I had decided to research my father's lineage. Up to that point, it had been difficult to get any information from my grandfather. He didn't want to talk about it and, being somewhat irascible on the best of days, I didn't push him on the subject.
So I turned to the archives. It was there that I was able to go back in time and forge these links: Jason Ballantyne > Lee (my dad) > Arthur (my irascible grandfather) > Oak > David > John
I had heard some vague stories about David (turned out he was a merchant in Bruce Mines and served a term as mayor there the year the Titanic sunk).
But John was new. More research revealed that John came over from County Antrim in northern Ireland with his Scottish wife Catherine Jerrard. They landed in Canada in 1832 and settled in Eramosa, near present day Orangeville.
1832!! Pre-Confederation! I felt a surge of pride. We were "real" Canadians, my daughter Claire being a sixth-generation Canuck.
I was terribly impressed and proud about my discovery. When I told my mom's mom, Olive Scarr (nee Leroux), she politely said how interesting that was but John coming over in 1832 was not my first relative to land in Canada.
Not by a long shot.
She handed me a family history of the Lerouxs written by a Jesuit priest at the turn of the 19th century.
In those pages -- written entirely in French -- I discovered that this man is my 13th great-grandfather.
And when he came to Canada -- in 1606 -- Shakespeare still had a decade to live.
Louis Hebert is considered the first European apothecary to practice in the New World,as well as the first European to farm full-time on North American soil.
He was friends with one of history's greatest explorers, Samuel Champlain.
So what does all this have to do with a 41-year-old man from Barrie cycling up to Penetanguishene?
Bear with me.
Thursday morning, after a breakfast of oatmeal and bananas (no more bonking for me) I loaded the bike on the back of the Civic and drove out to Fort Willow, just north-west of Barrie. The Trans-Canada Trail runs right past it and made it the logical place to head out for Penetanguishene, which is about 60K north- north-west of Barrie.
The start was interesting. I needed to carry my bike down a really long and really narrow and really steep staircase. I shuddered to think of what condition I would be in when I finished my ride and had to haul the bike back up the stairs.The first 20K were uneventful -- mostly hard-packed gravel with a few sections where trees had fallen and blocked the trail. Before long I arrived in Elmvale, a small village north of Barrie.
And it's here where I first ran into problems. When the trail crosses concession roads, it's very easy to see where the trail continues on the other side of the road. That wasn't the case with Elmvale. I couldn't see any obvious entry for the trail on the north side of Elmvale's main street. I mentally flipped a coin and headed west, hoping to meet up with the trail. However, after riding for close to 3K along the highway and through a construction zone I had to stop and ask for directions at a farmers' market. The consensus was that I had to return the way I had come, although no one was sure exactly where the trail continued.
After retracing my steps, I saw a park and figured it might be worth trying out. As I pedaled into it, I saw an elderly gentleman sweeping out a pavilion. He seemed like he would know which way to go.
Instinctively, I headed toward one of the picnic tables under the pavilion and prepared to place my left foot on the table's bench.
One problem. I was wearing clipless shoes for the first time. In a nutshell, it's a system where the shoes clip into a pedal so your legs become an extension of the bike. I had been using toe cages but the overwhelming consensus in the biking community is that clipless are the way to go because they greatly increase your pedaling proficiency and they are -- counter-intuitively -- safer than toe cages or toe straps.
All well and good but there's one thing you have to overcome other than mastering the physical aspect of getting in and out -- you have to overcome a few decades of just having your feet loose on the pedals.
I was already thinking about what I was going to say to the old man and so the cycling was on auto-pilot, including the movement of lifting my left foot off the pedal.
I reached that "oh shit" moment when the bike's momentum slowed to the point of tipping over and I realized my feet were locked in.
And so I started the dreaded -- not to mention a cycling right of passage -- slow-motion topple. Since I was leaning toward the picnic table that's where I landed -- wedged between the table and the bulk of the bike.
The only thing hurt was my pride.
"Jesus Christ! Are you okay?" asked the old man.
"Yeah," I mumbled sheepishly. "New pedals."
The man told me the Trans-Canada trail was just a few dozen feet away. I thanked him and headed back out. Things were going well until I hit another break in the trail, this time due to the fact a farmer had successfully blocked the trail from crossing his or her property. Again, the route was pitifully marked. There was an official Trans-Canada Trail sign nailed to a telephone pole but no arrow to indicate which way to go.
I guessed left and, after getting blasted in the face by 40K/hr manure-freighted winds, I lucked out and found the trail again.
Things were uneventful for the next 10K or so but then I started to experience some pain in my left knee. I was a little concerned because it wasn't in the area of my IT band where I had had some issues while running a few weeks back. This time it was on top of my kneecap and slightly to the anterior side.
Ironically, as the pain increased, Thunderstruck by AC/DC came on my iPod (don't worry -- I never listen to it on the road, only on trails). Here I was, about 50K from home on a trail that used to be a rail line with a knee that was getting worse with each wheel revolution and this is blasting in my ears: "I was caught / In the middle of a railroad track / And I knew there was no turning back."
So now I can get to the part about my 13th great-grandfather. He came over with Champlain more than 400 years ago and I now found myself on this trail....
I was in my 13th great-grandfather's colleague's old stomping grounds. I'll let the Penetanguishene Centennial Museum and Archives pick up the story...
In 1615, after the mapping of Lakes Ontario, Erie and Huron, the Governor of New France sent Etienne Brule, an 18-year-old coureur de bois, to Huronia to learn the ways of the Huron nations and establish and consolidate commercial fur trade contacts. Brule landed in Toanche, and befriended the Hurons, living among the Huron until his death 1633.
Following the same canoe path and again landing at Toanche, Samuel de Champlain, the Governor of New France, arrived in Huronia two years after Brule on August 1, 1615. Together with Father Joseph Le Caron, they held the first mass in Canada west of Quebec City at Carhagouha - Huron village on August 12, 1615.
Champlain arrived in order to cement an alliance with the Huron in which he promised to help them fight the Iroquois in exchange for a Huron-French trade alliance.
In 1629 while war was waging between France and England, Brule betrayed Champlain, and guided the English fleet up the St. Lawrence River where the English and Iroquois captured Champlain and Quebec. Because of Brule’s treason and other indiscretions, the Hurons turned on him, killing and eating him in 1633.
I nearly laughed myself silly thinking of the Huron chowing down on Brule while I was standing under this sign in Penetang. Great food indeed.By now my knee was fairly killing me so I was happy to be able to take a break. I headed for a Tim Hortons and had lunch in the company of a guy who walked in using a cane. He saw my get-up and asked if I was a cyclist. When I told him I was, he started telling me the story of how he used to be a fairly competitive road cyclist.
"I can't do anything any more," he said wistfully, gesturing to his cane. I didn't pry so I don't know what happened to him but I could see how much enjoyment he was getting hearing about my trip and talking in general about cycling.He had some great tips to pass along and before I knew it, almost an hour passed. We said our goodbyes and I climbed back on the bike for the trip home, but not before buying some Advil at a Foodland.
It kicked in about 30 minutes later, making some of the journey back somewhat pain-free. Just south of Penetang, I came across the one historical site I was really looking forward to seeing -- even though it may seem a bit morbid.
It was the Ossossane bone pit. The pit is a 17th century burial ground at the site of the former village of
Ossossane, which was the capital of the Huron Confederacy, and said to
have been one of the largest native settlements north of Mexico. Father J. Brebeuf, the most famous of the Jesuits who came to the Huronia area to try to convert the natives, witnessed a mass burial of more than 1,000 bodies there. After I read the sign I pedaled on a path back to the area where the pit was located. There were several ramshackle buildings along the path, including a few toilets just sitting out in the open. After a couple of hundred feet I came upon the pit. It was marked by a single pole in the middle of the clearing.
It was very quiet, the only sound coming from the hum from the vehicles on the highway a few hundred feet away. Looking around I felt terribly sad. I thought about my great-grandfather, about Champlain, about Brule, about the Jesuits.
I'm sure none of them could foresee what was going to happen after they arrived.
A slow-motion genocide that, over the next three centuries, would all but eradicate a people and a way of life that had existed for thousands of years. (Estimates vary, but it's believed the pre-contact population of natives in the Americas was between 50 and 100 million. By 1890, the native population in the US was 250,000).
And here I was, a descendant of one of those explorers, standing on what had been the centre of the Huron nation.
The rest of the ride home was pretty much a blur as I had to go into auto-pilot to disassociate myself from the pain in my knee.
I arrived back where I started at Fort Willow eight hours earlier, tired but proud, and -- given my experience at the bone pit -- very humbled.
Post script: The pain in my knee was more than likely caused by the new clipless set-up which probably forced my knee into an unnatural position that, as the ride continued, caused a repetitive stress injury. The good thing is that it can be corrected by a proper measurement and setup at a bike shop. I'm heading to one on Monday.
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