Trip Log: Awenda Provincial Park - August 1-3, 2018

The kids had been complaining that we hadn't been out in the Boler in a while, so I did a bit of searching and booked us a couple of nights at Awenda Provincial Park.  We had never been there, and it looked promising for hiking, swimming and photography.

Packing up the Boler doesn't take too long, and we were pulling out of the yard at around 1pm. We figured there was no real rush since the park was mostly full, and whoever was on the site we booked wouldn't have to leave until 2.  Since we'd had to sit around and wait for people to leave the site before, we decided to take our time.  This was great as we didn't have to come back home after 2 minutes of driving for something we had forgot to pack.

Everything was so green

Getting to Awenda from our house was about an hour and a half, maybe two hours.  For the most part, it's pretty easy driving for towing, not many big hills, and very little time on any major highways.  We arrived, got our permit and made it to our site without any fuss.  It was sprinkling a bit as we set the screen tent up, and both picnic tables were wet from previous rain.  We pulled one into the screen tent, pulled our camp chairs out and then Chris and Bubbie headed back to the office to get ice for the big orange water cooler, and some firewood.

While they were gone, I got started on dinner.  The plan had been to have mac and cheese for lunch, but it was close to dinner so we opted to skip it and move on to Sloppy Joes and salad.  I was supposed to have made the sloppy joes up the night before so we could just reheat it, but I ran out of time.  Instead, I brought all the ingredients, and hoped like heck I hadn't forgotten anything.  I cut up the onion and celery, then set up the stove...and realized the lighter was in the car.  There wasn't anything else I could do until Chris got back and boy did it feel like they were taking a long time!

Turned out, they went to check out the beach, which is where they saw the sign warning that there was a lot of poison ivy in the park.  We quickly realized Biscuit had run through a big patch on our earlier walk to the comfort station, and we spent the whole night (and most of the trip) worrying he would rub against one of us and we would have a reaction.  I should mention both Chris and I grew up in Haliburton where we tromped through the bush on a nearly daily basis and neither of us has ever had a poison ivy reaction.   Either we were just lucky all those years or we aren't allergic.

Sloppy Joes...sort of

With the rest of my utensils and food back, I went on with dinner preparations.  I got Chris to open the can of lentils and drain it.  When I went to add it to the pan, I saw the can was less than half full!  What the heck?  I've never had a can of lentils or beans contain so little lentils or beans!  At first I thought Chris had accidentally drained most of the can into the slop bucket.  It was a valid concern.  He's well known in the family for draining a pot of spaghetti into the sink...and losing have the spaghetti. But I checked and there wasn't even a single lentil in the bucket!

Our Sloppy Joes were looking very saucy and not in a good way.  There was no way it would be filling enough for four people now.  Desperate, I opened a can of sliced potatoes I had planned to make for our second breakfast (we still had 2 but the kids really like fried potatoes so I brought lots) and added it in.  It didn't alter the taste all that much, and helped to make the meal more filling.  We had garlic bread and salad with it.  There was just enough left for Biscuit to have a bit on top of his kibble (since he won't eat kibble when we are camping without a little of whatever we are having mixed in.)

Usually, when we Boler camp, we end up buying a few cases of canned lemonade or some other kind of pop.  We had a partial case, but rather than buy more, I brought four lemons and four limes.  With the big water cooler, we had lots of what the kids call "Sprite Water." This was a much healthier option, with far less to clean up afterwards.

While dinner cooked, Chris and Bubbie pulled out the ukulele's and played a few songs.  

On his trip to get wood and ice, Chris had grabbed a bag of marshmallows and some jiffy pop, but since the picnic tables were still wet, we opted not to have a fire that night.  Instead, we all headed down to the beach to take some pictures.

Sunset on Georgian Bay

The trails around the beach were loaded with poison ivy, and Biscuit has a serious obsession with it.  He makes a beeline for it every time.  We watched the sunset, explored a little, then went back to our site and made sure everything was locked away for the night, then headed to bed.

I had to get up a few times in the night to go to the bathroom.  It was super quiet and calm in the park.  The walk to the comfort station felt pretty long, and with so much tree canopy, it was really dark.  Usually this freaks me out, but for some reason I was pretty calm about it this time.  I had turned on a flashlight hanging in the screen tent to help me find our campsite on my way back.  My little flashlight I carry with me isn't very good, so it was nice to have a point of reference.

poison ivy at the parking area

Biscuit wanted out shortly after the sun came up, then we went back to bed until about 8.  It looked like it was going to be a nice day.

We made hot chocolate and coffee, then a starter of strawberry Pop Tarts, before making pancakes, then the kids broke out the GORP again.  Before we left, Chris and I made a trip to the Bulk Barn and loaded up on GORP stuff.  I brought us each a Ziplock bag so we could make up our own mixes.  Chris pretty much just makes himself a big bag of raisons and peanuts.  He probably would have added Craisons but I forgot to bring some from home.

With the poison ivy issue, we weren't sure what to do with our day.  We had wanted to do some of the hiking trails, but with Biscuit's love affair with that plant, we didn't want to spend the whole time dragging him out of it.  Instead, we opted to go to the beach.  Chris and Squatch would swim and Bubbie and I would walk with the dog and try and take some pictures.  In theory it was a good idea, in practice not so much.  We let the boys get out of sight before we let the dog out of the car, but it didn't matter.  He knew which direction they had gone and tried to drag me that way.

Beautiful day on Georgian Bay

Even though they hadn't planned to be gone long, it felt like forever.  We tried walking Biscuit the other way, but the parking lot was getting busy and every time a car came through, we had to hug the edge of the lot, which was over flowing with poison ivy.  It was also hot and muggy and every place shady had more poison ivy, so there wasn't really anywhere for us to stand to stay cool.  Finally, I sent Bubbie down to get the boys.  They would have been done soon anyway.

We ended up walking down towards the dog beach to see if we could get the dog cooled down.  The trails were busy and he either tried to jump on people or tried to run through poison ivy.  It was not a fun time.  Once we got to a quiet part of the beach, we were able to relax and got him into the water enough to cool off.

Rain coming over Georgian Bay

Once back at camp, we made up the mac and cheese we should have had the day before, and relaxed. The boys played Viking Chess for a while, then Chris took the kids to the park store to get ice cream. It started to rain a bit, and looked like a storm might be blowing in, so we quickly cleaned up the site and headed back to the beach, hoping to see Georgian Bay with big angry waves, but it was actually pretty calm.  We could see rain falling in the distance, in two directions.  We hung out a bit, hoping to see the rain come closer, but eventually we headed back to camp and started making dinner, which was spaghetti.

After dinner, Chris got  a good fire going and the kids toasted some marshmallows.  We sat around for a while before breaking out the Jiffy Pop, then the kids headed into bed.  Bubbie was pretty tired, but Squatch decided to read to her from the book Chris had brought, a book about conspiracy theories.  Chris had been reading it earlier, and Squatch was peeking out the window of the Boler, reading over his shoulder.

Chris and I stayed out until the fire was almost out, then headed to bed and read a bit of our own books (he'd brought a second book - Against All Odds by P. J. Naworynski.  It's about the Canadian Olympic Hockey team in 1948.)

Our screen tent has seen better days

It wasn't as hot that night.  We still didn't really need the blankets, except to protect us from the dog's nose, but he mostly slept on the floor until it got light outside.  Surprisingly, I didn't have to get up to go to the comfort station in the night, and Biscuit didn't wake us up at dawn to go outside.  We all ended up getting up around 8 again, and had coffee and hot chocolate, then Pop Tarts and potato and pepper hash.  We had also brought some vegan bacon to try out but it wasn't very good.  I've heard rave reviews about some types but I'm guessing this wasn't one of them.  Chris gave some to Biscuit, which we all cursed him for on the way home.

 Everything was wet, and because the tree canopy keeps everything shaded, it didn't really dry off much.  We started packing up, but with the Boler it really doesn't take very long.  Since it was the Friday of the August long weekend, we figured it would be best to head out early before the roads became a nightmare of congestion.

The drive home took longer than the drive there.  The roads were already busy, and a good portion of those people were towing trailers.  We finished off all the trail mix on the drive and made it home by 2pm.

Final thoughts on Awenda Provincial Park?  I'll be writing a park review, but it's a lovely place.  The sites are well space, designed to make it easy to back trailers in, and the beach is beautiful.  If we hadn't had Biscuit, we could have checked out the trails, so I can't comment on them.  All in all, it was really nice, and we would definitely go back, especially in the fall when the leaves were changing colour.

Trip Log: Algonquin Provincial Park: Source Lake to Raven Lake - July 18-19, 2018

Since the kids wanted to visit with my parents for a few days, Chris and I decided to take advantage of our alone time and do a night of canoe camping.  The advantage (besides the obvious) is that Chris only has to portage one canoe, so we can try and get to lakes with longer portages.

We had considered trying to get into Welcome Lake as it was showing as completely empty on the online reservation service, but I was down with a summer cold, and thought maybe treking over two kilometres with a 60 lb pack wasn't the best idea.  Also, timing wise, we would have gotten to Welcome Lake pretty late, given the time to paddle Rock Lake as well as Pen Lake, then do a portage over 2km long.  We decided on putting in at Source Lake, and doing two portages into Raven Lake.

We had to make a quick stop at Algonquin Outfitters for sunscreen and fuel for the stove.  We'd tried Canadian Tire before we left home, but they told us the brand they sold had been recalled for that type of fuel.

I'm not sure what time we arrived, probably around 1pm, got our permit at the Canoe Lake office and headed down the road.  The parks staff were doing some work on the Source Lake Road on the way in, I'm assuming to even out wash board spots.

We quickly loaded the canoe and set off.

Did you know loons have black feet?

Crossing Source Lake wasn't a long paddle.  I'd read some reports that said it could get very windy and wavy but we didn't have any problems.  The wind did pick up as we got close to the little bay where the portage was, but the waves stayed manageable.

It's here I should mention that I made one of my classic mistakes.  We were half way through the drive north when I realized I hadn't remembered to change into my Keen sport sandals.  In fact, I was wearing $5 flip flops.  So not only were we going to be doing the longest portage we had yet attempted, but I was going to be doing it without proper footwear.

The initial hill of the portage wasn't too steep, but the pack was heavy, and my feet were wet.  If you've never tried to walk up a hill in wet flip flops, let me tell you...it's not fun.  My feet kept sliding out of my shoes, I was huffing and puffing so bad I thought my chest might explode and my shoulders were killing me.  I got about 50 meters in and almost started crying, thinking there was no way I could do this portage, let alone the 920m still ahead of us.

Thankfully the trail levelled out for the most part, and even though it sucked, and my shoulders were screaming, we made it to Bruce Lake without mishap.  I did have a bit of an issue dropping the pack. It has this strap you can use that goes from the back, over top of the roll top and then clips down at the front.  We hadn't bothered to clip it on, and it got tangled around my arm.  I had that arm out of the normal carry strap, and with the extra strap hooked around my upper arm, I couldn't get the pack to shift enough to get the other arm out of it's carry strap...I had  to wait for Chris to drop the canoe and come help me, and ended up with a bruise on my arm because of it.  Did I learn my lesson and clip that extra strap into it's place?  No, but I was careful not to let it get looped onto my arm again.

Mostly, we were distracted by the fact that we could see the next portage across the lake...and it didn't look like the paddle was going to give us much of a break.

The landing at our site

We were right.  Long before we felt ready for it, we were landing the canoe and hauling our crap up another hill.  This portage was a bit more undulating, but after the initial rise on either end, it's fairly flat.  We stopped at the midway point where Chris was able to rest the canoe on a fallen tree, then we headed off again.  There were lots of big toads along the trail, and I almost stepped on a garter snake. It didn't even move, and I had to stop and make sure it wasn't actually dead.

By the time we made it to Raven Lake, my calves were cramping up and my shoulders on fire.  I think the straps need to be tightened because it felt like the pack was hanging more than sitting.  Something to look into next time.

We pushed off and went to the first campsite to check it out.  I'd read it was very steep and not very good, but we got out of the canoe and checked it out anyway.  It wasn't a horrible site, but the steep rise from the water would have been a pain for loading and unloading, as well as pumping water.  Chris liked it because he figured it would be good for swimming, but agreed we should check out the other site.  It was still pretty early in the day and I was pretty sure there wouldn't be anyone else staying on Raven Lake that night.

The sandy shallow water at the second site's put in won me over.  I'm not a dive-into-deep-water type of swimmer.  I'm a sit-in-4-inches-of-water kind of gal. (I grew up working at my grandparent's bait shop, where the customers used to like freaking me out with stories of giant muskie and trout that bit their toes off.)  The second site also had more open ground for tent site options so we decided to make it home for the night.  We set up the tent in front of the fire pit so we would have a good view.  There was a fire ban anyway, so it wasn't like we would have to worry about sparks from the fire landing on the tent.

Once the tent was up, Chris went for a swim, wading far out to find deeper water, while I sat in the sandy shallows.  He came and joined me and we spent a relaxing hour or so enjoying the quiet.  Biscuit fetched his ball a few times and smacked me with his wet tail.  All in all, a nice time.

Potatoes, stuffing, veggie burger and gravy

Dinner was a completely unhealthy but easy and cheap mix of store bought foods since I still hadn't had much time to dehydrate anything.  A package of instant mashed potatoes, half a box of Stove Top, a packet of gravy and two frozen veggie burgers.  It was filling, and tasted all right...I think.  Did I mention I was suffering with a summer cold?  I couldn't taste much of anything, but Chris and Biscuit seemed to like it.

There was a garter snake living in the alders along the shore.   It kept coming out but would take off when we came close.  After we cleaned up, we hung the food bag and went out for a paddle and he was on the sand, maybe looking for a frog for his dinner.

We paddled along the shore of the entire lake, finding a few spots that looked like maybe they used to be campsites.  There was one spot, near the other campsite, but not so close that it looked like part of the other site, where it looked like a trail.  It was wide and very distinct and we wondered if there used to be an old portage trail leading to Burnt Island Lake.  We didn't get out and investigate, the sun was setting and we decided to head back to camp.

Once back at our site, we tucked away any gear that was laying around and decided to crawl into the tent.  Since we couldn't have a fire, and the site didn't have anywhere to sit near the water, there wasn't much else to do.  I was a bit chilled, and somehow my butt had gotten wet while we were paddling around.  I realized afterwards it was because Biscuit was biting at the little whirlpools created with each of my paddle strokes, and every time he lifted his head, water would dribble out of his mouth and onto my seat.

Biscuit preparing for Chris for a wakeup call

It was a quiet night.  A few loons, a few owls and lots of bull frogs.  I was awake most of the night blowing my nose, and every time I did, Biscuit would get up and bunt me in the face.

When it started to get light out, he wanted out of the tent so I got up, grabbed the camera and wandered around the site.  There was some nice fog on the water, and the morning light was beautiful.  I really wish there had been a place to sit, or that we had brought chairs.  After taking a few pictures, I went back to bed for another hour or so.

We got up around 7:30.  It was time for coffee and pancakes...well one pancake each.  The frying pan that comes with our pot set is great for one big pancake, but not so great for a few little ones.  Chris did the cooking this time, and soon enough we were eating and cleaning up so we could head down the portage trail to Owl Lake to check it out.

The trail was pretty flat, but littered with rocks and roots that made it a slow hike (for me in my wet flip flops.  Chris was fine.)  We didn't portage the canoe over,  just walked the trail, took a few pictures and headed back.  Chris had found a trail at our site that he had followed during his initial explorations and it went pretty far, so when we got back to camp, he decided to follow it while I made use of the thunder box. (Note to anyone thinking of camping on this site...the thunder box is in plain view of the rest of the campsite, so if you aren't comfortable with your companions seeing your bare butt, maybe try the other site...)

Morning mist on Raven Lake

Turned out, the trail he followed went all the way to Owl Lake, and from the end, he could see the campsite that had been just around shore from the portage.  It was also a much easier trail, minus the few blow downs he had to bypass, and followed a creek for a bit.  It had to have been a portage at one point, but why would the park discontinue it's use and create one that was so riddled with rocks when this path was so clear and pretty?  I guess the fact it passed along the back of the campsite might be a good reason.  I watched him go by as I was preparing to use the facilities, so I guess campers might not be thrilled to have a group of camp kids go through while they were in a vulnerable state.

We spent some time watching four loons that were swimming just off shore, puttered around a bit, then decided there was no point in delaying the inevitable.

Biscuit waits patiently for pancakes

It didn't take us long to pack up and head back out onto the water.  Neither of us was looking forward to the portage and it was way hotter than it had been on our way in the day before.  We landed and I got a head start while Chris lashed the paddles to the yoke.  By the time I made it to the midway point, I was breathing so hard and I just wanted the pack off.  I ended up standing there, bent at the waist, just to ease some of the weight on my shoulders, though that wasn't doing my back any favours.  Chris came along then and says he's just going to keep going.  It should be said that the only way I could get the pack onto my shoulders was for him to lift it and then I'd slide my arms in.  If he wasn't stopping, I wasn't getting the pack onto my back again.  He took five steps then came back for a rest, thankfully, or I might have mutinied.

Once we made it to Bruce Lake, we decided to check out the campsite.  There's only one on the lake, and we couldn't see it on the way in.  It sits up on some nice rock, has a bit of a challenging climb to get your gear up, but it's a nice site, has a great bench and a nice view.  The tent pads are a bit away from the fire pit, following a little trail.  We sat on the bench and decided we would come back to it with the kids some time.

After a brief rest, we headed back out and landed at the portage back into Source Lake.  Chris had said the 540m would feel like nothing after the 920m, but he was wrong.  It still kinda sucked.   I'm pretty sure someone threw a few good sized rocks in the bottom of the pack or something.

The paddle back to the access point was nice.  It felt like we hadn't done much paddling on this trip.  I had joked about how it would be great to do more portaging and less paddling because Biscuit is not a fun dog to paddle with.  He has lots of fun...but his constant biting of the water makes it a jerky, sketchy ride for us.  Of course, as much as he loves the canoe, he loves the car more, and as soon as we got close to shore, he jumped out before we could grab his leash, and bolted.  Thankfully there were no other people around.  Chris was able to get his shoes on and go let him in, then drove down to pick up the gear and strap the canoe to the roof.

After a quick detour to Lake of Two River's Store for some snacks, we headed back south to pick the kids up and head home.

stuff left behind by previous campers

I've thought a lot about whether Raven Lake was worth the portages.  It's a small lake, and while it was pretty enough, it wasn't a super scenic spot.  It was quiet though.  We only saw a group of 3 canoes (kids from the camp on Source Lake maybe) come through, so in that respect, it was great.  I like that we did some longer portages, and while they weren't fun (are they supposed to be?) they weren't as bad as I had thought.  Some reorganizing of gear might be in order.  We take a four person tent because of the dog, but maybe if it had been just the two of us, we would have taken our little 2 person tent and saved a few pounds.

All in all, it was a good trip.  We had fun, enjoyed a quiet lake to our selves, and since we spent a good part of the drive home discussing where we might go next, I'd have to say it was a success.

Trip Log: Samuel de Champlain Provincial Park: August 21-23-2017

It's scary how fast summer can fly by.  At the end of June, when I'd get a shift that fell in the middle of our "weekend" (you don't generally get normal weekends off when you work in a restaurant) I didn't get too upset.  We still had two months worth of time to go camping, biking on trails, exploring in canoes and kayaks etc.

And here we are, almost the end of August and I look back and see just how little of that stuff we actually did, because those shifts come up often, and because car repairs always end up cropping up at the start of a week off, and because other obligations happen.

It's kind of sad because our adventuring is pretty much over for the year.  Since Chris and I work  weekends and the kids can't just skip school like they did when they were younger, we won't get much opportunity until the next long holiday.

I'm thankful though, that when we look back on the summer, the camping trips we did, were all in places we had never been before.  We saw a new Provincial park, saw parts of Algonquin we hadn't been to before, and finally got to explore a bit of the Haliburton Water Trails system, something I've been wanting to do for...well about 20 years.

This trip was kind of two trips back to back.  We had five days off, and after spending our last week of vacation fixing car issues so we could drive our "adventuring car" long distances again, we could actually go camping...the problem was, where to go?  Everywhere I looked, there would be one or two sites left, and they were pretty much all the tiny little site next to an outhouse that never gets booked except maybe on a long weekend.

Our Boler at Samuel de Champlain Park

I was getting bummed, and kind of pissed off.  Keep in mind, this was day one of our five days and we still had no idea where to go. The kids didn't want to go canoe camping, and instead wanted to relax in the Boler, Chris wasn't interested in anything along Highway 60 in Algonquin, and I wasn't keen on going a really long distance because fixed or not, the car is old and unpredictable.

We finally settled on two nights at Samuel de Champlain, then two nights at Kiosk at the North end of Algonquin.

We didn't leave the house until almost 5.  We had nothing ready, no idea what food we were taking.  Chris and I went shopping but I kind of ended up just throwing random cans of things from the pantry at home and hoped it took care of all the meals we would need.

We arrived at the park at 9:07pm and got our permit.  Then we had the fun task of navigating an unknown park in the dark, but we found our site with only one wrong turn.  The site was a pull through, or pull around I guess?  It had a U shaped entry so Chris didn't have to try backing in.  The problem was there was a stump in the entry was that was just high enough to scrape the underside of the Boler.  This wouldn't be a problem for most other trailers but the Boler sits pretty low to the ground and doesn't have a lot of clearance.  We actually broke a little chunk of the fibreglass body off...oops. Once into place though, we set up (moved food from the Boler into the trunk of the car) ate a quick dinner of wraps, then went to bed.

It was humid in the trailer that night, and Biscuit made a nuisance of himself, jumping up and down off our bed.  He was too hot when he was with us, but not comfortable on the floor.  It also started to rain, and continued to rain until just after lunch.

I woke up the next morning to take him out, and got my first look around the campsite.  It was actually quite nice.  We could see the lake, and there was a little spot across the road we could have used to launch a canoe if we'd brought them, but we hadn't since we were in such a rush to leave.  Not that it mattered, since it rained for half the day anyway, and we also didn't bother to bring rain jackets.

Once Chris got up, we set up the screen tent so we could have a dry place to cook and sit.  Rather than making potato, pepper and onion hash like I had planned, we ate dry cereal right out of the box and some other snacks. After cleaning up, we went to check out the visitor's centre.

So many neat mushrooms around our campsite

It's pretty small, but contains some interesting information on the history of the Mattawa River, the fur trade and a replica courier de bois canoe.  Next we headed to the store, hoping to get a patch for the park to add to the kids collection but they either don't sell them or they weren't available at the time, so the kids got popsicles and we headed back to our site.

Lunch was supposed to be wraps made with fresh veggies but since it was still rainy and everything was still wet under the bug shelter, we ended up making Mr. Noodles cups for the kids, and Chris and I shared a carton of green lentil curry soup I'd thrown in the food box at the last minute, with some of the garlic bread.  The soup was surprisingly good, but the carton only holds 500ml which wasn't enough really for two hungry people.

The rest of the day was spent walking around, checking out the park.  The beach in the Jingwakoki campground area was small, but looked pretty decent for swimming.  There were some swings and a few teeter-totters there as well.  You can see the other beach across the lake and it looked very nice, but unfortunately we didn't get a chance to go and check it out.

The kids finally had a chance to pull out the hammocks and the picnic table ping pong set we had bought them for Christmas, then lost before I could wrap it.  (I found it on Boxing Day, which is pretty typical I suppose.)  Bubbie and I also spent some time photographing the last few blueberries on the bushes behind our site, as well as the various interesting fungi nearby.

Sometime in the afternoon, Chris took Biscuit for a little drive out to the park store to get some ice, at which point the catalytic converter fell off the car.  He picked it up and threw it into the trunk, and we spent the whole rest of the trip laughing about it since we were pretty sure something was going to happen to the car.  Any time we attempt to go more than an hour away from home for a camping trip, we have car issues.  Thankfully, this time, it wasn't anything that could potentially strand us somewhere.

Dinner that night was spaghetti and garlic bread.  It's pretty much a camping staple for us, but the clean up always sucks.

The next morning I finally made the potato, onion and pepper hash I'd promised the kids.  It looked like it was going to be a nice day.  As we were cleaning up, we saw a group go by in a replica voyager canoe.  I wish we had been able to try it out.  It would have been a neat experience.  Next time.  The kids really liked this park and we will definitely be back.

Since it was a nice day and we wouldn't be travelling far to get to our next camping spot, we figured there was no point in rushing to pack up.  If there were people on our Kiosk site, they didn't have to leave until 2, so we decided to do a hike.  The Kag hike wasn't too far away, and was only 2.5km long.  The estimated time to do the trail was an hour and 15 minutes but we figured we could do it in less.

one of many steep sections on the Kag Trail

The trail is rated as difficult with some steep climbs on most of the information posted, but the one we happened to look at said it was moderate.  This is not a moderate level trail!  #Legday And those steep climbs?  They really are climbs.  There are sections where you are climbing what is practically a cliff, going back and forth like a goat trail.  Other times, you have to pick your way up almost with whatever tree root or rock you can find.  Chris got dragged up and down these hills, Squatch had nothing to slow him down but Bubbie and I had our cameras and it made it much more awkward to grab little trees for support.  This trip report took a while to get published, and because of that, when I was looking through the pictures, I kept going "why did I take a picture of that cliff face?" Then I realized, that was there trail...

The kids were good natured about it, but didn't hold back complaining about the trail.  Chris kept saying it was a lovely trail and they had nothing to complain about...until Biscuit dragged him down a hill and he ran into a fallen log in a very painful way.

You can barely tell it's a trail...just looks like a cliff

All of our legs were like jelly when we made it back to camp, and we were a little embarrassed that the trail took us a fair bit longer than the hour and 15 minutes estimated.  We had to rush to hook up the trailer so we could be off the site by 2.

This section of the trip was wonderful (not that Kiosk wasn't great too) and we all really liked Samuel de Champlain Provincial Park.  Our site was great, it was relatively quiet and there were enough things to do so none of us would have been bored had we been there longer than 2 nights.  It rained a fair bit that second day, and the roads were pretty muddy.  The intersection just behind our site had a huge puddle (or more accurately, a pond?) that many drivers had fun playing in as they went past.

All in all, a great trip.

Trip Log: Algonquin Provincial Park: Mew Lake, April 16-17, 2017

Easter is one of those holidays where it can be tough to get time off work, but it's also an ideal time for us to go camping because the kids get four days off from school.  Originally, I had hoped to take the whole weekend off...then it was how to manage two nights, and by the time we ended up going, we could only get one night off of work.  Sucks, but at least one night is better than not camping at all.

So, since Chris and I had to work Friday and Saturday, the kids ended up going to my parents house.  The plan was that Mum and Dad would drive them up Sunday and meet us at our site, we'd have easter dinner, and then the kids would stay and Mum and Dad would drive home.

Pine Martin - Mew Lake Campground

Since we were only going for one night, we got packed and ready to go in good time.  I think we left the house by 9:25.  We were chased down our street by a big male turkey, one of the flock (is a group of turkey's a flock?) that spent the whole winter in our little neighbourhood.  Of the five that were here, there's only the one male and one female now.  The male spent the whole winter chasing cars up and down our street.

It rained on and off the whole drive up to Algonquin, but it wasn't until we got to the West Gate that it began to get heavy.  I got out of the car to get our permit and was told they'd opened the Mew Lake gate house for the weekend so we were to get our permit there.  Mum and Dad were already there, parked at the start of  the trail by the garbage area waiting for us.  They let us know our site was empty...but it was a huge pond.  While Chris set up the inside of the  trailer for six people to sit, I walked to the bathrooms and to find the others since texts weren't getting through.  When I showed up at the parking area, they were gone, so I ran back to the comfort station, then back to the site.

The first thing the kids tell me is that they don't want to stay.  I thought they were joking. But it was chilly and wet and we couldn't actually find a place to put the trailer that didn't mean stepping out into 2 inches of water, so even though they had boots, they weren't keen on staying.  Mum and Dad weren't big on it either. As we discussed it, I was standing in the rain, getting wetter and wetter, and they all sat in the warm, dry cab of my Dad's truck.  Needless to say I gave in rather than stand there for too long.

As I was talking to them, Chris was trying to reposition the trailer onto a bit of higher ground.  He managed to succeed, sort of, and then when he went to unhook the trailer from the car, the key for the lock that he uses on the hitch snapped off, leaving us with no way to disconnect the trailer from the car.  This left us essentially stuck at the campground unless we wanted to haul the Boler with us, which we didn't.  It wasn't a big deal.  We had planned to run to Whitney and grab a few last minute things for dinner, but since it would be just Chris and I, we didn't really need extra food.  We'd have to make a run there on our way out to gas up but that was a problem for the following day.

flooded section of trail between the bridge and the rail trail

Since we were already soaked, and Biscuit was driving us nuts being cooped up in the trailer, we decided to just go for a walk.  We had our sneakers on still, and there was a good foot or two of snow on the ground in spots.  After snapping a few shots of a pine martin near the garbage area, we headed off down the trail.  The plan was to head across the air field, then cross the river at the bridge, head to the right down the railway tracks and come back via the backpacking trail and track and tower trail.

When we got to the bridge, we saw how high the water was compared to when we had paddled through in August.  We decided to explore further down the rail trail so turned to the left and continued to where the trail runs very close to the shore of Lake of Two Rivers.  Mostly this was to see how thick the ice still was, and it looked pretty solid.  We turned around and continued on to where the Highland Backpacking trail crosses, and turned down it to loop back to Mew Lake.  The solid part of the trail was only about six inches wide.  Anything on either side of that was soft and meant you would sink about 2 feet down into a few inches of icy slush. We didn't make it very far before Biscuit tugged Chris to the side and he went through the soft stuff.  Not long after that and we came to a part of the trail where the river had flooded up over, blocking our way, so we turned around and headed back to the airfield.

Now cold and hungry, we got back to camp and changed into dry socks, pants and warm boots, then Chris set about rigging up a bit of a shelter for the dutch oven.  Our Easter dinner plan had been to make beans and biscuits.  The meal usually feeds 6 with leftovers, so I had to cut back a bit in order to not have a huge pile of food go to waste.  It was yummy and very filling.

Beans and Biscuits - Yum!

Cleaning the dutch oven proved a little challenging as usual, especially since it kept drizzling on and off and I was concerned with the outside of the pot getting wet then rusting.

After dinner, we walked around the campground a bit, then headed back to camp for an early night.  We were both tired after several days of long hours at work, and our earlier hike.  Walking in snow that is solid one minute then collapses under you the next takes a lot out of a person!

Biscuit snuggled himself in between us and we had a great night's sleep.  The fireplace worked very well when it didn't have to try and combat temperatures in the -20s.

Flooded approach to the bridge over Madawaska

The next morning, we made bagels with the toaster oven like we did on our last trip.  This time we didn't have to thaw them first, which was nice.  Since we were in no real rush to get home, we decided to go back out again for another hike, this time going our usual way - head out past the garbage area and turn right onto the track and tower off shoot, then left onto the backpacking trail to the bridge.  The trail was much harder going than it had been a few weeks previous.  A lot of melting had taken place since our last trip and like the day before, we sank through several deceptively solid parts of the trail.  There were a few places where we had to build temporary bridges with downed branches because the whole trail had a creek running through it.

As we got closer to where the two trails cross, I saw that the water level was very high, as high as it had been a few years back when there was so much flooding.  And sure enough, when we turned onto the backpacking trail, we were stopped several meters from the bridge by rushing water.  The two sections of wooden platform were washed into their current position a few years ago, and were never put back into their proper place.  The water there was at least a couple feet deep.

Disappointed we turned around and headed back to camp.  With nothing left to do, we packed up and headed back to my parents house to get the kids and head home.  It was a little disappointing, having the kids back out on the trip, but sometimes it's nice to have some camping time to ourselves as well.

Trip Log: Algonquin Park: Rock Lake, May 4-6, 2015

May the Force Be With You!  I guess the Force was with us, because things fell into place for us on this trip.  We thought we were going to be delayed on departure day (May 4th) because Bubbie's school concert band was supposed to have an event all day and she couldn't miss it.  Luckily for us, something got messed up and at the last minute, it got delayed 2 weeks!  Yay!

We'd planned to eat lunch at the campsite but we were all hungry, so when we stopped at Two Rivers Store for drinks, we handed out the sandwiches/pizza buns and ate on the way.  The weather was a bit grim looking, with grey skies and the odd sprinkle of rain but we were hopeful we'd get set up before it got really wet.

We managed to get up to our campsite at around 1pm, and it was just starting to spit rain.  We put the tent trailer up by throwing a tarp over it so we could then stay dry while we raised the roof and pulled out the ends.  At one point after everything was raised, Dad realized he couldn't find the keys so he could get into the little storage area so he could get the two support bars he'd forgotten to get out at the start.  We searched everywhere and eventually started to wonder if they'd been on the roof of the trailer before we cranked it up.  Turned out they were in his back pocket the whole time.

We retreated inside to play Star Wars games to celebrate.  Mum had bought the kids Star War's Day gifts…Bubbie made a comment about not understanding the big deal, because it wasn't like Christmas.  I nearly kicked her out into the rain.

Biscuit was so excited to be there, he was driving us nuts with his need to get out and explore.  We ended up walking him around in the rain (a steady moderately heavy rain now) so we could see how many other sites were in use.  There weren't many, maybe a dozen, if that, at least in the electrical section.  Everyone was spread out, so even though Rock Lake doesn't offer the best privacy, we didn't feel crowded at all.

Mum and I started supper around 4:30.  In honour of this special day we had Bobba Fett-agetti, Endor Salad (caesar salad,) Sarlacc Bread (garlic bread) and Yoda Soda (Mountain Dew.)  For dessert we had Wookie Cookies,  and Exploding Deathstar Cookies.  Mum and Dad offered to do the dishes while Chris and I took the kids out for a paddle.

Now, this is our first time really paddling so early after the ice is out.  The lake was mostly calm, and the wind was minimal, but I still had horrible thoughts of us tipping, and kept trying to get Chris to take us closer to shore.  Chris kept us going straight down the middle of the lake.  And here's where Chris and I have our only canoe difference.  We work really well together in the canoe.  He prefers to paddle on the left, I prefer the right.  We share the load pretty evenly on portages.  We just canoe well together, but he is very much about getting to the end destination and therefore it's straight down the middle of the lake, every time.  Where as I like to go fairly close to the shore.  Not only can we maybe see wildlife, but you actually feel like you're moving, where as out in the middle of the lake it can often feel like you're expending a lot of effort for very little reward.  When we were coming back from High Falls, trying to get back to our site at Achray, paddling into the wind, it might have felt less like we were standing still if we were twenty feet closer to shore.  Just saying.    I know there are times when you are trying to make your distances, or there's a limited amount of time, but when there isn't (like this time) why can't we just explore?  Ugh!

Anyway, when we turned around, we realized the wind had picked up a bit and was now in our faces.  Not bad, but the waves were just at the point where the tops collapse, not quite white caps though.  We made it home without incident and then decided to drive West on Highway 60 and look for moose.  It was about 7:30.  We saw 2 before we even got off Rock Lake Road, and a total of 8 more that night (for a total of 10 that day.  We saw 2 just before we got to the West gate on our way into the park)  After a quick stop at Fisherman's Point for pictures, we headed back to camp.

Since the campground office closed at 4:30 we didn't get any wood, but everyone was pretty tired anyway so we just went to bed.  Our only fairly close neighbours stayed up late talking but it was pretty quiet.  Lots of spring peepers could be heard as well as the odd loon call.  Just a relaxing night in Algonquin Park.

Day 2

Breakfast time at Rock Lake

I was up pretty early, but I didn't check my phone to see the actual time.  I'd been up to go to the bathroom at around 4 and the moon was brilliant, shining on the water.  By the time it got light out, there was lots of fog on the lake.  Biscuit and I walked…a lot.  All around the camp ground, to the boat launch (a quick detour to the garbages to dispose of his morning business) then down to the non-electrical sites.  There were hardly any people there, maybe 3 sites in use?  We got back and still nobody was up, so we walked some more.  I don't think the others got up until 9:30.

Coffee was the first priority, then breakfast.  One-Eyed Buffalos, bacon, potato and pepper hash and maple baked beans (we forgot to cook the beans…again.  That can has been in my mum's camp food bin for like 3 years now.)  After cleaning up, we headed to the East gate looking for moose.  We only saw one.  Chris and I had planned to hike the portage trail into Pinetree Lake but he also wanted to do the Booth's Rock Trail again, and we wanted to go canoeing.  We opted to wait on the portage trail.  Actually we were all originally supposed to hike to Pinetree, but mum had hurt her ankle and was having enough trouble walking around the campground.

Chris and Biscuit on top of Booth's Rock

While the kids went with my parents looking for more moose, Chris and I headed back to Rock Lake to hike Booth's Rock.  There was a tour bus at the office and we thought we should get on the trail quick before a load of people headed out on it too.  Biscuit is a little unpredictable in his desire to protect us, and having to stay ahead of a bunch of people when there's that much tough up hill would have killed me.  As it was, I thought I was going to have a stroke trying to keep up with Chris.  I finally let him carry my camera bag (which he later claimed to barely notice he was carrying…it weighs like 30lbs!  Jerk.)

Time for a rest - Booth's Rock Trail

As it turned out, we only saw 2 other people on the trail, two men at the very top.  We explored the remains of the estate, and ventured a little further along the shore to check out the back country canoe campsite near the ruins.  It doesn't look like a bad site, a big fairly level spot near the fire pit, but the landing looked quite rocky.  That being said, it would probably be a good site for those very late season trips where you might wake up to an iced over lake and have to hike out.

Very glad we were going down these

Biscuit was pretty good about not dragging Chris along, until we got within sight of the car then he nearly decapitated himself pulling so hard on the leash.  He loves the car, if you couldn't guess.

We got back to camp, had a quick lunch of crackers, cheese, meat, apples, a fruit tray and leftover cookies. Mum offered to take the kids out for a little paddle, to check out the river.  While Chris was helping push them off, Biscuit, who hates water, ran right in trying to get into the canoe!  I guess he likes canoeing more than he hates being wet.

I walked the garbage down, taking Biscuit with me, and we detoured to the boat launch.  I figured we could wait for mum and the kids then drop off the bag.  When they pulled up to the little dock, Biscuit again tried to get in the boat, and when I kept him back, he retaliated by peeing on the garbage bag.  I almost got caught with it too but I managed to jump up quickly.

When we got back to camp, we relaxed while waiting for mum to return.  They'd headed out with Squatch in the middle, mum in stern and Bubbie in the bow.  I kind a figured the kids would tire easily and mum would be left paddling alone, but when they came into view we realized Bubbie was in the stern, Squatch was in the bow and Mum was in the middle getting a free ride!

Mum getting a free ride

After that we didn't leave camp until it was time to go home.  The kids pretty much just paddled on their own.  Mum had showed them how to j-stroke and do some other things.  They stayed close to shore but they were out there almost all night except for a break for dinner  and to let Chris take biscuit for a little paddle.

Dinner tonight was in honour of Cinqo de Mayo.  Tacos, quesadillas, southwest salad, and two types of tex-mex rice.  We were all stuffed afterward…okay, the kids still had room in their dessert stomach (kids have a second stomach like cows do…but kids use theirs for desserts)  We had a fire going so they toasted marshmallows, and tried toasting strawberries dipped in marshmallow fluff.  It worked out okay, not as pretty as the pictures online, but they tasted good.

As we made dinner, we kept seeing this odd group of canoes.  Two people would paddle from the non-electrical section, to the river and then return a few minutes later with 2 canoes each pulling another canoe, so four in total.  This happened 3 or 4 times.  We finally realized that when Chris and I came back from our hike earlier and saw lots and lots of tents in the non-electrical section, it was probably a school group and they would likely be departing from there for a canoe trip, hence bringing the canoes to the campground rather than hauling all the group with their gear (and no cars) to the boat launch.  They were a bit rowdy, but not bad.  We heard a few excited shouts as we sat around the fire that night but if it was a school group, I'm actually glad to know they were so excited to be there.  And I admit, I was really jealous.  Why didn't our high school have an outers club or wilderness skills class when I was a teen?  My mum did in high school, and the school our kids will be going to has things like that.  Ugh!

Mum had brought the game Ultimate Werewolf: One Night.  The kids love this game, and were really excited to play, so after the fire was put out, everyone else played while I lay down with Biscuit.  He was pretty wiped out from all the hiking and walking around the camp ground he'd done.  Squatch had also run around the campground roads with him quite a bit, and while we'd gone looking for moose, he ran from side to side in the back seat, popping his head out the window on each side for a minute. (As I'm typing this, he's passed out on the couch.)

While mum and the kids were waiting for us to go in to play Werewolf, mum gave the kids each a scratch ticket.  We always play a "how many moose do you think we'll see" game when we go to Algonquin, and Bubbie won the first day's game. The ticket was her prize.  She won $75!  While Chris and I had been hiking, they'd stopped at Tea Lake Dam for snacks, and a bird had pooped on her hand…you know how people say that's supposed to be good luck?  Apparently it's true.  Squatch was not impressed.

We all slept better the second night, and yet again I got up before everyone else.  Biscuit and I walked some more, but this time, he put is paw down after an hour or so and just sat in the middle of the road, so we headed back to camp and sat for a while.  He desperately wanted back in the trailer to sleep but I didn't want to wake everyone up.  Mum got up shortly after that so I let Biscuit have his way, and mum and I took the canoe out for a paddle.  We checked out some of the cottages on Rock Lake, went up the river but detoured off to where the river passed right by the campground near the outhouses.  We tried to go further but there was a beaver dam and neither of us felt like getting our feet wet when the water was so cold, so we headed back.

Dad had the coffee on by then, and Chris, Biscuit and the kids had walked down to the boat launch hoping to see us but we hadn't gone that far.  We kept breakfast simple, just bagels and coffee/hot chocolate.

While me and mum and dad were packing up, The kids took Biscuit for a little paddle, then brought him back and went out alone again.  Chris took the GoPro and filmed them, when they explored the river section mum and I had gone to earlier.

Nobody wanted to leave.  Other than a bit of rain the first day, we'd had a great trip, but as always it was far too short.

Trip Log: Algonquin Park - Canisbay Campground, October 10-13, 2014

Thanksgiving Dinner in the Dutch Oven

Thanksgiving in Algonquin!  This was our second time so in my mind that means a precedent has been set, and from now on that's how we celebrate Thanksgiving.

We had been undecided on if we'd be going or not, but after our trip two weeks ago, Mum and I and the kids had pretty much decided yes, we'd be going.  Dad wasn't so sure, but the promise of turkey lured him in.  So since we didn't decide until late, there were no sites available.  I kept my eye out a few times a day for cancellations and we lucked out and got a decent one at Canisbay.  On the map, it looked like it backed onto the area with the comfort station.  In reality, we had to follow a trail through the back of the site then go down the road a bit, but it was still pretty close incase of a late night trip.

We arrived fairly early, at least Dad and I did.  Mum and the kids arrived a little later in her car since they had to pick up a few last minute groceries.  We got our permit and were mostly done setting the trailer up before the others arrived (Chris wouldn't be arriving until Saturday.)

It was a bit chilly and we were a little worried we wouldn't be warm at night but we had lots of blankets.  Supper was spaghetti with ceaser salad.  We'd made the sauce at home and just had to heat it up.  The dogs, especially my parent's dog, Lucky, love spaghetti and they mooched like crazy while we ate.  There was only enough left over for Lucky which was fine.  He always gets a bit when mum and dad make it at home, and Biscuit doesn't really so he wasn't going to be too upset.

After dinner, I was on the way back from the comfort station when I saw a guy walk into the site beside us.  I didn't recognize him as one of the people there, but he said hi as if he knew them so I didn't think much of it.  He walked to the back of the trailer went behind it and then cut through to our site and walked right through it too.  It was really weird.  At first  I thought maybe he was lost or drunk or something, trying to find his own site in the dark, but I also wondered if maybe he was just one of those people that don't get that you don't walk through someone else's site as a short cut.  This has happened a lot, but never had we seen someone cut through multiple sites like that.

A few minutes later I went to the comfort station laundry room to fill up the wash basin (not doing dishes there, just getting hot water.) and there was someone standing halfway down the little trail into our site.  I asked if I could help him and he politely asked to borrow a lighter.  I gave him mine, not at all convinced I'd get it back but we had lots and it was just a dollar store one anyway.

Evening on Canisbay Lake

Dad and I did up the dishes then decided to go down to the beach and see if we could get any decent night shots.  The moon behind the clouds gave us some interesting shots, but it was pretty cold, and when a bit of a breeze kicked up, it got too chilly to be messing around with metal tripods, so we headed back to camp.

Sleep was surprisingly comfortable.  We had the trailer's furnace set fairly low, and left a small electric space heater going all night.  The furnace only cut in occasionally, and the electric heater kept the temperature from dropping too rapidly. The kids and I each had our regular summer sleeping bags with polar fleece liners, then they had a comforter and I had Chris's sleeping bag open like a blanket. Before we went to the beach, I had sent a text to Chris to bring more blankets when he came up, but we didn't really need them.  At one point I was too hot and had to kick off the extra sleeping bag.  Biscuit helped keep us warm too.

The young man who had borrowed my lighter gave it back that morning.  Then I heard him asking people if they had jumper cables because his battery had died.  We are pretty sure they slept in their car that night because it was cold.  They got their boost and headed out pretty quickly, and not long after, another group of young people showed up.  Two guys got out and set up the tents while the girls (their girl friends?) sat in the car.

And here's where I have to have a mini-rant.  What's up with people carrying make up bags to camp that are bigger and heavier than a day pack?  Every time we went to the bathroom there'd be five or six young women touching up their make up, washing their faces (and doing some weird cheek slapping thing for a minute at a time)  One girl loaded on a bunch of creams and berry scented perfume at about 10pm and we kept thinking a bear would smell them and come running.  Trying to brush our teeth at night was a lengthy and sort of embarrassing procedure.  Lengthy because we had to wait forever for a sink to become available (cause God forbid your mascara not be perfect for hanging out with your boyfriend in the pitch dark) and embarrassing because there we were with Ziploc freezer bags holding nothing but a toothbrush and toothpaste.  Anyway, I don't get it, but I'm not in my twenties trying to impress a guy, so what do I know.  I sort of figured it would be more impressive to a guy to be unafraid of getting dirty and back to nature, but then I didn't grow up in a city either.

Rant over!

Dad had forgotten to bring his pills, so he and Mum did a quick run home.  The kids and I had a quick breakfast and then spent the morning walking around with the dog.  Biscuit is pretty high energy (make that super high energy) and a lot of walking means he's not a spaz in the trailer.

When mum and dad got back, we had some wraps and tortellini soup (forgot to add the beans) for lunch, then mum stayed with the dogs while the rest of us went out to see if we could find some good photo ops.  In all honesty, there wasn't much.  The sky was a dull grey, the trails were really busy, and it was colder than the day before with a bit of a breeze as well.  We drove to Opeongo, then went out to Whitney to buy some dry(ish) wood.  On the way back we stopped at Two River's Store for ice cream.  It was packed!  Considering the store closes as of Thanksgiving Monday, we were worried there wouldn't be much ice cream flavours to choose from, but there was lots.

Since Chris was supposed to be arriving today, but we had no idea what time, we held off on making dinner.  I figured he'd get there around 9pm, but it ended up being closer to ten.  We ended up eating at around 7.  Dinner that night was tex mex tortilla lasagna.  I forgot to add the baby chard and kale to the beans and peppers when I was making the sauce, but it was yummy.  We had Chipotle BBQ Chop Chop salad with it then pumpkin pie for dessert.

Despite the cold, we sat around the fire a bit that night.  We hadn't bothered with a fire the night before, since Dad and I had gone to take pictures and when we got back squatch was asleep.  He hadn't brushed his teeth and it was all we could do to get him to move out of my mum's bed to his own sleeping bag.  This night, he couldn't find his toothbrush.  (I later found it at the bottom of my sleeping bag.)

Sunday morning was a bit warmer (my nostrils didn't freeze together) when I got up and took Biscuit for a walk.  When I got back, we started breakfast.  The plan for the day was to have a big breakfast so we could skip lunch because it was Turkey Dinner Day!  We had potato and pepper hash, pea meal bacon and french toast.  Mum and dad got to try out the griddle we got them for their Coleman BBQ and it worked really well, especially for the french toast.  It doesn't have much of a lip around the edge so it was a little touch and go when trying to stir up the hash, but all in all, it worked great.

Waterfall on the Madawaska River

After dishes were done, we thought we'd go do the Whiskey Rapids trail.  It was apparently open, and we'd been dying to find out how much the trail had changed after last spring's high water.  Unfortunately, the trail was really packed and with Biscuit being a bit unpredictable around people lately, we decided not to risk it.  Instead, we drove to Mew Lake and walked to the water fall.  No people on the trail and only a few at the falls themselves made for a much less stressful hike.  We took some pictures, saw lots and lots of wolf scat, and then headed to the Two River's Store for ice cream.

Mum and dad had gone for a drive to the Visitor's Centre so mum could email work.  We ended up getting back to the campground at the exact same time.  Now it was time to start cooking dinner.  It was about 1pm and we had a turkey to roast.

The turkey was still a little frozen inside, and unfortunately wouldn't fit perfectly even in our biggest (14") dutch oven so we covered it in foil then squished the lid on as best as we could.  Once the bird was cooking, we got started on the sides.  Foil wrapped carrots, foil wrapped parsnip, foil wrapped brussels sprouts (yum!) as well as potatoes and turnip.

After an hour we started to think maybe the briquets would take too long.  Dad had a fire going and for once it was a decent fire (yay for good wood) so we piled all the briquets on top of the lid then put the dutch oven onto the fire.

Now there was nothing left to do but wait.  The kids buried Chris in leaves, Biscuit caught his tail on fire (well, it singed the tip of the hair...it wasn't on fire I guess) and we got to sit and enjoy the decent weather.

Eventually, the turkey was done.  The top got burned where it had been smooshed against the lid, but then again, we'd put about 30 briquets on the top so it's not surprising.  But the insides were nice and juicy.  We got ready to take everything inside and then realized Chris hadn't brought the two boxes of Stove Top Stuffing from the counter.  To save space in the car, we left all the thanksgiving dinner stuff at home for him to bring up, and I'd left him a list...it only had like 5 things on it but I guess in his rush to get going, he forgot.  We made fun of him all night for ruining thanksgiving.  We also had coleslaw and cranberry sauce and gravy.  Awesome dinner and there was even dessert...apple spice dump cake.

While we ate, we talked about how we sort of felt guilty for skipping out on the big dinners we'd been invited to, but all agreed that it was worth it to enjoy Thanksgiving dinner in a place we all loved so much.

After dinner, we cleaned up.  There wasn't much in the way of dishes since a lot had been cooked in foil and we'd used paper plates.  We sat around the fire for a while then went to bed.

For our last morning, we had one eyed buffalos as well as fried potatoes made from the left over potatoes from dinner.  We didn't hang around long mostly because the camp ground closed  at 2 and we'd been told it would be appreciated by the staff if all the campers left by then.  Mum took the kids home with her, while dad, Chris and I took the trailer down.  Dad drove home with his dog, while Chris and I had Biscuit with us.

Such a great weekend.  A lot of people left on Sunday probably so as to be home for family dinners, so it was really quiet for our last night.  We ended up with a lot of left over turkey.  Last year, we simply took a breast and 2 drumsticks and it was enough for all of us, but I had 3 frozen turkeys in my freezer that I wanted out of there.

It was also interesting to note the number of people who simply weren't prepared for the weather.  The young man who borrowed the lighter, the group of four who set up on the same site next, and at least 2 other groups of people in their early twenties all seemed to have trouble.  Most of them seemed to have their cars running all night, possibly they all slept in their cars.  I felt really bad for them all.  On one hand it was a learning experience, and maybe next time they'll have more of an idea of what to expect when fall camping, on the other hand, the experience might have soured them toward camping all together.