[This is a guest post by Dean Burry and Katherine Semcesen, who are currently travelling with the Xstrata Ensemble Studio school tour. Dean Burry is the COC school tour manager and composer of the touring opera Isis and the Seven Scorpions and Katherine Semcesen is the COC associate director, education and outreach.]

Clear skies and an open road... the perfect start to the COC's trip up to Sudbury! With every kilometre we travel outside of the city, the more excited we get knowing that we'll be bringing opera to people far beyond the city limits. There's a noticeable change in our environment. We're far from the concrete jungle of Toronto. The further we drive north the more beautiful the landscape. The change in the colours of the leaves is epic, almost on an operatic scale. Our first stop... the French River Trading post and The Hungry Bear restaurant. After a quick stretch and some samples and a large purchase of homemade fudge, we continue our journey to Sudbury.

First impressions... we're looking forward to exploring Sudbury in the daylight! En route we saw signs of a diverse arts community: the Sudbury Theatre Centre was holding acting classes for adults and we're staying not too far from the Sudbury Art Gallery. We're looking forward to our first workshops tomorrow for the Sudbury Catholic School Board.