people “touching” or “pushing” them. There was this one guy who let his toddler out of his stroller in the middle of the crowd and Mike accidentally nudged the kid. The guy made some snide comments about us pushing his kid behind our backs. Dude, the kid is barely knee-high, how are we suppose to see him in a crowd? Even dog owners carry their smaller dogs in their arms while there. He was just lucky the kid didn’t get knocked over rand trampled.
Overall though, it was a fairly fun way to spend a lazy Saturday in Waterloo. If the train is running again next year, I might go again.
Tagged: Waterloo
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© Maggie Tam 2007-2009 www.onechopstick.ca
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