Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Best March Break ever: Day 1

The drive to Gravenhurst (which, for those of you who don't know the hinterland of Ontario well, is in Muskoka - close to Algonquin Park - about 2 hours north of Toronto and 4.5 hours west of Ottawa) went remarkably well.  The girls watched a couple of videos, Emily took a nap, Hope talked.  And talked.  And talked.  We had to stop three times.  Twice was for me to pee.

Went we got up here we had a tour of my Dad and Donna's new house.  They're building a timber frame house on a piece of severed property that Donna and her brother inherited from her parents.  Her family cottage is on the remaining piece of property.  That's where we're staying.  

The cottage always smells like woodfire, which is awesome.  

After our house tour yesterday, we walked across the bay on the ice to the cottage and settled in.  After supper we took another walk on the lake.

This morning the kids were outside playing by 8:30.  We made a fire outside and walked over the ice to visit the men ice-fishing a ways away.  We pulled the kids across on toboggans.  Bentley, my dad's dog, rolled in dead Pike.  So nasty.  When we got back we pulled out the roaster sticks, hot dogs and toppings and roasted our lunch by the fire.  Marshmallows followed.  Emily wanted to check out a small hole in the ice where Donna was checking the ice thickness but never actually made it to the main water level.  There was in fact water in the hole though (see where this is going).  She ended up knee deep in the hole when she decided to touch her toe to the water and lost her balance.  No joke, that's the third pair of pants today.

I'm loving it up here.  We're outside a lot so far.  I hope to catch a nap this afternoon and put a hot water bottle on my belly which is not happy at the moment.  Aside from that, this is a great first March Break for Emily.

7 comments:

little b said...

wow, it sounds like an awesome first day. I'm glad you're having a good time, but i hope your stomach feels better after some hot water bottle time.

Anonymous said...

This is a fine blog post, but you have left several important questions unanswered:

Can you see the underwater city of Kachegui (pronounced catch-AY-goo-EEEE) through the ice? How do the Kacheguians survive the winter? Do they get cable? Have your daughters been able to make contact with the Kacheguian children? Swimming is out, obviously. But perhaps they might play some Candyland or that Kacheguian classic, "Where is my Blowhole?"

I trust these questions will be answered.

Karen said...

Uh, yeah. Thanks John.

Shan said...

Sounds like you're having a great time Karen! Enjoy!!

Pam said...

Wow, sounds like a fantastic March break for all of you.

Julie said...

So glad to hear you sound a little more like you. Glad it was such a good ride down and you had a fantastic first day.

Erika said...

Sounds like great fun! Of course, it's strange to read about you playing on the ice when here in central Illinois it was about 22 degrees this weekend and I was paddling on the lake in my kayak! (C: Hope the rest of the week is wonderful!
-E