The Current - What’s your favourite vacation spot in Canada? Add it to our bucket list!

Episode Date: March 11, 2025

With simmering U.S.-Canada tensions around tariffs, some Canadians are rethinking where they want to spend their travel dollars — and looking to some of the great places this country has to offer. The Current is putting together a travel bucket list and we want your suggestions! Go to cbc.ca/thecurrent to help us celebrate this big, beautiful country.

Did you know it was nearly eight o'clock at night in Washington when Donald Trump set a date for Canadian tariffs? I think we'll do it February 1st. And his plan for steel and aluminum just sort of slipped out on the way to the Super Bowl. It's going to have a 25% tariff. The new U.S. administration is making news that matters to Canadians whenever and wherever it wants. And we stay on top of it. I'm Stephanie Scanderis, the weekend host of Your World Tonight from CBC News. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.

This is a CBC podcast. Hello, I'm Matt Galloway, and this is The Current Podcast. I can go east. I can do absolutely nothing. I can go west. I can have a snowball fight in July. You might remember the tourism ad for Canada from 2003. East or west or north, we here at The Current have you covered.

With Canada and the United States in a trade war, many people are putting trips south of the border on hold. In fact, new data from Statistics Canada showed that car travel to the US fell by something like 23% in February. Earlier this winter, we spoke on this program about people rethinking vacation plans and spending those travel dollars here at home. But in a country as vast as ours, where do you

start? Well, help is here. We are creating the current Canadian travel bucket list built by you, then voted on by you. And you actually kicked this off by sending in suggestions. And so we will begin our search for the top destinations for the Currents Canadian Travel Bucket List with the Currents producer,

Amanda Grant, who is here to explain how this is all going to work. Amanda, good morning. Good morning, Matt. We got so much mail on this that we decided to come up with this contest and I'll get to how to participate in just a moment, but here are some of the letters we received so far. Our listeners had a lot of thoughts on where to go. From coast to coast to coast.

I have to say this was some of the most fun mail to read. I want to start with an email from Joel Malay from PEI. He writes, years ago, I went to the end of the road up to Yellowknife Northwest Territories to work as a fishing guide and discovered a vibrant community living in houseboats on Great Slave Lake. I'm talking over 30 homes frozen into lake ice. These houseboats are part of a neighbourhood called Old Town offering grassroots tourism to the world.

On a winter's day in March, tourists can shop for indigenous art, take a dog sled ride, eat famous fish and chips, relax at a spa, attend a live music concert in a snow castle, and if they're lucky, witness the spectacular Northern Lights. J Douglas Rains in Crows Nest Past, Alberta writes, Saskatchewan in capital letters with three exclamation marks. I'm not even joking. Bald, flat, boring, look again. Fly into Regina, head south and west by car, flat, mystic, open. You may spot a hide

polished buffalo rock on your way to the big muddy, the sunken badlands. Back on Prairie Hardtop, you're looking forward to a few beautiful days with beautiful people in the city of Bridges, Saskatoon, the prairie oasis that Burton Cummings crooned about. You will want to move to this warm, prairie sophisticated mecca. Flyovers and drive-bys are missing a whole Canadian world of wonders. Tell Canada to stop sometime and visit Saskatchewan. It's a convincing pitch. I think I might want to go and follow that path. This submission is from Lindsay Jensen in Sun Peaks, BC.

She writes, I've lived in six provinces and driven across Canada, east to west, numerous times. I've made it a goal to visit new places in Canada as often as I can. My favorite place to visit in all seasons is Gibson's on the Sunshine Coast in B.C. The beaches, hikes, backcountry, whales, breweries, picnic spots, people, farmers markets, sunsets, gelato and more, you'll fall in love and want to go back before you've even left. We've had a lot of letters like this. The ideas are too good not to share.

So we want more, believe it or not. Go to cbc.ca slash The Current. You'll see our Canadian bucket list submission page. You wanna click on it and fill it in with your idea. Make a case for why a particular place in Canada should be on our bucket list. Maybe it's a place you visit every year. Maybe it's where you live.

Maybe you went there as a kid. Tell us what makes it special. You know, it's interesting when we talked about this earlier, there are people who said I'm not telling you about my favorite spot, why would I do that? I'll spoil the magic and the mystery of it. Somebody who has had a chance to visit many of this country's very special places from coast to coast to coast is our friend David Gray. He is a travel ambassador and fellow with the Royal Canadian Geographical Society. He is the former host of CBC Radio's Calgary Eye-Opener. David, good morning. Hey, good morning, Matt. I love that list. It's good so far, but we're hoping to add to it. You know, social media, if you believe

it, would suggest that you spend like all of your time traveling? It kind of feels that way. I think I've spent the last, what, couple of years since I left CBC filling up my bucket. I've had a bucket list forever like everyone else, but there are so many amazing spots in this country, Matt. I want to tell you about all of them, but so you'll have to tell me when to stop. How about that? What is it, and I want to get to the list,

but what is it that makes traveling, you've traveled all over the world. What is it that makes traveling in this country special? Well, what's that old line travels the only thing you can buy that makes it richer. I think that's actually true. And traveling in Canada has so many advantages. So, you know, pick a couple of the obvious ones, you don't have to change the currency.

That's really nice. If anyone's been to the States or anywhere else for a while, it's really nice to know that you're spending your money and you're spending it in your country. That's a great way to get to know your family because there's usually a long drive involved. So lots of great conversations along the way or you can hear a good book tape if that's not for you. And I also think it deepens your sense of country when you travel in Canada. You learn this country's history, you meet your neighbors from other provinces from the North, you can think of it

as a nation building exercise. And guess what, this country kind of needs more of that now than I think ever. What's really interesting, I mean, that nation building is unfolding right now. We've been talking a lot on the program about how we're in this moment. And it's people celebrating this country,

wrapping themselves in the flag, but also deciding, as I said, to spend their money here, not spend it south of the border. Why do you think it makes sense to do that for people to make their travel plans closer to home? You know, let me answer it this way. I go on these trips all around our country and I meet people in the most obscure corners of Canada. and I meet people in the most obscure corners of Canada. But I meet people usually there from, and they're from Great Britain or they're from Germany or they're from Australia or from the States.

And you know where the Canadians are, Matt? They're in Vegas or they're paying through the nose to tour some dusty church in Europe. I don't understand that frankly. People outside of Canada really realize how amazing this place is. And I would challenge people listening now, how well do you know your country? How much better off would we be if we really knew each other from East and West and North? I think it's a real challenge. I think Canadians need to sit back and go, I need to learn about where I live and see these amazing spots. Tell us about some of the amazing spots that you've seen. What is one of your

favorite destinations in this country? Oh, hard to pick one favorite, but you've been to Hadegwai. You did a show from up there not that long ago. It's astonishing. How can you? It's astonishing. There are 40,000 islands along the Pacific Northwest coast of this country. When I was in Hadegwai, what, a year ago, I went with a company called Maple Leaf Adventures. Find a more Canadian name than that. They'll take you all the way from the archipelago by sailboat, or by catamaran, right down to

Skungwai, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. That's the one at the southernmost tip of that volcanic archipelago. And, you know, man, I've been to World Heritage Sites, like I've been to the pyramids in Egypt or Versailles in France, but none moved me like this place did. When you see those mortuary poles still standing at the entrance to an abandoned village, and they're all carved with animals and spirits and it's like coats of arms declaring who lived there. It's incredible. I think it's the Galapagos to the north. That's got to be one of them. Let's stay in the west, the north end of Vancouver Island. There's a little town called Port Hardy. Have you ever been up there? No.

You can rent kayaks and head off into the Broughton Archipelago, go with a guy, but you can hang out with orcas, humpback whales, grizzly bears. I stayed in the eco lodge there called the Farewell Harbor on a little island. It's run by this really knowledgeable guy named Tim McGrady. He spent years building up this business year by year. It's just beautiful. Go to Prince Rupert. It rains a lot, but sometimes you want rain and you can catch a boat there up into the Kutsumatine grizzly bear sanctuary. I've done this, you sail up into this estuary and you go by orca on the way in and you get in there and that's where all the grizzly bears are eating sedge grass and you're in this little boat in this narrow estuary.

The bears don't care that you're there because you're not threatening them or vice versa. Shockingly beautiful. The list goes on and okay, so I'm gonna come back to you because the list is a long one. Um, but we want to hear from some people who have made their own suggestions as well. Stick around, David. Um, David Gray is a former host at CBC radio and now essentially just travels.

Um, and you can see his photos on social media. Um, while you were listening, maybe you had your own suggestions. If you want to give us a destination that we should consider in this country, go to the Currents Travel Bucket List website, cbc.ca slash The Current, and then just submit the location there.

Stephanie Reed has already made a pitch to us for her hometown. She's in Thunder Bay, Ontario. Stephanie, good morning. Morning, Matt. Why should every Canadian go to Thunder Bay? Well, you know, I heard the, you know, the places that were listed in the letters and what David

spoke about and all of those places are fantastic places, but if you can only take one vacation in the summer and you want a sense of everything that Canada has to offer in that one place, Thunder Bay and Northwestern Ontario is that spot. Everything that Canada has to offer in one place. A taste of at least, yep.

That's a strong pitch. So tell it for people who've never been, what is so glorious about Thunder Bay? Well, Thunder Bay is on the shores of Lake Superior and so while a lake by definition, it is an inland sea in every sense of the word. The largest freshwater lake in the world by surface area, so looking at it, you can't

tell it's not the ocean. It, you know, standing in the, in the harbor in downtown Thunder Bay, you'll see sail boats racing, you'll see ocean bound ships. It is a true port city in every sense of the word. It has Northern Ontarians and Maritimers and folks from Nova Scotia are very similar folks. They're very nice. They're very welcoming. And so I often say that if you got on a plane and woke up in Cape Breton Island, you wouldn't maybe know you even left Northern Ontario. As you keep going, Thunder Bay is the largest city on the largest lake, so it is a city in every sense of the word. It is 130,000 folks with an incredible art and culture scene, surprisingly incredible culinary scene, some of the best restaurants I've ever been to

in my entire life. Again, art, culture, connectivity to that nature. Within five and 10 minutes, you can be in the thick of the boreal forest and experiencing true Canadian, rocks, trees, and water, and all that stereotypical Canadian vision that I think people think of. true Canadian, you know, rocks, trees and water, and all that stereotypical Canadian, you know, vision that I think people think of. Thunder Bay, if people aren't aware, is, was created between, or through the amalgamation of two cities, Port Arthur and Fort William. And those were known as

the furthest west Eastern Canadian city and the furthest east Western Canadian city. So they were sort of, you know, Eastern Canada and western Canada in one city. And we still are that today. So you on the Canadian shield, rocks, mountains, cliffs, but also just west of the city, you're in prairies and you're on the edge of the prairie and it flattens right out. And it's incredible to witness that as you drive through. And so it really is from east coast to West Coast and everything in between, you can have all of that in one place.

And there's only a quarter of a million residents in a space about half a million square kilometers. So there's lots of room for you to spread out. Stephanie, that's a great pitch for Thunder Bay. Thank you very much. Thanks, Matt. Stephanie Reed in Thunder Bay, Ontario. On the Embedded Podcast.

No, no. It's called denying us freedom of speech. It's misinformation. Like so many Americans, my dad has gotten swept up in conspiracy theories. These are not conspiracy theories. These are reality. I spent the year following him down the rabbit hole, trying to get him back. Listen to Alternate Realities on the embedded podcast from NPR,

all episodes available now. So this suggestion is from Pat McGuire in North Vancouver, BC. One of the places that surprised us most was the Magdalen Islands. At the southern tip, there are beaches with sand so fine that the softest of steps produce an audible squeak and you feel like you're walking on talcum powder. Surprisingly warm waters, especially in August, a wonderful local brewery in a prominent building reminiscent of Scottish castles, serving amazing beers, local cheeses, produce and meats, including an amazing seal meat sausage. Consistent winds, smooth waters that are ideal for water sports like windsurfing and kite sailing. Thanks for the show. It has us excited for more Canadian travel.

I've never had seal meat sausage before. Now I wanna go and try that. Stephen Sims is in Guelph, Ontario. His choice is actually in an entirely different province. Stephen, good morning to you. Good morning, Matt. Where is the one place in this country that we all need to visit, according to you, Stephen Sims?

Well, it's the Gaspé region of eastern Quebec and it's a place we went for just over two weeks last August and it's just it's just amazing it's it's from southern Ontario it's very accessible a couple of days couple good long days by car but we went there my wife and I with our little tent trailer tent trailer. And we've already scratched the surface of what there was to do there. When I look over the notes for what we actually did, and the notes I'd made in planning the trip

of possible things we could do, we just kinda had to, even with over two weeks, we just kinda had to hit the highlights. And- Aaron, so tell me about the highlights with your little tent trailer, as you said. What did you love? Well, our main reason for going there was to visit Forio National Park at the very end of

the peninsula, which is on its own little sub-peninsula. And it's just a spectacular place of natural beauty and wonderful facilities. We're campersers so obviously we really appreciate good infrastructure for camping and they really have that in spades. For those who don't camp there's lots of other like you know hotels and things nearby and the small city of Gaspé itself isn't too far away. This is a place that you've been a few times? Well my family when I was a child, my family made a trip around the Gas Bay Peninsula with our massive 1970s station wagon pulling a massive 1970s tent trailer and I had very fond memories of that and not only the geography but I recall

at that time also the culture of people selling little carved wooden things on the side of the road, also little people baking things in their front yards and selling that on the street. I didn't see any of that on our 2024 trip, maybe on some of the side roads that still exists. But yeah, that's, I kind of lost my train of thought there. No, no, it's perfect because that's what happens with travel. You kind of fall into those memories, right?

Hey, I'm going to let you go, but just we're talking in part because of this moment, right? Where people are thinking this country is pretty great and we need to celebrate this country. In the, in the spirit of that, just briefly, why do you think people should focus on traveling here in Canada right now? Well, the, the obvious reasons like, you know,

what we're facing from the States, that seems like a no-brainer to me. And as your previous callers have said, we just have so many things to see. I was nodding constantly as you were both reading out that early letter in your show and then talking to David and Stephanie, nodding, nodding, nodding, because I've been to some of these places already and I have so many more things I wanna see in this country.

And when I was planning retirement, starting in 2019, I told myself then that, if I could never leave Canada for the rest of my life, I wouldn't at all feel like I was hard done by. And even Ontario has so much to offer, as a person living in Southern Ontario, but there's just so much to do.

Wonderful. Yeah. Stephen, we'll leave it there. It's good to hear from you. Thank you very much for the suggestion. Thank you for the call. Stephen Sims is in Guelph, Ontario. David Gray's been listening

in Royal Canadian Geographical Society Fellow and extensive traveler. David, you mentioned Vegas. One of the reasons why people might go to a city like Vegas rather than travel in this country is because of cost, right? It's expensive to travel in this country. What do we do about that? No, it's expensive to travel anywhere. But why not put your money

where Canadians are going to benefit from it? I think I can't think of a better investment, frankly. And there are, you know, again, these buccalos. I've skied through the Chick-Shock Mountains. He's absolutely right. The Gaspés is spectacular. Maglons, fantastic. Go to Sable Island and see the wild horses. Amazing thing.

You're right. I mean, money's an issue. And you can spend whatever you want. In my backyard, you can go out with the Canadian Mountain holidays and hell a hike in the summer up in the Bugaboos. It's expensive, but you can also drive in there and hike in there. You've got options. And there isn't a place in this

country if you don't like sleeping on the ground where that you can't find a glamp site somewhere or a motel that'll take you. So lots of options out there. Okay. So 30 seconds. What is on the David Gray bucket list? A place in this country that you want to go to that you haven't seen yet.

Okay. This summer I'm on a rafting trip on the Chilkoot and Chilkotan rivers up in that's called the that's with Nahanni River Adventures and Canadian River Expeditions. There's the Alsek River in the Yukon. I'm doing that the year following. I can't wait to go there. I want to go out with a company called Churchill Wild to see polar bears. It's the world's only walking with polar bear safari. Imagine that. I mean my wife did it with my father-in-law and they were

blown away by that experience. There's a fantastic company called Adventure Canada, does trips to Baffin Island. I was talking to Barney Bentol on the weekend, the musician, he drives a Zodiac for that company. So he plays music at night and drives a Zodiac by day. How much fun would that be to go on that trip? You're living the dream, David, making us jealous. It's good to hear from you.

Thank you very much. Thanks, Matt. A pleasure to talk to you. This is great inspiration. David Gray, Travel Ambassador, fellow with the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, former host of CBC Calgary's EyeOpener. You can follow his travels on Instagram, GradioGRAYDIO1 is his handle. So we hope that we've made this pretty simple, but we want your suggestions.

We've heard just a few of them so far. Go to cbc.ca slash The Courage. You'll see our Canadian bucket list submission page. Click on it, fill it in with your idea. Don't send us an email, use the form on the website. That's where I'm going to be reading everything. We want to hear about places all across this country, whether it's your favorite spot in your own community or a place you've traveled to.

The trick is to paint a picture, to scribe to us what makes it special. Is it the restaurant, an art scene, a hike you've done with breathtaking views, maybe a hidden gym? Gem, take us there with your submission. Why is this a place every Canadian should see? And after you make your case, what happens then? Well, that's when the fun begins, Matt. We'll be narrowing it down to a list of 20 destinations.

Our listeners will be voting for their top picks. Using those votes, we'll name the current Canadian travel bucket list. It's hopefully gonna be a bit of a guide for your future vacations. You could carry it around with you. You could check it off. That's right.

In terms of places that you want to go. Oh, the ideas. How are, like what are we doing and considering these submissions? How is this working? Okay, well, so full disclosure, it's not scientific. We did wanna make sure that the whole country is reflected. Fair enough, yeah.

We wanna hear from people across the country. So we will be taking geography into consideration when we make our list of 20. People will be able to vote for their top spot once a day while we get people to join you on AirMAT to defend their choices for this bucket list. This is such a great idea to get people to think about this country in a different way. Amanda, thank you.

Thank you so much. Amanda Grant is a producer here at The Current. You can submit your ideas for the top travel destinations in Canada. Go to the website, cbc.ca slash the current and make your submission there. We cannot wait to see what you have picked. Let the fun begin. For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.