Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Vacation Part 2

Before I get into these set of pictures, I figured I'd go into some of the back story. When my dad was in his 20s, my grandparents (let's call them grandparents N,) decided to purchase a cottage on Lake Cameron in Ontario. My dad, uncles and aunt grew up going to the cottage on the weekends, skating on the frozen lake, taking their new wives there and eventually, their children. Like I said before, we used to go up every summer and spent 2-3 weeks swimming, roasting marshmallows over the fire and spending time with family.

My mom's parents (grandparents B,) also have a cottage, over on Lake Baptiste. I'm not sure when it was purchased, but I don't remember going to it often. My Papa had a stroke when I was about 11 and died a few years later, which resulted in my Grandma moving out to British Columbia to be with my aunts. My great aunt, my grandma's sister, and her family have a cottage a few hundred yards from my Grandparents B's cottage, so they purchased it when my grandma moved away.

In comparing the two cottages, the N cottage is more what I guess you'd call a summer home. Indoor plumbing, hot water, TV, a boat used for water skiing and tubing, etc. The B cottage is more roughin' it. An outhouse dubbed "The Throne," a pontoon boat only used to get from the cottage to the car on the opposite side of the lake, no TV, but they did just get internet recently so my great uncle can work over the summer. They're polar opposites, but they both hold a special place in my heart and my childhood.

Tuesday night, after wandering around downtown Toronto, we got up to the cottage pretty late, so we caught a quick look at the lake, played some board games and went to bed.

Wednesday, we wanted to reenact all the things we did when we were younger. We convinced my dad to get the boat out, and we went tubing and skiing.





The universal hand signal for "SLOW THE FUCK DOWN!"





Keegan, Bri and Julian tried skiing, but none of them got up. Apparently Julian got up a few days later after Keegan and I had left. 

Thursday, we went over to Grandparent B and my great aunt's cottage. We had lunch with them and my second cousins, and Keegan went kayaking. 

Unlike the N family cottage, you cannot get to the B family cottage by car. You have to park across the lake and take a boat. 



 
My grandparent's cottage. It's not actually curved, we had to take three pictures and stitch them together to get it all in one shot. 

My great aunt and uncle's cottage




Nights at the cottage were spent around the fire roasting marshmallows and star gazing. 



Friday morning, the day before we left, we were greeted with a mama duck and her babies. When we were younger, we'd feed them corn, but all we had was a left over hamburger bun. When we ran out of bun, the ducks climbed out of the water, over the rocks and up onto our lawn searching for more. One of them actually nipped at Keegan's toes thinking they were food! 







That night, the rest of my extended family came up for the weekend, but unfortunately, Keegan and I left Saturday morning. That was a whole ordeal to itself! When we got in the car at 4 in the morning, we realized the low gas light was on. Unlike the larger cities we are used to, there weren't any gas stations open in the small towns around the cottage, so we had to drive about 45 minutes looking for an open station. Thankfully we made it before we ran out of gas and made our flight just in time. 

I'm so happy that I finally got to show Keegan the people and places that made up my childhood. Besides two uncles, an aunt and my great aunt, Keegan hadn't met any of my extended family before this trip. My grandparents are getting up in age, so I'm thrilled that Keegan got to meet them once before they pass. We're hoping to make it back up to Canada every other year or so, and it's my dream to eventually take my kids up to the cottage. 

4 comments:

  1. Hi from ICLW...looks like you had a great time!!!

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  2. Lovely! I'm so glad you were able to get away!

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  3. Looks awesome!! Glad you had fun!!

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  4. i love love love looooove this. so much. cabins and chilhood memories are the best.
    and i SUCK at water skiing!

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