North of Kingston, ON sits Murphies point provincial park. It is the only Ontario Provincial park with a mine in it that offers tours on the weekends in the summer. The season stretches into the fall, with tours winding down in September. Getting there is easy, most of it driving along Hwy 401 going north along Hwy 15. The last stretch has lots of surprising twists and turns as you make your way to the park past the Rideu Canal.
Murphies point is about a 340 km drive, no problem for my 2018 Nissan Leaf as there is ample charging available along Hwy 401. This being a weekend trip, the kids were hungry when we got near Trenton Onroute so that is where we stopped. As always with Ivy, be sure to have at least $13 in your Ivy account for a smooth charging experience. Why, no idea, but I am glad I did as my Leaf charged smoothly. I could have made it after stopping in Trenton, but we wanted to top off a little, in case there were any issues with charging at our Campsite, so we made a quick stop at the PetroCanada charger in Kingston and enjoyed the convenience store.
We had reserved an electric “deluxe tent” which did not disappoint on the comfort front. Our neighbor kindly allowed us to use their 30 A plug to charge our EV, as ours was taken over by the tent, which was used to power a heater, fridge and coffee maker, essential appliances really. This was helpful, as I had a little too much fun plowing through these twisty turns in the leaf, and thus arrived with a lower state of charge than I had planned. The extra speed (24 A vs 13 A) ensured I had a full battery for our return on Sunday.
Tours of a real Mine are surprisingly hard to find. In fact, Murphies point and the Dynamic Earth museum in Sudbury (source), are the only ones I know of in Ontario that offer tours of a mine. There are a few more options to explore mining in general (see for example few in my earlier post, along with the Toburn gold mine). This is a shame, as an EV owner, we need to be aware of and appreciate the effort involved in mining the materials required to make that EV we love. Particularly when the mining industry makes an effort to reduce their impact on the environment (see for example here). Know of an interesting tour, drop a comment below.
Electric car adventures 