There are many more majestic masses that aren’t title holders for height or elevation. But upon gazing at each of the peaks below, you might find yourself feeling like you’ve never really seen a mountain before you saw any of these.

Here below is a look at eight of the most incredible mountains in Canada that you can drive to (or near.) Bring your camera for sure, but feel free to leave your hiking boots in the car!

Mountain: Pyramid Mountain
Area: Jasper, AB
Nicest view: From Pyramid Island on Pyramid Lake, 5 km north of the town of Jasper or Pyramid Lake Lodge for a drive-up, stay-the-night view. On off-season days in April or October, visitors have a chance to have the island (and – seemingly – the lake and mountain) to themselves…at least for a few minutes.
http://www.explorejasper.com/sights/pyramidlake.htm

Mountain: Mount Athabasca
Area: Columbia Icefield, AB
Nicest view: The mountain to the left of the Athabasca Glacier (North America’s most visited) is easily seen by pulling off the highway into a parking lot which used to practically touch the glacier (it’s receding at several metres per year.) You can also drive onto the glacier itself in an Ice Explorer “monster-truck”-style bus (for a sense of scale, another bus like the one at left in this picture can be seen at the top of the glacier, as a black dot at centre – click to enlarge.)
http://www.pc.gc.ca/eng/pn-np/ab/jasper/visit/visit13.aspx

Mountain: “The Whistlers”
Area: Jasper, AB
Nicest view: Jasper’s iconic mountain range can be seen from town, from local accommodations on the outskirts of town: everything from the Whistlers Campground to elegant resorts such as the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge (where guests have included Marilyn Monroe and Queen Elizabeth II), or via a tramway you can drive up to and take to the summit (a view seen in the picture at right.)

Mountain: Fairview Mountain
Area: Lake Louise, AB
Nicest view: From the shore of Lake Louise by the famous Chateau hotel, gaze up past turquoise waters to this beautiful mountain and adjacent Victoria Glacier.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Louise_(Alberta)

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Mountain: Tunnel Mountain
Area: Banff, AB
Nicest view: Believe it or not, some of the niftiest views of Tunnel Mountain are up on top of it, looking back at its peak from places such as the Tunnel Mountain Resort, or Parks Canada’s Tunnel Mountain Campground. The RV/trailer site (seen here on a moonlit night in the fall) has an especially spectacular view of this and other nearby mountains, as well as the terrain near the town and popular hiking trails.

Mountain: Mount Rundle
Area: Banff, AB
Nicest view: You’ll know it – if only from pictures – as soon as you see it. One of the most iconic mountains in the Canadian Rockies is a beautiful site in or near the town of Banff. Even better is the closer view from neighbouring Tunnel Mountain, via Tunnel Mountain Road.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Rundle

Mountain: Cascade Mountain
Area: Banff, AB
Nicest view: Walk down Banff Avenue away from the Bow River into town and you’ll look down the posh main drag up to this mountain. Any shop or restaurant on Banff Ave. with a patio or terrace will provide stunning views of this mountain. One of the most authentic such views could be from the patio at The Grizzly House mountain hot rock fondue restaurant or the rooftop terrace at the Elk & Oarsman. For a truly amazing mountain view, take the gondola to the top of Sulphur Mountain and go for lunch. In true Banff fashion, there’s even Starbucks.

Mountain: Mount Robson
Area: Mount Robson Provincial Park, BC
Nicest view: The most prominent mountain in the Rockies isn’t the tallest of the highest above sea level, but aesthetically, it stands out perhaps more than any other Rocky Mountain peak. Filmed for many movies, TV series and commercials, Mount Robson is a true Canadian icon amongst mountains and – for that matter – among any other icons in our country.

For a leisurely autumn drive, a morning commute, or a bread & butter trip from point A to point B, here are six ways you can use your hybrid – or lessons learned from hybrid driving styles – to your advantage:

When (and when not) to use cruise control
Cruise on most cars is meant to get you and/or keep you at the speed you set, as quickly as is safely possible. In the long run, cruise control will save more fuel than the average person manually controlling the gas. But in some cases – such as climbing hills and hitting “resume” at a lower speed than you set the cruise for – high revving from cruise trying to get you back up to speed may cost you efficiency. To be most efficient, coast up hills a little, then only use cruise on flat sections of road. Click here for some helpful cruise control tips

On-ramps
To solve this problem and get back up to speed, or to enter highways via on-ramps, accelerate as gradually as traffic will safely allow, using your foot or the + button on your steering-wheel-mounted cruise controls, to inch up to your desired (legal) speed. Try to keep your RPMs between 2,000 and 2,500 while doing so.
Read more highway driving tips here

Coast down hills (and wherever else possible)
As long as you’re not breaking the speed limit or any other laws, let your hybrid coast down hills to store more energy. In fact, the more you can coast anywhere in any car – but especially hybrids, where you’re using the free power stored in your batteries – the better.

Keep your windows rolled up on the highway
Though windows down in the city may be the energy-efficient way to cool your car in the summer and fall, most agree that energy consumption from windows-up with A/C on is more fuel efficient than no A/C and the less-aerodynamic windows-down. For hybrids, this will also help the car run on battery-only (or at least more often on the battery) on highways with lower speed limits, such as 80 km/h.

Braking
Because hybrids convert braking power into electric energy, it’s important than ever in such cars to brake as gradually as is safely possible. Quick stops that are preventable (i.e. not in an emergency) rob your hybrid of the opportunity to turn braking force into energy for powering your car’s battery-driven motor. Braking gradually also prevents unnecessary ware on pads and is just plain safe practice for drivers of any type of car.

Avoid using your defroster whenever possible
Believe it or not, on many newer cars, your defroster runs off your A/C compressor. While cold weather is tough enough on hybrid batteries (and most hybrids have to run with their engines on in the winter when you crank the cabin heater, even when the car is at a standstill), you can avoid further inefficiency by thoroughly cleaning off your front and rear windows before you drive so there’s less need for the defroster in the first place.

These are just a few energy-saving tips for getting the most out of your fuel. For more on green driving techniques that can save you money, and other driving habits that may save your life, check out some of our previous posts below.

More green driving tips

9 to-do’s before you drive this winter

Green tips for winterizing your car

7 lifesaving techniques you learn in defensive driving courses

Should we go or should we wait a few more days? Finding the perfect front-row seat for the majesty of the fall colour change is equal-parts location and timing. Finding the right location is largely a matter of preference (and sometimes a little word-of-mouth).

Finding the right time is now a simple matter of consulting the right web service. In Minnesota, the Department of Natural Resources even has a fall colour change app that brings the latest updates on fall colour to your mobile device.

Is it the Best Time to Go?
In Ontario, such updates are available on a number of regularly-updated web sites that report the colour and per cent of foliage that has changed for dozens of picturesque locations:

Ontario Parks
Definitely the most attractive of the online fall colour change services, the Ontario Parks fall colour report beautifully chronicles the status of reds, yellows and oranges on the leaves of each and every provincial park in the province:

http://www.parkreports.com/fall/

Algonquin, From the Source
By far the most travelled-to destination in Ontario (and one of the most travelled-to in Canada) for viewing fall colours is Algonquin Park. The Friends of Algonquin Park report highlights of the fall colour change at the best sites in the park: http://www.algonquinpark.on.ca/visit/general_park_info/fall-colour-report.php

A Great Second Opinion of Colour Changes in ‘Gonk
Another great source for information on whether it’s time for that drive up north to take in nature’s wonder: http://www.400eleven.com/colour-progressing-report.html

See For Yourself: Weather Webcams of Autumn Ontario
Even better than apps or text reports on the progress of the fall colour change is a live view of what the leaves actually look like.

Click here for all weather web cams in Ontario (remember to look in the daytime!)

See for yourself what the fall colours look like via webcam in these popular autumn destinations:

• Honey Harbour (Muskokas)
• Wawa Lake (Wawa, mid-Northern Ontario)
• Kenora (Northern Ontario)
• Confederation Park (Ottawa)

Other Fall Colour Change Resources

• Fall colour destinations in Northern and Mid-Northern Ontario
• Fall colour destinations in Western Ontario
• Halloween Roadtrips in Ontario
• More of the best places in Canada to see fall colours
• Tips for photographing the fall colour change

The trip from Upper Canada to the Pacific can be a five-day sprint or a multi-week odyssey. At the very least, something between these extremes is highly advisable. Along the way, hundreds of little-known roadside stop-offs await curious adventurers. Check out our province-by-province showcase of zany curiosities, quirky eats, and – always good for a picture (or a Tweet…or Facebook post) – big ol’ stuff on the side of the road:

ROADSIDE CURIOSITIES

From duelling goose statues to a living-breathing Viking community on the Prairies, to the world’s smallest church to a gruesome “merman” to a Canuck desert, and an enchanted mountain castle, the Trans-Canada and highways-slightly-further-afield boast some of the most interesting “alternative” tour stops in the world:

Ontario

• Tour the post-war-era ”Diefenbunker”, Ottawa
• Colbourne’s “Big Apple”
• Santa’s Village – a weirdly-specific cottage-country theme-park, Gravenhurst
• The multiplying Wawa Goose [Geese?], Wawa
• Visit Winnie The Pooh’s birthplace, White River

Manitoba

• The snakes (70,000) of Narcisse
• Go on a fossil dig on the prairies
• Gimli: A little piece of Iceland (Visit the largest Icelandic settlement in the world outside of Iceland)

Saskatchewan

• The great shipwreck of Medicine Hat
• Canada’s only particle accelerator (certified since 2003 to not create a black hole on Earth)
• Al Capone’s Canadian rum-running tunnels

Alberta

• The World’s Smallest Church, Drumheller (this location appears to be tied for this title with several other buildings in the U.S.)
• the Banff “Merman”
• Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump UNESCO World Heritage Site

British Columbia

• Enchanted forest & castle (on the Trans Canada Highway between Revelstoke and Sicamous)
• Radium’s chainsaw Woodcarver (and goat zoo), Kootenay National Park (one of the most talented, and by far, Canada’s most eccentric)
• Sand dunes of Canada’s desert, Thompson River Valley
• Home of Canada’s Loch Ness Monster, Lake Okanogan

ROADSIDE FOOD

Perhaps nothing is more satisfying than good food in the middle of a trip – especially when that food is tasty and truly unique. Take our word for it and try any (or all) of the following taste-tested joints for some absolutely-superior roadside grub:

Northern Ontario

• Curious Thyme’s Bistro, Sudbury (across from Science North)
• The Lighthouse Restaurant (**for breakfast only** if travelling west via the Chi-Cheemaun ferry), Tobermory
• Voyageur Lodge and Cookhouse, Batchewana Bay (between Sault Ste. Marie and Wawa)

Manitoba

• Black Sheep, Winnipeg
• Horfrost, fine traditional Manitoban cuisine, Portage La Prairie

Saskatchewan

• Calories (lunch, dinner, specializing in locally-inspired deserts), Saskatoon
• Venice House (Greek and Italian), Prince Albert/Saskatoon
• The Berry Barn (traditional Saskatchewan cuisine and gift shop), Saskatoon

Alberta

• Burger Barron (a family-owned Alberta tradition), any location
• Grizzly House famous hot-rock fondue, Banff
• Best gourmet burgers in Alberta at Delux, Edmonton

British Columbia

• The Old Salzburg, authentic Austrian food in the Rockies, Radium Hot Springs
• Thai Basil for “The best Thai dish this side of the Atlantic” (Pad Grapow), Vancouver
• Urban Burger, Vancouver

BIG STUFF

No rundown of roadside stop-offs in Canada would be complete without an homage to the hundreds of novelty giant statues of people, animals, things, and total oddities that defy explanation. See our top picks below and experience all the unbridled whimsy for yourself:

Ontario

• World’s Largest Muskoka Chair, Gravenhurst
• “The Big Nickel”, Sudbury
• Giant baseball, Sault Ste. Marie
• Giant fish (“Husky the Muskie”), Kenora

Manitoba

• “Happy Rock”, Gladstone
• World’s Largest Curling Rock, Arborg
• World’s Largest Sturgeon, Dominion City

Saskatchewan

• Mac The Moose, Moose Jaw
• World’s Largest Wheat, Rosthern
• Giant honey bee, Tisdale

Alberta

• World’s Largest Easter Egg, Vegreville
• Jurassic Forest (a truly-amazing 40-acre valley of life-sized animatronic dinosaurs. Check out this video), Edmonton
• World’s Largest T-Rex (approximately 4 times larger than the largest real T-Rex fossils ever found), Drumheller

British Columbia

• World’s Largest Hockey Stick (& puck), Duncan
• World’s Largest Cross-Country Skis, 100 Mile House
• World’s Tallest Totem Pole (173 feet high), Alert

(Got a favourite to add? Weigh-in via the Comments area below)

One of the best parts of getting underway each day on a road trip is the chance to sample rich, delightful breakfasts in places we might not otherwise go.

While such a meal can be as simple as cereal, fruit, or a bagel, sometimes (actually most of the time while on vacation), you just have to treat yourself.

Here below are five truly amazing day-starters for a cross-Canada road trip: one from each province west of Ontario, as well as one from Northern Ontario and an honourable mention.

Okay…Who wants more syrup!?

British Columbia

Huckleberry’s

Invermere (near Radium Hot Springs, 2 hours west of Banff)

Whether it’s 8 am or 8 pm, be sure to stop here for breakfast on your way to hitting the lake, skiing at nearby Panorama, or taking in the healing waters at the world-famous Radium Hot Springs.

A local favourite, these purveyors of fine mountain berry products (which range from soaps to jams) have become well-known for generous breakies featuring – you guessed it – locally-made huckleberry syrup.

Whether you try the mammoth “Sunriser” egg, cheese and veggie grill platter with a choice of breakfast meats, you can also get (included with many meals) the restaurant’s signature huckleberry pancakes or toast and tatters (for the ‘breakfast wuss’, there’s also a choice of fruit bowl…but who has time for that on vacation?)

http://www.huckleberrysrestaurant.com/

Alberta

Twin Gables Bed & Breakfast

Calgary (Mount Royal area)

One of Cow Town’s true hidden gems, and a nice stop-off on the way in to (or out of) the Rockies:

Not only does this lavishly-appointed five-star B&B cost the same as some motel rooms in town (in the off-season, a room can be had for as little as $99,) but the made-to-order roster of full hot breakfasts rivals or surpasses most high-end hotels in the area.

Daily delights range from omelettes to mile-high waffles with all the fixin’s to Eggs Benedict draped over fresh croissants, trimmed with fresh fruit & veggies.

http://www.twingables.ca/

Saskatchewan

The Station Place

Saskatoon (weekend brunch)

This gorgeous landmark, made partially of decommissioned rail cars, is one of Saskatchewan’s ritziest dinner reservations, with fine dining steak and seafood mains, as well as prices – justifiably-so – to match.

What’s incredible is the breakfast – at least Sunday brunch buffet – is a comparative bargain at $16 for adults and $2-$11 for younger folk.

What you get for that price is all the pancakes, eggs, French toast, Eggs Benedict, sausage, bacon, waffles, salads, pasta, ham, and roast beef – cut-while-you watch – with all the trimmings that you can eat.

In case you’re already gunnin’ for lunch at this point, there’s also dessert at the end.

http://www.saskatoonstationplace.com

Manitoba

The Falafel Place

South-western Winnipeg

Voted Winnipeg’s “Best Breakfast Place 2010” by the weekly breakfast review team at Breakfast Connoisseurs, this joint’s farmer-platters can be ordered with such delights as potato pancakes or latkes, extra sour cream and onions/garlic, home-made hot sauce, real butter (on fresh bread), real maple syrup, and hashbrowns with peppers and fresh herbs.

A far more thorough – and yummy – review by Andrew McMonagle at Breakfast Connoisseurs truly does this place justice. Check it out at the URL below…

http://www.breakfastwinnipeg.com/Falafel.html

http://www.falafelplace.ca/

Ontario

Voyageur’s Lodge and Cookhouse

Batchawana Bay (about 45 minutes north of Sault Ste. Marie)

Thick cuts of breakfast ham, freshly-baked toast dripping with real butter and gloriously sweet baked beans top off an egg & sausage platter fit for any fur-trading paddler’s morning (and most-likely, yours.)

Speaking of canoes, the Paddler Breakfast – mentioned above – is the first thing you should order if you’re not sure…but flapjacks and every omelette imaginable are also wise choices.

Another wise choice in planning a visit to this breakfast Valhalla is to be sure to arrive early or come for breakfast later in the morning to avoid line-ups to get a table in the summer. If you DO find a line in front of you – don’t make the mistake of leaving. Instead, send some members of your party to play horseshoes out front, check out the gift shop one floor above, or purchase some of the lodge’s famous homemade cinnamon buns, all while waiting to eat at the restaurant that inspired this blog entry on great breakfasts.

http://www.voyageurslodge.com/

Honourable-mention:

The Lighthouse Restaurant

Tobormory, Bruce Peninsula/Georgian Bay (take-out rated, though dine-in available)

The stand-out surprise of this post: This so-so lunch and dinner establishment in the harbour of “the shipwreck capital of Canada” comes alive at the takeout window during breakfast.

Looking for a pre-cruising/post-scuba-diving delight for your taste buds? Order either the Eggs Florentine or Eggs Benedict for the most amazing take-out Hollandaise sauce in Canada.

Friendly chefs parcel out gastronomical masterpieces, presented as-well-as-can-be-done in Styrofoam containers. Patrons can eat on the go or at picnic tables outside.

Dog lovers will especially love this as a canine-friendly stop – where Fido can pick up a snack at the adjacent Purple Doghouse (http://www.thepurpledoghouse.com) and his people can wander back with him to pick up a truly amazing breakfast.

http://www.restaurantica.com/on/tobermory/the-lighthouse-restaurant/23107946/

Whether you own a beat-up big-box-store special or a racing bike that costs more than your car, there’s more to keeping your mountain bike in good shape than inflating your tires to their proper pressure.

While proper storage and cleaning are important, so are a number of fundamental areas you may not have thought of.

Here below – in order of increasing importance – are our picks for the top services you should perform, learn to perform, or have performed before the next time you hit the trails:

5. Align your derailleur[s]
Yes, that’s the correct spelling. Yes, it means about what it says. This is the part that actually moves your chain onto different sprockets when you move the shifters on your handlebars. By far the most important maintenance element here is keeping your derailleur or derailleurs properly aligned so that they place your chain precisely on each sprocket. The imagery in the link below shows how to do this and also where to lubricate.
http://garynuke.homestead.com/derailleur.html

4. Lubricate!
Perhaps because it’s potentially messy, loads of mountain bikers hold off on doing this as much as they should. The truth is, you should be lubricating and wiping off excess from lube from all moving parts including your pedals, brakes, derailleurs, stem, axels and cassette.

Learn to lube your entire bike in about 2 minutes: http://mountainbike.about.com/od/basicbikemaintenance/ht/Quick_lube.htm

3. Clean your chain
The easiest thing to let slide is the maintenance of your bike’s chain. When the chain on your bike in otherwise good shape starts to rust or look like the one pictured here, it’s time to decide whether a cleaning and lube will keep you riding for another season or if you need to just buy a new chain. (A new chain can cost as little as $20 and as much-or-more than $100).

Time to clean or replace? Take a look at this very useful visual guide:
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/chains.html

2. Clean/replace/align your brake pads
At the very least, make sure the surface of your brake pads that touch the rim or discs are free of debris and clear of fine dirt, dust or sand. If your brake pads are wearing unevenly or they no longer catch and stop your bike the way they once did, it’s time to replace them. Unlike a car, replacing your bike’s brake pads is something you can do or have done, and for as low as $5-$10.

For more on when and how to replace (or get someone to replace) your brake pads, check out: http://www.jimlangley.net/wrench/brake1.htm

1. Adjust your brake levers
Going in any bike is secondary to stopping, which even the best-adjusted bike will fail to do if the controls don’t work properly. One of the easiest (and oft-neglected) things you can do to keep your bike in tip-top shape is to make sure the reach and position of your brake levers are properly adjusted.

Next steps…

The above is only a bare-necessity starting point.

If you’re interested in thoroughly tuning up your own mountain bike, check out this tutorial: http://bicycletutor.com/tune-up/  and buy yourself a good-quality cycling multitool.

If you’re not completely confident in your ability to do the above work, leave it to the pros: Shop around and look for the best deal (coupled with a good policy for recourse if you’re not happy with the tune-up) from your local bike or bike & board specialist.

Remember, though: Just like your car, any investment in keeping your bike in good working order is an investment in your own well-being.

**NOTE: Always have your bike serviced by a reputable repair shop if you are not confident in your ability to effect repairs that will render your bike safe to ride. CAA North and Eastern Ontario assumes no responsibility and holds itself harmless in connection with any repairs persons reading this page may undertake**

As June turns to July and July edges into August, the hot, sticky summer gives way to mild late-summer breezes (or – just as likely – more hot sticky days that make you wonder when the mild balmy breezes will begin.)

If you’ve planned well, your late summer adventure will be the stuff of legend for you, your special someone, and/or your whole family.

If you’ve already got your plan set-up for the perfect wrap-up for the season, congrats!

If you’re looking for ideas for such a trek, you’ve come to the right place:

FOR FAMILIES

No single page can hope to contain all the amazing possibilities for a good ol’ fashioned driving vacation, never mind all the elements that will make such a vacation fun as well as possible.

In the interest of providing a starting point for both power-planners and those content to go whichever direction the wind blows, check out our six-element recipe for a spectacular road trip:

1. Plan your road-trip

Whether heading out with family or friends, the notion of throwing a dart at a map and hitting the open road may seem romantic, but don’t do it!

You’ll have lots of time to relax and live life on a whim once you’re on your way, but for the love of Route 66, take a second (or more) to make a basic plan on where you’d like to go day-by-day.

For longer road trips, you don’t necessarily have to plan to be in a certain place everyday, but even breaking a couple of weeks into 2-3-day chunks will make the trip more enjoyable.

For more advice on road trip success, pick up or download Living Your Road Trip Dream by Phil and Carol White (many of their most popular tips can also be found on guides on their site http://www.roadtripdream.com).

2. Fitting it all in your budget

The biggest deterrent for any trip is money. But almost any driving trip can be affordable with the right planning. For a frugal (but not cheap) guide to making road-trip bliss out of a tight budget, check out the following financial guide at planning-fun-roadtrips.com, possibly the best road-trip advice site on the web:
http://www.planning-fun-road-trips.com/frugal-road-trip.html

3. (A few days) before you pull out of the driveway…

While you can use Google Maps at home to plan distance, route and scheduling, another life-saver is the CAA’s free TripTik service, which offers the assistance of a real person who plans trips for a living to build a day-by-day, turn-by-turn route for you to aim your hood ornament at and follow: http://caaneo.ca/Travel/Destinations/Maps-and-Guides.jsp (Almost the “Holy Grail of trip planners,” says a TripTik review on roadtripamerica.com).

Again, for actually planning the logistics of your trip in the car, check out http://www.planning-fun-road-trips.com/road-trip-planner.html

And for specific guides on…

Food: http://www.planning-fun-road-trips.com/road-trip-recipes.html

Packing: http://www.planning-fun-road-trips.com/travel-packing-tips.html

Gas & cost-per day calculator: http://www.planning-fun-road-trips.com/road-trip-calculator.html

4. Realizing and responding to the different personalities in your vehicle will greatly improve all your chances for getting along, be it for an overnight drive or a multi-week trek…

What type of driver are you?

• The Schedule-Master Focused on getting from Point A to Point B on or before time, then on to the next leg. This type needs extra support and patience in their goal to get to the destination: A valuable asset if tempered with a little fun and flexibility.
• “We’ll get there when we get there” A much more lassaiz-faire driver, prone to frequent tangents and pullovers. Fun if not overdone, this personality can clash with schedule-masters in other seats in the car.
• “The journey is the destination” The great Canadian dreamer – This personality sees the open road as the vacation in and of itself: Great for inspiring other vacationers, as long as they keep on-track.
• The Tour Guide A detail-oriented showman, valued for their ability to point out the DVD Special Features aspects of any trip – Groovy as long as they guide in moderation.

What type of passenger are you?

• The Talker This passenger is happy to just sit and visit with the driver and/or other passengers for an hour or the whole day – The Talker doesn’t need an iPod but appreciates frequent stops and needs other talkers in the car to avoid becoming a nuisance to mellower vacationers.
• The Gamer Happy to disappear into games and apps for hours at a time – Low-maintenance but must remember to disconnect from technology during prime vacation time.
• The Sleeper Another low-maintenance passenger, the Sleeper is happy and ready to adventure once the car stops, as long as they’ve been left alone to snooze sufficiently on the road.
• The Multitasker Most-often manifested as work-a-holics that need to keep on top of work even on vacation, this passenger will shrivel up and die without an A/C power adapter in the car…Their mindset is very useful when trying to plan out a complex route or day of touring.

5. Gear & Gadgets

Tasty treats, a deck of cards and even a DS or two and an iPad can only make up so much of the entertainment between stops on a 1-3-week car ride. With that in mind, below are some additional lifesavers to make a trek in 100 cubic feet of rolling steel and plastic as pleasant as possible:

Forget about DVDs in the car – watch HD TV on the road! (Also, wireless Internet in your car, but – really – are you ever going to look out the window??)
http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/life/the-coolest-road-trip-gadgets-1977741

Best car A/C power inverter
http://www.canadiantire.ca/browse/product_detail.jsp?PRODUCT%3C%3Eprd_id=845524442936337&bmUID=1304009336474

Roll-out picnic kit
http://www.picnictrend.com/picnic-backpacks-17/service-for-four-28/avalanche-wheeled-picnic-cooler-95.html

I spy with my little eye…Image stabilized binoculars let you zoom in on sights from the road while helping keep nausea at bay
http://www.escience.ca/telescopes/RENDER/5/1020/1033/13312.html

6. Living in the moment

Remember when we poo-pooed improvisation? In the interest of creating as many memorable moments as possible, one final note on your carefully-planned-out schedule, budget, route and menu: Once in a while, throw them all away and just have fun. So pull over if you see an eccentric gift shop, splurge on a restaurant meal for that never-tried-it-before local cuisine, and spend an extra day at a destination you fall in love with…After all, what good is a carefully-planned escape from the everyday if you cant let loose to enjoy it.

More resources:
5 tips for kid-friendly road trips
Guide to historical battle road trips in Ontario
Guide to eco-road trips in Ontario
Guide to stargazing road trips in Ontario
Pet-friendly road trips

TripTik Tangents:
Between Ottawa and Thunder Bay
Between Ottawa and Toronto

Most people think of provincial parks like Algonquin or Killarney when they envision wild spaces in Ontario.

But despite our lack of mountains and hot springs, there are actually quite a lot of national park experiences to be had here in Upper Canada.

In honour of Parks Canada’s 100^th anniversary, here’s our look at our favourite activity at each of Ontario’s five national parks: (more…)