The Peterborough Kawartha Rotary Club has been a long-time supporter of the Monarch Ultra, starting in 2019, when Carlotta James and Rodney Fuentes, co-founders of the Monarch Ultra made a presentation to our club. They were seeking support for their planned international relay run from Peterborough to Mexico to raise awareness about monarch butterfly depletion.
Taken with this crazy idea and just having retired from 50 years of working and teaching in the hospitality industry, I offered my time and expertise towards the project and joined the team at their maiden run to Mexico in the fall of 2019. We departed in September as the Monarch Butterflies gathered for their incredible journey to Mexico. For 7 weeks, a crew of four were living in and navigating a 32-year-old mobile home through heat waves and storms, over mountains, through farmland and desert, cities and villages. Every day brought new challenges and victories. Daily encounters with schools, environmentalists and government agencies were covered by local media and posted on social media and in newspapers.
All in all, 47 different runners ran 50 km or 100 km a day, following the flight path of the Monarch butterfly's migration from Canada through the USA and Mexico to the Cerro Pelon mountains of Michoacan and the State of Mexico. The journey was a life changing experience for all of us. Team member and film maker, Rodney Fuentes has captured beautifully the 4,300 km long journey with its challenges and celebrations in his 54-minute-long documentary “The Monarch Ultra.” We are currently in the process of making the documentary available for broader viewing. Here is a link to the trailer of The Monarch Ultra documentary:
https://vimeo.com/988432000?fl=pl&fe=vl
While running again to Mexico was out of the question, the Monarch Ultra team has continued on various fronts with their efforts towards raising awareness about monarch and pollinator depletion. In 2021, we organized another relay run, this time a three-week, 1,800 km relay run through southwestern Ontario to continue with our mission to create awareness about pollinator decline. Several Rotary Clubs along the way supported and welcomed us in their community.
A butterfly inspired fashion show in March 2025 in Zitacuaro, Mexico
Building Connections
Since our first journey to Mexico, we have cultivated a close relationship with Nacion Verde, an environmental group caring for the butterfly sanctuary and the surrounding forests. We also established a close connection with the city of Zitacuaro, Michoacan, also known as the Monarch Butterfly capital of Mexico. As recently as March 2025, members of the Monarch Ultra group were invited to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the discovery of the Monarch migration in 1975, by Canadian professor Fred Urquhart and a team of scientists. A special part of the 2-day celebration was the screening of The Monarch Ultra documentary to a large audience of students and butterfly enthusiasts.
Monarch Festival & Race
With the generous support of the Peterborough Rotary Clubs, we recently organized the third annual Monarch Festival and Race at Peterborough’s Millennium Park. A day of celebration, community and connection.
9:30 am - 1 km Kids Fun Run, with kids in costumes running their little heats out.
10:00 am - 10 km Race for adults, with first timers and sprinters running for butterflies.
10:00am - 2:00pm - Monarch Festival, with performances, music, speakers, artists, vendors, non-profit organizations, and arts & crafts for children.
In recent years, our donations raised through fundraising were sent to Nacion Verde for their tree planting campaign in the Monarch Butterfly sanctuaries. This year we have committed funds to Camp Kawartha, who is collaborating with Peterborough Green-UP in their unique program to install educational pollinator gardens at local school grounds. The Festival commons was arranged in a colourful semicircle with a children’s activity section including face painting, a pinata, painting of a giant butterfly mural and arts competition. Local and national environmental groups were sharing information and making connections, artists displaying butterfly inspired art and a local landscaper demonstrated how to build a pollinator garden. Meanwhile food, music, dance performances and Zumba kept all visitors entertained and the atmosphere buzzing. Everyone had fun and the message to protect the Monarch Butterflies was loud and clear.
 Monarch Butterfly Festival 2025, Peterborough, Ontario |
1km Kids Fun Run, Monarch Butterfly Festival 2025, Peterborough, Ontario |
