Itchin' To Travel

The Blue Jays are playing tonight down by the lake with the Dome open - the second-earliest date this has happened in any season since they moved there in 1989. (For trivia nuts - like me - the earliest was April 16, 2002. Thanks to @ShiDavidi for the information.) This is getting me excited for the prospect of getting out of town this spring and summer for camping, day trips, visits to see Sarah's mom in the Ottawa Valley and, of course, whatever long road trip we decide on (most likely it will be Kenora as usual, which is fine with me).

This, in turn, caused me to look back through some pictures I had taken on these trips over the past few years (at least the years I owned a digital camera!) and I am going to post a couple of my favourites here. Most (except the last two) may be found on my Flickr photostream in case you're not "satisfied" with the samples here.

"What are you lookin' at?"

There is a man-made pond in the back of Sarah's mom's home in Lefaivre which was in need of some repairs last summer. Sarah is the handyperson in our relationship so while she helped her mom around the pond's edge I took some pictures of the myriad frogs who call this watering hole their home. This is my favourite; my son's favourite is this one, so I blew it up and framed it for him for Christmas. I love these frogs; I make sure to visit and chat with them every time we are at la Maison Fortier.

Our two beautiful lead dogs on our Haliburton dogsled adventure

Several years ago I changed jobs in February so I worked it out that I had a week off "between engagements". Sarah and I took advantage of this time off and booked a cottage near Minden, ON for a few days. The highlight of our trip was a dogsled adventure with Winterdance Adventures and these two beauties were our leads. If memory serves (I can't believe this isn't in the caption of that picture) their two names are Rocky (the male, dark grey) and Winisk. It was an absolutely perfect day that neither of us has ever forgotten. Unless you count the names of the dogs, that is.

Sarah in a trance on Lake of the Woods, Kenora

This is Sarah, blissed out while fishing on gorgeous Lake of the Woods in Kenora, ON. If you've ever been there, you can totally appreciate how she feels. We try to get out there at least every other summer, usually around the time of Harbourfest on the August long weekend. We occasionally fly into Winnipeg and her dad picks us up there, but most of the time we like to drive there and back because Day 2 of that drive takes us along the North Shore of Lake Superior, which looks like this:

Kakabeka Falls, near Thunder Bay

Pancake Bay Provincial Park, near Sault Ste. Marie

And this---->

 

"Sleeping Giant", near Thunder Bay

<---- And this.












I think you can see my point.

There are more pictures I want to share but if I upload them all at once then there's less reason for you to visit again. I'll post some more vacation treasures soon.