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Craft Beer & Ribfest (craft beer section)

Off to a Rib Fest around lunch time in Victoria Park, central Kitchener. Tokens bought, we charged our sampling glasses and headed for the shade. A huge range of craft beer stands bordered one side of the central area of the park (porters, light and dark ales, lagers and fruit flavoured beers!); stands selling ribs, chicken and huge onions dipped in batter vied with one another on the other. Large tables sporting trophies from past glories fronted some of the latter.

Craft Beer & Ribfest (ribfest section)

This was a serious business. It seemed the more trophies that were displayed the larger the queue line. Ol and Rick headed off and decided a half rib from the stand with the shortest line was a good idea. Good choice boys – the judges agreed with you – it beat the established trophy holders hands down!

Craft beer appreciation society

A couple of hours had passed under the trees and a pleasant breeze was building up along with the cloud cover. We decided to take a walk in the park away from the fest. The sky had turned a steely grey – better head back to the car we thought as a few large drops of rain fell on the lake. Car reached, the heavens briefly opened. No sign that there had been any when we got back home. Ol and Ang's friends and previous near neighbours, Steph and Dave, arrived to share the evening with us. It was great to get to know them.

Sunset in Waterloo

Temperatures predicted to rise even higher today so after a leisurely start we headed off to West Montrose to see the oldest covered bridge in Ontario and the town where Bill Tutt one of the Bletchley Park code breakers settled after the war. He was invited to became a professor of Mathematics at Toronto in 1948 and then moved to nearby University of Waterloo in 1962. He returned briefly to Newmarket, his place of birth, after the death of his wife in 1994 but the call of his adopted homeland brought him back to Ontario.

City Centre

On to Guelph and after a brief stop for lunch at Pitta Pit (great value and really tasty) we reached John McCrae's House (place of birth) and now a small museum dedicated to his memory and to those whom he treated as a Colonel in the Canadian Medical corps in the Great War.

John MaCrea Birthplace

It is thought that he wrote 'In Flanders Fields' following the death of a great friend in 1915. We had visited 'Essex Road' one of the dressing stations where Col McCrae had worked and had written the poem when we stayed near Ypres last summer but both of us had assumed that he had been killed from shelling. Not so - apparently he had suffered badly from asthma throughout his life and contracted pneumonia while working at a Field Hospital near Boulogne. Meningitis took hold and he died only a few days later in January 1918.

A detour to look at a possible rental for next May on our way to the very small museum in the local bakery dedicated to Lucy Maud Montgomery (Anne of Green Gables) at Norval. Norval was the second place in Ontario where Maud's husband Ewan was minister. Back home to delicious barbecued steaks and corn on the cob!

written by

rickandsuejohnson on July 24, 2012 from Waterloo, Canada

from the travel blog: Go West then go East

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