travel blog Archives - Wandering Wellington County

The Waterloo Central Railway Village Station in St. Jacobs hosts some wonderful Holiday rides. Walking towards the venue, you could see the glowing lights from the Christmas decor.

Bells could be heard jingling in the darkness of the evening sky. One of the smiling attendees from the previous Polar Express train ride said, “Enjoy your time, you will love it, it was so amazing!”

Entering the warmth of the building, there were Children dressed in pajamas clutching hands with their parents some were browsing the Polar express memorabilia and perhaps wondering what the night would entail.

The lights dimmed, smoke began to fill the room and our evening at the Polar Express began as actors began to tell the story of the popular Christmas book written by Chris Van Allsburg.

Entering train C, there were festive Christmas lights decorating the interior of the 1950’s old style train. We were met with the actors in costume greeting us all with smiles as we found our seating arrangements.

The conductor said, “All Aboard, we are embarking on a trip to the North Pole, please have your tickets ready!”

Rolling out of the station we all knew we were in for a special evening as the conductor began to inspect the golden tickets, walking up and down the aisle performing his golden ticket duties.

Attendees can enjoy a 1 hour train ride to the North Pole in the comfort of cozy seating while The Polar Express is read, hot chocolate and treats are served, carols are sang and everyone receives a gift and visit from SANTA.

The acting was really well done along with all of the details taken in to account to make the ride so memorable for Children of all of all ages.

Tickets are limited so be sure to check out the website and pre book your ride, Waterloo Central Railway, https://waterloocentralrailway.com/the-polar-express-train-ride/.

One of the last impressions I heard on the loudspeaker was, “What matter’s most is not where you are going, but that you got on!”

This annual family fun Polar Express train ride along with the Santa train ride experience takes place from Mid November only until Mid December, so get ready to make one of the most memorable experience’s your family will have this holiday season.

Talk soon,

Nancy

During a recent trip to the wonderful Toronto Zoo this past Month, one of the first things you see when walking into the gates is a larger than life-sized Marlin.

Looking closer you could see it was made of recycled materials, reading the plaque by this huge fish was my first time learning about this travelling project called “Washed Ashore”, “Art to Save the Sea”. Here is the link about this project found on the Toronto Zoo, http://www.torontozoo.com/washedashore/.

Walking around the Zoo in the warm sunny skies, I had an opportunity to explore all 10 of these amazing larger than life sculptures.

Of course like many visitors, I too had snapped photos of the gang standing beside these friendly characters.

A travel friend commented on one of my social media posts. She mentioned how much she had loved this artist. She first saw these creatures at an exhibit in Palm Beach Florida several years ago.

This lead me to do some more research and learn more about the artist and realized how lucky we and the visitors to the Zoo are to know this is the Canadian Debut of this thought-provoking exhibit.

The lead artist and founder of this organization is Angela Haseltine Pozzi. Each sculpture is designed and created by a team of people who love the Ocean and the mission of this amazing project. Pozzi said the first step is to let people know there is a problem with plastics and garbage in our Oceans.

“The friendly characters are giving a voice to what needs to be done, better than what a statistical chart can do”, shares one of the artists on a YouTube video.

Here is the CEO of the Toronto Zoo sharing about the Canadian Debut of the project on the Zoo’s FB page, https://www.facebook.com/TheTorontoZoo/videos/716042262151443/

An interesting article on how a dog advisor learns from zoo’s on behaviours can be found here, https://yourdogadvisor.com/zoo-mental-exercise/.

Help get the conversations started about our environment, share these great images which are taken from the Washed Ashore Website or better yet go see them yourself, they are only on display until November 17th, 2019.

Talk soon ~

Nancy

The Polar Express Train Ride

Washed Ashore Exhibit at the Toronto Zoo