I am considering a position in SW Ontario, and was looking for peoples opinions of what life is like there. I have a wife, a 14 year old and a 7 year old. Schools are important, training environment is important. I know there are quite a few posters that are from the Great White North and was looking to pick some brains. Thanks.
Oh yeah, I currently live in not very cold Northern California, so I know the winter might be a bit hard to swallow at first.
I moved from Florida to E Ontario (Ottawa) so I know what it is to deal with “extreme climate change”. That was 8/9 years ago.
Fred.
Where abouts in SW Ontario?
St. Catharines -Kitchener, maybe a little further south. The position is in St. Catharines. So I am open to commuting up to an hour if need be. I have not yet been up there to visit. I am planning on going to visit the facility next month, so while I am up there for a few days I can do some exploring.
lol…you do not want to commute from Kitchener to St Catherines. 
I am in Waterloo (right beside Kitchener) if you want to shoot me a PM.
St. Catherines - puts you smack in the middle of some great wine country, different varietals than what you get in Cali, but really good for the type they grow (The Baco Noir is phenomenal there, and the ice wines are some of the best in the world). A number of smaller population centers around there that would be a reasonable commute - depends on you cost of living. St. Kitt’s isn’t bad (I used to work there), Niagara on the Lake has some very nice but pricey stuff. Never impressed with Fort Erie and too much of Niagara Falls is taken up by touristy stuff. If you want your largest nearby urban center, that would be Hamilton. I lived there and there are still some great housing deals. Commute for me was about 35 minutes. Even there, if you don’t like the feel of Hamilton, Stoney Creek, Ancaster, Dundas and even Grimsby would all put you close to work and near a 500K uran area. Town has a stigma because of being steel based, but living there is nowhere as bad as Toronotonians will make it out to be.
Climate is about as good as you get in southern ontario, though you can get some interesting snowfalls depending on the lake effects (you are close enouigh to both Erie and Ontario to be affected by both).
Like I said, lots of good wineries with accomapnying restuarants, near to the home of the Shaw festival, some beautiful parkland, and some good rural road riding, but except for the climb up the escarpment, not a whole lot of hill.
St. Kitts would be about 1.25 hours to Toronto in fairly clean traffic, so you are never very far from major entertainment and shopping.
I lived in Windsor, London Toronto and Hamilton, and really enjoyed my time living and playing on the Niagara Pennisula the best before I went way remote up to Georgian Bay - that is a whole other kettle of whitefish.
Let me know if you need more specifics- I amy even know a really good real estate agent to help you with relo.
I’m an American living in Canada for the last 24 years. I’m in Toronto. Don’t know much about St. Catherine’s except that it seems like a nice place as I drive through on the highway. I’ve been to Hamilton a few times for my girls’ sporting events and it seems like a nice small city too. What you see on the highway is the worst, but the downtown is actually quite nice. The schools here are the same as in the US - some of them are good, some of them are bad.
The Toronto District School Board has a great website listing their schools with a huge amount of information along with grade 3 and grade 10 test scores. That will give you some great background information as you start doing your research on neighborhoods. I would think that St. Catherine’s and Hamilton school boards would have something similar.
I’d suggest live closer to St. Kits than K-W. There are lots of nice nearby small towns and you’re just across the border from Buffalo. It’s not a bad area at all in Niagara. I’ve only visited so it’s best I let others guide you.
Born in St. Catharines and lived there until about 16 years old, before moving north to the Perterborough area, then Waterloo for University and now living in Southern California.
The Niagara region is protected by the escarpment and the temperatures are moderated by the great lakes so it does have a very favorable climate for the area - significantly less snowfall than Buffalo gets to the South. I spent my childhood riding a BMX bike and we rode all year round there, other than a few days.
There is a 50 meter pool at Brock University which would be great for training. Its very easy to get out of the city onto rural roads through the vineyards and orchards for cycling.
Like anywhere, some schools are better than others. However, I don’t think there is as big a discrepency between the Canadian schools than I find in the schools here.
St. Catharines has been hit hard over the past 20 years by the downturn in the auto industry, but it is also a thriving wine area and one of the few places in Canada that has long enough growing seasons for fruit such as peaches, apricots, etc.
During the summer you will have multiple triathlons to chose from every weekend within a 1 - 3 hour drive. There is the trisportcanada race series and another big series that has started since I left Ontario that each have about a dozen races between May and September.
Thank you all for your input, it is helpful.
Coming from Cali you will also be pleasantly surprised by the cost of triathlon entry fees, especially if you sign up for a whole season package. When I raced the Trisport series between 1993 and 1998 it was $295 for the entire series of 12 or 13 races. I’m sure its a bit higher now, but still cheaper than down here!
I grew up in St. Catharines. Lived there til I was 18 and a few years in my 20’s. It has indeed been in decline over the past decade(s). Typical rustbelt downtown with just about everything out of business or close to it. It is a decent place to raise kids that age and I do have fond memories of my upbringing, but it’s pretty damn blah man. To be brutally honest I would advise against the move. Yeah yeah yeah, strong banks, decent schools, blah blah blah, it’s not enough.