Wawa is a small lakefront town on the Trans-Canada Highway, 216 km north of Sault Ste. Marie. It is a mining town, but better known as a base for outdoor and wilderness adventures — boating, hiking, fishing, hunting, and exploring the vast Canadian Shield country that stretches in every direction.
"Wawa" means "wild goose" in Ojibway, and the town has leaned into this with a giant Canada Goose monument standing over the highway junction. The steel statue went up in 1963, replacing an earlier plaster version that couldn't handle the Northern Ontario weather. It was the brainchild of a local businessman who wanted to draw travellers off the Trans-Canada and into town after the highway's last link was completed in 1960, bypassing the downtown area. The goose worked — it remains one of the most photographed roadside landmarks in Canada.
Beyond the monument, Wawa is a useful base for exploring Lake Superior Provincial Park just to the south, paddling and swimming on Wawa Lake, and stopping at Magpie High Falls on the way out of town.