From Winnie's Home to the Rockies

Finding out a childhood icon is Canadian hits different. We pulled into White River, Ontario, and found the actual birthplace of the real black bear that inspired Winnie the Pooh. Chey instantly clocked it from the classic Heritage Minutes commercials, and we read the Disney plaque at the official monument.

Boondocking by a communications tower the next morning, we filled our water jug at a free station. ‘Never pass up a free water station’—that’s the rule when you live on the move.

We drove the Blue Meanie down an unmaintained clay trail to the Geographic Centre of Ontario, where only four-wheelers belong. Chey signed the logbook and dropped a Screaming Heads sticker into the geocache. The ruts were deep enough to swallow a tire whole, and a sign was turned completely backward, so Chey jumped out to play traffic controller.

When Chey shouted ‘Muddy tires!’ navigating those deep ruts near Hornepayne, I knew that was it. That’s how muddytires.ca was born.

I launched the drone off a cliff in Northern Ontario after a year of no flying. The battery warning screamed just as someone pointed out a black bear moving through the trees below. Heavy shadows and low-battery panic made tracking impossible, so I got the rig safely back to the rocks.

We pushed through Red Rock Coulee, Marathon where we caught a free hot shower at Pebble Beach, Waterton Lakes, Crowsnest Pass, and Vulcan. We woke up in Banff, spotted wild dogs and wild horses near Stoney Nakoda, saw sheep in Kananaskis, and ended at Lake Louise.