Man makes mullets his mission

Simon Varwell is a man on a mullet mission.
He has set himself the task of visiting every single location on the face of the earth that has the word “Mullet” in its name.
So far, the Glasgow, Scotland resident has been to Belmullet in Ireland, Mullett’s Farm in Suffolk England and at least three Mullet Creeks in Australia. He has crossed eight references off his list and has 19 more known Mullets to visit.
But in terms of numbers of mullet references per square mile, Varwell admits he may find his personal Mecca when he visits Mississauga next week.
The prospect of seeing a Mullet Creek, Mullet Drive, Mullet Park, Mullet Walk and Mullet Creek Park all in the same day, not far away from each other in the same city, has Varwell eager with anticipation.
“Most mullet places are obscure, small and rarely-mentioned,” says the 29-year-old. “I usually just go there and take a picture, so anything else will be a bonus.”
When he gets here next Monday morning, Varwell will meet over breakfast with Ward 11 Councillor George Carlson who has agreed to give him a whirlwind tour of the mullets of Mississauga.
“I think it’s the most unusual request I’ve received since I became a councillor,” says Carlson, a long-time Streetsville resident who recalls his great-grandfather  telling tall tales of the days when the mullets (the fish for whom the creek was named), “were so thick you could walk across their backs from one side to the other. These days, you’d be lucky to find a minnow in there,” laughs Carlson.
The degradation of the Mullet Creek watershed has been a matter of concern for some time for both the City of Mississauga and Credit Valley Conservation.
Over 70 per cent of it has been developed in Mississauga and the remainder upstream in Brampton is scheduled for development. Heavy runoff required a diversion channel to be built around Streetsville in the 1970s. CVC would like to remove a huge plug of sediment near the diversion to improve water quality.
“There is still fish life throughout but it is very stressed,” says biologist Bob Morris.
The creek is undoubtedly named for the fish, not the haircut of the same name — although it is the distinctively unflattering hairstyle (short at the front and sides and long at the back) that actually inspired Varwell’s obsession.
After graduating from university in political science in 2001, the student travelled across Europe to the Middle East with his friend Niall, who made a sport of spotting men with mullets. “With something like that, you either join in or you go mad,” explains Varwell.
Back at work, he was idly searching the Internet one day when he noticed a small place in Albania named Mullet, “and had an epiphany.” He made the Albanian town the first stop on his map-the-mullets world tour, only to find that its real name was actually Milot. Undaunted, Varwell pressed ahead.
His hobby has brought him lots of media attention and raised the possibility of putting his experiences into a book one day. He even has a tentative title, inspired by one of the newspaper headlines about his adventures — “Up the Creek Without a Mullet.” Varwell does not sport a mullet hair cut.
He had planned to take next year off work and complete his mullet tour, but a new job and an accompanying move to Inverness have spoiled that plan.
He is using his vacation time this summer to visit an aunt and uncle in Barrie, from where he will visit both Longueuil (the French word for mullet) in Québec and Mississauga.
Carlson says Varwell’s trip to Canada already seems to have been blessed because Barrie is a bastion for mullet haircuts. “It’s the mullet capital of Canada,” says Carlson.
Varwell admits he has taken the Mullet Rd. less travelled by, but he has no regrets.
“Some folks just don’t get it. They think I’m weird,” he said in a telephone interview from Scotland. “But everyone’s inquisitive in life. These are living, breathing places with real people behind them. Travel is about encountering the world and stretching yourself and your boundaries.”
As far as the pursuit of a mullet can take you.

jstewart@mississauga.net