From Sea to Sea: An Exploration of Canada by Bicycle

This trip was completed September 1999.

The first 86 days (British Columbia to Quebec) are downloadable for free. If you would like the entire book (122 days - British Columbia to Newfoundland) please send me $5 US through Paypal (www.paypal.com) using trevor_hennessey@yahoo.com as my user name and I will e-mail you the entire document. If you do not have a Paypal account please e-mail me and I will provide you a mailing address where you can mail me the money. I hope that you enjoy reading about my trip as much as I enjoyed doing it.

Sincerely, Trevor Hennessey

Here are answers to some of the common questions I had to answer about my trip

Who am I and what am I doing?

My name is Trevor Hennessey and in the summer of 1999 I bicycled across Canada from Crescent Beach on the West Coast to St. Johns on the East Coast. I set up a website so my friends and family could follow along with me on my journey and this is a transcript of that journey.

Bicycle across Canada! Are you nuts?

Although people may not come out and directly say this when I tell them what I did, I find that it is usually inferred in the conversation. The reason I undertook this endeavor was to have the opportunity to see more of this grand country that I, among 30 million other people, call home.

The actual idea of bicycling across Canada come to me in 1998 while I was working in Montreal. I found that I loved living in a new city and enjoyed experiencing a culture other than the one I grew up with (no matter what some people say, Quebec is truly different from B.C.) With this realization, I had the desire to experience the rest of Canada and what better way to do it than by bicycle?

But why not go by car or train?

The answer to this is quite simple. Just as tourists can't truly experience Paris by flying in on Monday and out on Sunday, neither can one truly experience the Prairies while encased in a metal box moving at 100 km/hr. Instead, they would be missing out on the sounds of the wind rustling through the fields of wheat and all the other aspects of nature. There is more to Canada than Hwy. #1 and to truly get a taste of the country you need to get to know the people who live there. On bicycle I have the opportunity to move at a slower pace. To fully discover the areas I pass through and yet still be able to cover enough distance each day to cross the country in a somewhat timely manner.

When traveling by bicycle I also have the chance to meet the most interesting people. My lodging is a tent but when looking for a place to camp for the night I just start knocking on farm doors asking if I can pitch my tent out by their barn. More often than not I will be offered a shower and a hot meal (two things that are always appreciated). In this manner, the true character of the region is revealed to me.

Why now?

The main reason for choosing to do the trip at the time I did was quite simple, I had the time. I had just graduated from Simon Fraser University with my B.Sc. and really needed some time to recuperate from the previous 5 years of study.

How long did the trip take?

Well when I left I had hoped to be back home by the start of September but as I had no real deadline and was enjoying the "scenic" route it ended up taking me nearly four months and 9524 km to complete.

Disclaimer:

My website was originally started so that my friends and family back home could follow along with me on my trip. Well with all the publicity my page has gotten my readership has jumped far beyond this. Because of this I felt that I should add a small disclaimer for those of you not familiar with me and my story. Please understand that most of my entries are written late at night after over 100 km of bicycling. At that time my emotions are laid bare for all to see and my heart is on my sleeve. On rough days I may make broad sweeping negative statements which reflect how I am feeling at that time. These may sometimes come across as overly harsh when I did not mean for it to be that way or to meant to only refer to a small subset of people. I could have edited out those portions later but I felt that in order for you to truly feel as I felt I needed to leave them in. Please read with this in mind and enjoy. Thank-you.

Gee this all sounds great. I appreciate the hundreds of hours you have spent typing this up and posting pictures on your webpage. Is there anything I can do?

If you enjoy reading about my trip let others know about it and the book may be freely distributed for non-commercial purposes so share it around. If you like it send me a note to trevor_hennessey@yahoo.com and let me know.

Sincerely,

Trevor Hennessey