Florida, cottaging

 And then there was another year. Time flies when you're not doing much vacationing.

We did go to a cottage in March with a couple of families, including my little sister. That was fun, and not too far away.

Everyone got all foodie of course...

People chilled...

... some more than others.

There was an indoor hot tub, which got lots of use. Carrie went in it one day for a minute, for which she was rewarded with a giant itchy rash for the next couple of weeks. Hot tubs are gross.

And then more life happened. And then it was the last week of school. A friend need to go to Florida for work stuff. He wanted to drive, and he wanted company so as not to fall asleep on some interstate. So I volunteered to tag along, leaving the kids with our wives, on the busy final week of school, what with its school trips and half days and graduation stuff.

We set off Sunday evening, making it to the border pretty quickly. Getting into the US was no problem. We strove to take the most direct route, but Google keeps pushing fuel-efficient routes these days. What's with that anyways? Let us burn gas if we wanna burn gas. It's good for the economy.

Speaking of which, gas was anywhere between the equivalent of $1.40 to $1.75 a litre, at a time when back home it was over $2. Nice and cheap!

Toodling down the interstates, we were impressed by the number of roadkill deer we encountered. Hopefully they were taken out by big rigs and not cars. Must be a few dented grills driving around.

And those rigs... yikes! More often than not they kept up with traffic, happily going 130km/h. No speed limiters in those things, apparently.

Another random microburst

At any rate, we made it to Fort Myers area in about 24 hours, with a couple hours of sleep each. No real incentives to stop, except, perhaps, for ... (*drumroll*) ...

Pedro's! Giant billboards announce it for miles as you approach the North/South Carolina border. A big ol' tourist trap boasting glorious slogans such "You're always a wiener at Pedro's". Seriously though, you never sausage a place!

We did not stop. Made it to Fort Myers, stayed for 44 hours, headed right back home.

Palm trees make any scene nicer

A random parking lot turtle

We hit a bit more traffic coming back (thanks Orlando), so the return trip was about 26 hours in total. The border crossing into Canada was thoroughly uneventful; although we were well prepared with our ArriveCAN apps, none of that nonsense was even required.

Arriving home on the last day of school, I wasn't in any shape to attend the grad dinner with the rest of the family, but I did manage to drag myself out for the grad ceremony that evening. Duty done.

The week following that, a few families headed off to a cottage resort near Parry Sound. Each family occupied a little full-featured cottage near the water. Oh, except no air conditioning; the first night was brutal! Fortunately I had the foresight to bring a couple of fans along, so those sort of saved the day.

Our waterfront home

Our view

A private beach for the resort

Boerenkool for supper on our screened-in deck

There were a bunch of kids, and they mostly got along just great, spending time at the playground, in the water, or just hanging around.

Someone brought this giant pad... tons of fun

The kids made lunch! They really don't need us.

A couple of hiccups during our week... First, we kind of forgot to bring entertainment for our kids, so we had to visit a nearby Walmart one day.

Problem solved. These girls love colouring/drawing.

The other hiccup was bladder infections. Carrie has had them off and on since then; at the time, it wasn't clear how bad things would get, so we ended up spending an afternoon in the emergency room. We lucked out... we were out in under 4 hours!

Other than that, it was a great week.  A couple of guys brought boats, so there was the inevitable boat stuff.

Lily and her friend happily share a low tolerance for speed

Nora loves tubing, but the boat rides are just as fun

Fishing shmishing... pffff

Mini boats!

And of course, plenty of time to chill...

on the couch...

with food...

on the beach...

with food on the beach...

and around the campfire.

Good times were had. Oddly, now that we have a camper, we haven't camped yet this year. That may change yet!

Summer plans, part 9: Back through Ontario

Part 1 - The prep

Part 2 - The trip west

Part 3 - Okanagan

Part 4 - Smithers

Part 5 - Eastbound

Part 6 - The badlands

Part 7 - Saskatchewan & Manitoba

Part 8 - Assiniboine Park Zoo

Part 9 - Back through Ontario

Our short stay in Winnipeg was over. We made our way to the Forks Market for a peek and a quick breakfast, then took a little eight-hour drive to Thunder Bay.

In Thunder Bay, we had booked the seedy 2-star Prince Arthur Waterfront Hotel in a lousy part of town. It had very few redeeming qualities. We found a restaurant down the street, where we were seated at an outdoor patio next to the sidewalk. A homeless guy decided we were worth talking to, so we didn't get a whole lot of quiet time. I tried to buy him dinner; actually I did, but he was gone when his food arrived and still gone when we departed, so I can only hope he came around to collect his free meal.

Waterfront view but no access, as the walkway was closed.

Anyway, if you're in Thunder Bay, I wouldn't suggest this hotel. Lily and I did better tenting 45 minutes away at Kakabeka Falls park a month earlier. I guess if that was among the worst of our summer experiences, we can count ourselves blessed.

Then it was off to Wawa, less than six hours down Highway 17. Halfway there, we stopped for lunch at Pebble Beach in the town of Marathon. Can't say I understand why they named the beach after pebbles.

Beach of giant pebbles

Once we reached Wawa, we had a job to do: find lodging! This was one of the few times we were winging it, and we hoped we could find a place easily enough. Well, that turned out not to be the case. We called or visited every motel around, but everything was full. We went on to Lake Superior Provincial Park, but it too had nothing for that night. So back we went to Wawa and finally found a private campground where we could rent a little bunkhouse, basically a shed with a few beds. This was one step up from camping and didn't cost much more, so we happily took it.

The next morning we headed a little ways down the highway to Lake Superior Provincial Park. Carrie has always wanted to do some hiking along the shoreline, so that was our plan for the day. We got a couple hours of hiking in.

The trail wended in and out of the forest.

Boardwalks kept us dry.

Once we were done with exercise, we headed to the campground to find our spot for the night. This one we had booked in advance. Strangely, things seemed pretty booked up online, but there were a ton of empty campsites to be seen.

Giant beaches. These were more pebbly.

Drinking tomato soup for supper.

Chillin'

After a night of camping, it was finally time to get home. We drove 10 hours with hardly any breaks. Turns out this driver needs more pee breaks than his wife and daughters; they do make great travel companions, even if I don't haha!

Donut break.

And then it was done. Lily and I spent just shy of six weeks away, Carrie and Nora a little less. The Suburban was of course the ultimate road trip vehicle, and we put on 12,000 km with nary a hiccup. I would totally do this again.

Summer plans, part 8: Assiniboine Park Zoo

Part 1 - The prep

Part 2 - The trip west

Part 3 - Okanagan

Part 4 - Smithers

Part 5 - Eastbound

Part 6 - The badlands

Part 7 - Saskatchewan & Manitoba

Part 8 - Assiniboine Park Zoo

It was a lovely day to spend at the zoo, so that's what we did. Every kid (and adult) should get to see a zoo. It wasn't exactly cheap, but my research tells me it probably doesn't get much better than this one. Zoos are crazy expensive.

They had antlered guests...

Rudolph? Is that you?

...guests that would happily snack on the antlered guests...

Wolves survey their domain.

They had felines...

Soooo cuddly!

The cat of many names.

Just pretend you can see the tiger. He was not cooperative.

...and other fluffy creatures...

Red panda. Not a bear like the giant panda, but more like a raccoon.

The close-up.

And some horned characters...

Blizzard the white bison.

Musk ox selfie.

Sichuan takin.

The aquarium was near/below the polar bear pen, and the bears were supposed to swim around and let us see them from below. I guess they didn't get the memo or were too modest. Too bad for us.

Looks like this one didn't make it. Did they forget he's supposed to live in water?

Some birdies...

A sad-looking eagle

Mmm... clean water.

There was a butterfly garden, but there wasn't much going on in there.

An obligatory photo.

Monkeys!

Well, at least one.

They had a dinosaur section for some reason.

That rope should keep him in.

Looks legit.

Complete with sounds and a bit of movement, the dinos were a hit.

And that, friends, was our visit to the zoo. We had to visit some pens multiple times before we caught a glimpse of the animal hiding inside, but I think we managed to see everything we'd hoped to.