July 10—Port Dover

Our time at Algonquin is over, and back to Cambridge we went. We spent the afternoon hanging out with DJ’s parents and then decided to go to Port Dover, a town on Lake Erie. Angel had pickerel, a fish she’d never tried before, and Ashlynn had clam strips (probably her favorite seafood).

Here's Ashlynn with her feet in Lake Erie.

We drove through Paris on our way to Port Dover, and I discovered that Canadians disdain punctuation as much as Americans.

While in Paris, our friend Don found that a lovely flower basket may make a clever hat.

Flashback to Angel’s childhood—Angel’s mom had one of these growing at the edge of the driveway in the old house in Ruffin that Angel grew up in. Well, one day, Angel was playing in the yard, all wrapped up in a make-believe world. While she cannot recall the reason, she decided that the big flower growing up from the middle of this plant needed to be cut down. So she found something and chopped it down. You can imagine how ticked off her mother was when it killed the whole plant, not just the flowering part.










Ashlynn and I were pretty tired, so we took a rest while we waited for our food to arrive.

July 9—Dorset

We went to Dorset to climb the 125 steps up the old DEW line tower. There was a fire tower here, but it was torn down and the current tower moved in. While it may be that on a clear day you can see forever, the day was quite overcast and hazy, so our view was dimmed. It would be an awesome view in the fall when the leaves change colors, but I doubt we’ll make a trip up here just for that.



















After the tower, we went over to Robinson’s Store. This store is a historic part of DJ’s family. He came up to this area every year as a child to go camping and fishing, and Nana still comes up to this area to stay in a relative’s cabin. She comes to Robinson’s to get the Native-made (they are NOT called Indians up here) moccasins she sends for Christmas each year.

Here's Ashlynn with Bruno Bear and Mickey Moose.

Wildlife

We may not have seen moose, but we did see a few wild creatures up here.


We saw this painted turtle near the sheep pen at the B&B.












This moth is called the One-Eyed Sphinx.













I believe this is a young American Bullfrog. We saw him at the Beaver Pond.












Chipmunks are everywhere!













These loons were at the pond by the logging museum. It was difficult to get a picture of both of them, because they kept diving down into the water to feed.











Another frog, but it's a different one this time. I think it's either a leopard or pickerel frog.

July 8--Algonquin Park

This is one of DJ's most favorite places in the world. Algonquin is this massive provincial park that is used primarily for hiking, camping, and canoing. We mostly drove through (it's 35 miles from the west gate to the east gate--and that's at the very narrow bottom of the park. This place is huge), but we also stopped at the visitor's center, museums, and gift shops. We were going to go canoing, but it was drizzly and windy.

I just looked it up, and it's 7,630 square kilometers big. I have no idea what that is in miles.


The museum has a section dedicated to Tom Thompson. He was one of Canada's famous painters in the early 1900s called the Group of Seven. He was found dead in the park back around 1917 and his death remains a mystery. There's monuments to him everywhere up here. It's a very interesting story--I recomed you look him up online.






We hiked the 2 km trail around Beaver Pond, and this is one of the many beaver lodges we saw. Looking through binoculars, we did see two beavers swimming way across the lake, but Angel wasn't able to zoom in close enough to get a picture.








Dam.













Dam. Again. Small, but still holds back the river.














Still at Beaver Pond.

















This is Ragged Rapids, and it's so tremendous you can hear the water thundering from pretty far off.

















This is Oxtongue Rapids, and it's usually calm enough to swim in. However, there's been enough rain lately to really swell the river and make it too dangerous to splash around in.










This place is so beautiful and wild. There's just mountains, trees, rivers, and lakes as far as you can see.











Here's what we were really hoping to see in the wild instead of stuffed in the museum. There were several sightings of moose, but mostly on the various hiking trails. It's not uncommon to see them as you drive on the main road however.

July 7--Morgan House B&B

This is the front/side view of Morgan House Bed and Breakfast, our home for three nights. The family that lives here is super nice--Jamie and Pam, and their kids Eli and Sadie. (Angel had an aunt named Sadie. She lived to be about 105 years old. But that really doesn't have anything to do with this story.) The house is powered exclusively by wind and solar power, and Pam makes just about everything by hand. Our breakfasts so far have been INCREDIBLE. As you can guess, I'm a few days behind in writing on the blog. We got here Monday, and it's currently Wednesday. I'm in a little cafe with Angel in Huntsville while Damon and Ashlynn are at the movies seeing Wall-E. But back to Pam. For breakfasts, we've had waffles, pancakes (both with homemade maple syrup), banana nut chocolate chip muffins, strawberries with fresh whipped cream, the best vanilla yogurt ever, and homemade granola.

Pam has three sheep whose wool is sheared (shorn?), dyed, carded, spun, and made into artwork, rugs, and heaven knows what else. It's really incredible. Didn't I already use that adjective for the breakfasts? Hmm, I need a thesaurus. Anyway, this is a really neat place. The family also has three horses, a dog, chickens, two cats (only one of which I've seen inside), and a rabbit. The rabbit hops around the sunroom and is friends with the cat.

July 7--Santa's Village

Ashlynn, Angel, all the other stuffies, and myself left Nana's house and traveled east to Damon and Candy's house. They're DJ's parents and our next stop on our trip. Damon took us up north to Algonquin Park for a few days. Santa's Village was our first stop along the way. It's in a little town called Bracebridge, in the Muskoka area. Ashlynn cannot seem to say Muskoka, so she calls is Novaskoka.

This is not the real Santa. This is Ricky, our boat captain. One of attractions at Santa's Village is a boat ride along the river. The boat is called "Santa's Summer Sleigh."
















You know what they say--If you're not the lead reindeer, the view never changes.


















Can you read the sign? It says that we're at the 45th parallel, which is halfway between the equator and the North Pole. What better place to have Santa's Village? I guess Muskoka is the big guy's summer home.









Ashlynn and Damon on the ferris wheel.












The sign says it all folks!


















Yes, this is one of Santa's reindeer, but I'm not sure which one.













Roller coasters are great fun. The first time we rode, we got there just before this one was ready to take off. Guess you could say we got there just in the St. Nick of time!











I think she'd look cute with antlers.


















They don't let you bear them up here either.












This is the "real" Santa. He enjoyed hearing about how I'm blogging our trip, so since I'm such a good little monkey, he let me sit on his lap for the picture.

July 6--Day 24--Observations

Like Ashlynn's new hair-do? Pretty nice, huh? She and Angel have been having so much fun on their trip.


















They've also been enjoying Nana's cooking, including these Yorkshire Puddings, part of today's pot roast feast. The yummy goodness has also included ginger snaps, cheese straws, strawberry-rhubarb pie (a first for Angel), tons of ice cream and ice cream bars, and chocolate pudding cake.






So here's a few things I've forgotten to report in posts past:

Deer--we saw three of them in fields on the side of road driving to the Toronto Zoo. There's so many farms in this area, and they're growing just about everything up here.

Snails--boy are they everywhere! Remember the pics of Ashlynn from the Canada Day BBQ? We've seen tons of those black and yellow snails. They were all over the trail surrounding the Museum of Archaeology (yeah, that's how they spell it up here). The ones we keep seeing are the Banded Wood Snail.

For years Angel has poked fun at DJ when he has gone off on a tirade about all the things that are better in Canada than the U.S. Well, she's finding out that there are indeed some things better up here. Those things would include:
* Packaged Chocolate Chip Cookies--a company called President's Choice makes them, and it's the Decadent version. Boy are they better than any store brand back home!
* Ketchup--don't ask me why, but it's sweeter.
* Tea selection--where else can we find Prince of Wales and full boxes of Lady Grey?

But there are some things that are not better. Such as:
*Gas prices--right now they're at 1.35 a liter, which is about $5.11 a gallon (there's 3.7854 liters in a gallon)
* Taxes--there's two different kinds. One is 5%, the other is 8%. One of them is called the GST, or goods and services tax. DJ says it's the gouge and screw tax. His is definitely more fitting. Rumor has it that Angel can fill our a certain form, submit her receipts, and get some of what she's paid in taxes back. You'd better believe she's going to do that!

So tomorrow we're off to Cambridge to stay with DJ's parents for a while. As soon as we get there, the girls and DJ's dad are going up to Algonquin Park until Wednesday. Hopefully I'll be able to get an internet connection so I can update the blog, but if not then I'll get lots updated on Wed night. Good night and good luck!