[OBSCURA] "Peterborough family bumps into wild Trudeau on hike"

[rfmcdonald]

Verity Stevenson's Toronto Star article describing how a Peterborough family ran into Justin Trudeau while exploring Québec's Gatineau Park blew up all over my Facebook wall today.

When a Peterborough family set out on a hike inside Quebec’s Gatineau Park, they didn’t expect to see a cave, let alone a shirtless prime minister popping out of one!

“It was like a 20-foot-wide round hole and Justin (Trudeau) emerged with his family in tow and said, ‘This is the moment of truth; do we stop here or do we carry on?’” said Jim Godby, who was on a five-day camping trip at the park last week with his wife, Arlene, and two kids — Alexander, 13, and Charlotte, 10.

They had decided to go on a hike on one of the trails near their campsite Tuesday and happened upon the Lusk Cave, a marble cave thousands of years old in the centre of the park.

As they went to take a peek inside, Godby heard the familiar voice. That’s when Trudeau, Sophie Grégoire Trudeau and two of their children surfaced in what Godby described as a casual chance encounter that humanized the prime minister.

“It was just said with such an enthusiastic, joyful tone that that’s what kind of struck me,” Godby said of Trudeau’s comment, which appeared to be referring to whether the family should continue hiking or not. “He evidently enjoys leading. . . . It seemed pretty characteristic of his personality.”

This is just fun.