Honey Harbour sunsets

A week at Aimee and Greg's cottage starts with a 6 hour drive with stops at Tims and Costco.

A phone call brings Aimee bombing to the dock on shore to pick me (and my stuff) up.

I arrive in hot, still, weather and we spend a lot of time in the water and sympathizing with Greg who is building a gazebo. They have been through 3 canvas gazebos and have decided a real one would be less trouble in the long run.

Nearly done and it will be so much better than the canvas ones.

I have been lucky to be coming up to this cottage for years and one of the high points is watching the Osprey's feed their young and teach them to fly. Two years ago there was a huge storm while George and I were visiting. It blew away the Osprey nest and the young birds. Last year we watched one small, weak, baby being fed and we wondered whether it would survive the trip south.

This year: An early tragedy. A storm in June blew away the nest and eggs. Occasionally
the Ospreys come back and fly around the nest but that is happening less and less frequently.

Aimee and I try to get out to the dock for sunset (sometimes with a glass of wine)

The sky cooperated on my first evening.

Also the second evening.

This is not photoshopped. The colours were intense with gold lining.

And on the other side of the island the moon was coming up.

Long Point - another project and the first monarch.

I have a number of pieces of furniture that are showing their age. Some are from George's Mum's home, one from my Grandfather and a big project from a garage sale this spring.

This weekend I tackled this little bedside table. It has two drop leaves on the sides that weren't
in too bad shape but the main table part was looking pretty rough. This picture shows what it looked
like half done. I had started to stain the left hand side after giving the whole thing a rough sand.

Bob and Helen, next door, had suggested I try this product for the big garage sale project but it
couldn't tackle the water marks (nor could the gel stripper for that matter) but it worked
nicely on the little table.

This is what it looked like when finished and back in the spare bedroom.

In between working on that table, I glued a few places that needed to be secured on the garage sale table, glued a couple of stoppers to the underside to stop the legs when folding out for the leaves and tried the gel stripper. It went on OK, bubbled as the directions indicated it would but when I scraped it off it really hadn't taken much of the finish off and boy was it messy, smelly and started to burn my hand right through the towel I was holding to catch the scraped remains. I wont be using that product again and will try sanding next.

When we first bought this property, 15 years ago, we saw monarchs frequently. Last year I don't think I even saw one.
The Long Point Rate Payers Association distributed plants this spring to try and attract monarchs and provide them
with a food source. I got some but already had milkweed growing on the property. Today I saw a monarch on that
milkweed. Hopefully the sign of more to come.

Name of a sail boat seen at Toronto Island.

A tourist in Toronto

I have always been a little uncomfortable on the transit system in Toronto. I don't know why. I'm more comfortable on the Paris Metro and buses or London's or Barcelona's for that matter. I think it is because I am not a tourist in Toronto and should know my way around. After all it's all in English and I have a general sense of the layout of the city. Anyway I decided to try and treat Toronto as if I was a tourist when Chris asked me to come into Toronto and check out wedding venues. I opted not to drive due to the anticipated PanAm Games traffic.

I drove to Aldershot and took the Go Train in to Exhibition. Chris met me there.

Next it was a streetcar to the waterfront.

This woman's job is to use the metal bar to change the switch on the track depending on
which route the streetcar is taking. Seems a little antiquated.

We ate on the waterfront and stopped in at a couple of the hotels to get information about group rates.

Along the way I was a tourist, taking pictures of the animal sculptures outside Paws Place
which Chris described as an "events facility for pets".

Next stop the ferry terminal with it's memorial to Jack Layton.

A fluffy puppy waiting patiently for the ferry.

Like Chris, I'm a sucker for the skyline.

From the ferry dock we walked out of the crowds and through the residential area of Algonquin
Island, to the the Algonquin Island Clubhouse.

Chris was right. The view was impressive.

Across Wards Island for a glass of wine and shared chocolate mint truffle cake at a lovely
patio

and then back on the ferry.

One of the things we like to do when I'm in the city as get a mani-pedi. This entailed another streetcar
(this one was one of the new ones), the subway and a bus. We were pretty late by this time so Chris
found a CAR2GO near the salon and drove me down to my Go station in a little Smart Car.

So there you have it, my day in transportation: Car, Go Train, Streetcar, Ferry, Streetcar, Subway, Bus, CAR2GO, Go Train. Car. - Whew.

The evidence of  the PanAm Games was everywhere, not just in the decorated ferry, but I rode the Go Train
with a volunteer and heard about her experiences, the blue and orange signs were everywhere and there were
also extra information people at the stations and near the venues.

It was a good job all that help was there because I still found the signage in the stations and terminals to
be minimal and confusing. The automatic ticket machine wouldn't accept my credit card so I had to walk quite a way to get a person in the ticket office. Luckily Chris had bought me a day pass so I just had to show that, after I met up with her, but she had her monthly pass on her phone and the turnstiles don't accept that yet (again, she had to find a person to show it to)

Fun day anyway. I got a better sense of some of the plans Chris and Jason have for their wedding and Toronto has lots for a tourist to see.

Babies and Blueberries

Last weekend was very busy. In total 14 adults and 3 babies were in an out of my house over a 4 day period. Luckily not all at the same time and not everyone slept over. Aimee and Avery are back in Ontario for a visit and I hosted her family which included her brother and partner (and son, Nolan, aged 8 months) and her sister and husband (and daughter, Jasmine, aged 2 months).

Nolan. Rasta was really not impressed and spent most of the time as far away as he could:
on the top bunk!

All 3 babies were very good but it helped that there were abundant arms to hold them
(and rock them and walk them and feed them).

Jasmine having some bathing suit time with Aimee.

Avery is just starting on solid foods, with some trepidation.

Maybe more than "some".

That's more like it.

The only good thing about babies visiting; the basket under the stroller

I have to admit, I was pretty tired after the weekend but since then the blueberry picking season has started. I have picked twice this week.

So far I've picked 10 quarts

and I'm in the process of washing and freezing them for winter smoothies.

Long Point - Home from cruising and on to projects.

We stayed an extra day in Erie due to strong winds from the wrong direction. When we finally did set out, it was on to a dead calm lake with a bit of drizzle. Well Lake Erie was just playing with us. On the trip back we had fog, torrential rain, strong winds, standing waves at The Point that Zatarra had to climb and then fall down the other side and finally coming in to Port Dover, sun and a gentle breeze. The fog was a little disconcerting when we were crossing the shipping channel and luckily we spotted a Laker when we had turned downwind to allow Sharon some respite in the galley, so she could cook soup on the gimbaled stove.

As there had been plenty of rain while I was away I returned to a vegetable
garden gone a bit wild. The tomato plant was nearly as high as the pole bean trellis.

There was a distinct battle going on between the tomatoes, green peppers and bush beans and
the basil and beets were losing out.

After some weeding, both in the vegetable garden and the flower beds, I decided to tackle some projects.

This is an old drawer that I picked up a few months ago. I forgot to take a "before"
picture but it had obviously been used in a workshop, lots of slivers and paint splatters.

I sanded it down (rough and then fine), stained it (pecan) , put on a couple
of coats of verathane and painted the handles with black rust paint.

It fits perfectly in the narrow space between the bunk bed and the wall and is just big
enough for a lamp, kleenex box and a book.

Whenever I am working anywhere near the bunk beds Rasta has to crouch on the top
one and play at being a tiger in a cage, swiping at me at every opportunity. 

Next project: a kayak dolly.

I found it hard work dragging the kayak through the sand to the water and its
not good for the kayak. Bob, next door, and I adapted Georges golf bag carrier.

We cut off the piece of metal that supported the bag at the bottom and bent the arms, top and bottom,
that held the bag, then attached bungee cords. 

I tried it out yesterday as it was a lovely still day. I can drag it by the kayak handles. It is still not easy (but easier) as the wheels are not ideal for moving in sand.

These 2 baby blue jays have been around my property for the last couple of days. They
can't really fly yet, just managing to flutter up on to bushes, the vegetable garden or the fence.
The parents have been very noisy and aggressive, protecting them. 

Rasta is not keen on the heat and tends to stretch out rather than his usual position of
curled up with his paws tucked under. He seems to prefer the kitchen vinyl to the ceramic (?).

When Two does this Chris calls it "sausaging".

Zatarra Cruise - return to Erie

We left Ashtabula in a nice brisk wind, both sails up and whipping along for all of 10 minutes then the wind dropped and we were motoring.

There were a lot of sport fishing boats out on the lake and a few transients,
like us.

By the time the wind picked up a little it was dead ahead of us and in the spinnaker of this boat
going in the opposite direction.

Finally, our first way point, the Presquile lighthouse.

Afternoon coffee.

Heron to greet us at the channel.

We just got docked at the Erie Yacht Club when Rhapsody slipped into the dock beside us.
We invited John and Kathy and their daughter and future son in law for a celebratory drink.
 The engagement occurred on the trip over the lake from Port Dover. 

Looking at more boat names I realized that most of the cutsey names were on power boats (like "Knot at Home" and "San Knot Ra" - with a hat like Frank). A poster in the club house advertised a wooden boat race in September and I realized how many wooden boats there were at EYC.

And of course the beautiful two master that I have taken pictures of in the Interclub:
Dreamer.

I went over to the new community clubhouse to take pictures of the sailing school and my camera
battery died. There will be no more pictures until I get home.