It’s a bit like having a magic portal when ‘going to the cottage’ requires no packing or travel, just a determination and discipline to embrace our home as we would a rental and ‘not do’!
A dear UK friend asked us what made us think to do this but, in truth, I know few people who live in this amazing area we call our home who regularly choose to go away during the summer. Instead, we head for the water and move lazily from hammock to gazebo or fire pit!
Paul in Tin Lizzie 
Fire pit 
Kayaking on Loughborough Lake 
Hammock time 
Enjoying the Gazebo at dusk
We kayaked on Loughborough Lake, a 20-minute drive to the dock at Battersea; at times it felt almost like wilderness and at others what we term rural suburbia but always beautiful, blessed by loons and herons and so quiet! It was lucky that Paul snapped his paddle before we set out and even luckier to be able to get a new one just 12 minutes’ drive away.
Water Hyacinths 
Heading back to the dock at Battersea 
On Loughborough Lake 
Heron – on Loughborough Lake 
Loons – on Loughborough Lake
We explored the south end of Dog Lake in our underpowered metal tub, Tin Lizzie, running out of fuel just at the tip of Carrying Place – we paddled over to a neighbour who kindly ran us up the road to fetch the extra fuel.
Older home on Dog Lake 
Boulder on Dog Lake 
On Dog Lake 
Swans on Dog Lake 
Tin Lizzie
These minor adventures are the true stuff of Canadian cottage time!
We learned more about the origins and build of our house over a cream tea here with the original owners and about the past and renovation of the beautiful Arts and Crafts home on Beaupre Island, truly a piece of living history.
We ate out a couple of times (at the Holiday Country Manor and the Opinicon Pub – both in local villages), just enough to feel we were ‘away’, with simple cottage BBQs and salads the rest of the time.
Holiday Country Manor – Porch Sessions 
Holiday Country Manor – baked brie 
Holiday Country Manor -Blackened Mahi Mahi 
Holiday Country Manor – a really good burger! 
Mojito at the Opinicon Pub 
Music at the Opinicon
And we were blessed with 10 days of probably the best weather this summer so far – golden and hot without being suffocating.
Mostly what stays with me is time to just sit and soak up the sights and sounds, the delight of being distracted from my book by the whirring wings and peeping of the hummingbirds and the orange flashes of the Monarch butterflies, and the sense quiet companionship – with Paul and with all that is.
It was so tempting just to ‘stay at the cottage’ . . .
These are wonderful impressions Gina. I really like the photos with captions.
Thanks Bob! Yes, I think captioning can add an interesting dimension to ‘storytelling’ and like the way WordPress is now displaying these.