A Junior Hockey Journey: Crossing the Northern Border

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June 28, 2015:

The Norfolk Vikings Coach and General manager emailed me the day before I was set to arrive in Simcoe: “12:00 Meet at the clock tower on Norfolk Street. We will be doing dryland.”

We were about to cross the Canadian border through Allentown, New York and were aware that our phones would soon operate on data charges alone. We took the QEW, Queen Elizabeth Way, for about thirty minutes before switching to Route 25, then 27 to 63 and finally Talbot through Cayuga into Norfolk County. The roads were small and stretched straight for miles on each end.

In every which direction along our way, the land grew high with corn stalks and farmhouses. By 9:00pm, we were fortunate enough to witness the sun dip behind those fields, and with Tom Higginson’s ‘American Nights’ softening my ears, my eyes watched salmon pinks and the yellow bellies of perches swarm the Canadian sky. At night, the sky was dark, save for a few stars. Those modest beacons gleamed in a blackness that, I swear, I had never seen so pure. It was rural and it was bliss.

Our car had found Simcoe without complication, one of the few small miracles witnessed that day. Both our GPS and phones had malfunctioned crossing the border and were premature with their Canadian maps. We settled into The Travelodge hotel pretty late that night. And, although I recall hearing some French still buzzing behind closed doors, I had no idea those muffled ‘Putains’ would be some of my closest teammates, just a few rooms away.

-Jeff Gu

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