So we took a vacation and made it back safely. It included two countries, two states and 1597 miles of driving. Read more for a full trip report.
Pictures are available.
Map of our Travels
We left Thursday afternoon and headed to New York. We stopped in Hemlock, NY and did a test paddle at Hemlock Canoes. All we could say is “we need to start saving.” The test paddle was on Canidace Lake and we were amazed that there were no houses surrounding the lake. Dave Curtis told us that the City of Rochester bought up all the property around Canadice and Hemlock Lakes to use them as a reservoir. Hopefully we will pick up a Hemlock Kestrel and Peregrine in the near future. We liked Canadice lake so much that we spent the night nearby and paddled Hemlock lake the next morning.
After a morning paddle we headed down to Elmira, NY to visit some friends of my in-laws. Their daughter has a wine shop and hung out there for a while and then went to lunch.
After a late lunch we headed to Saratoga Springs to visit Anna, Phil, and Lil. We spent four nights there and did a lot of hanging out. We walked around town and saw the sights. We also went to Moreau Lake State Park with a picnic lunch and the canoes. It was a ton of fun Eli got to swim in a lake for the first time and he is a fan.
Wednesday morning we left NY and headed to Kawartha Highlands Provincial Park which is brand new so it has the advantage of being next to free, but has very little info about it. The only palace I have been able to find a map with campsites marked is on a board at the marina we put in at. Anyway we got to the marina at about 5:30pm and checked in it. We were planning on heading to compass lake. We were headed into the wind which slowed progress and we had a few instances of Eli demanding attention so sometimes we only had one person paddling at a time, which was expected. There are no portages marked on any of the available maps so we weren't sure if we would have to portage into Compass lake or if the stream would take is though. We got to the stream that leads from Loucks Lake to Compass and there was a portage. We decided to turn aroun and stay on a nice campsite on Loucks. It was getting late and we didn't have much sunlight left. I quickly learned that when you have kids you need to set up camp early. Eli is at the age where he can't walk and he puts everything in his mouth, so one person had to be on constant Eli duty. We did put him in the canoe (it works well as a pack and play), but that will only last so long.
For those of you who have never camped in bear country you have to hang your “smellables” in a bear bag. Smellables are anything that smells delicious or interesting. There are varied levels of intensity about this some people hang batteries because they have a distinct smell. With a baby everything ends up covered with food so we had to include all of our daytime clothes as well as Eli's backpack and PFD. As I was throwing the ropes for the bear bag I heard a rustling between me and camp and then heard a growl-ish noise. I didn't think it sounded like a bear, but I was still cautious (and a bit freaked out with the possibility of a bear between me and my wife and child). I decided to get the ropes hung and kept at it. Eventually the “bear” ended up being a huge raccoon. As soon as it got dark it was like someone turned the mosquitoes on. We ended up eating dinner under our (homemade and brand new) screened in tarp in the dark and then had to hustle to get dished cleaned and in the bear bag (which is a pain to hang with one person)
We slept well and the morning was wonderful. We decided to head out that afternoon and that we were having a great time, but camping with just the two of us and Eli at this stage was hard and started teething hard a couple days before we started camping. So we had breakfast packed everything up and decided to leave most of the gear and just take lunch with us to Compass Lake and then head back to the car. So we hoisted the bearbag again and took a small pack on the two portages into Compass Lake where we had a great lunch. We saw a group of what looked to be Scouts heading our way so we hightailed it to beat them through the portages. I picked up the packs and Bridgit did a diaper change and we were on our way back to the car with the wind at our backs.
We knew it had been a good trip when we were sad to see the car and know we were done, but as we left the marina raindrops hit the windshield and then it started pouring. It must have been providence.
We headed South to Petroglyphs Provincial Park. It was amazing to be in such a spiritually significant place. The rocks contain stories that are still used for teaching. Eli was enormously happy and giggling as we walked, but as soon as we got to the rock he as silent. They have wood blocks with replicas of some of the glyphs and we made a couple rubbings. The visitor center there had really amazing information about the glyphs and the spirituality that use them.
We then headed to Peterborough, ON and found a hotel room and had really bad Chinese food (Bridgit isn't allowed to pick anymore). In the morning we went to the Canadian Canoe Museum and it was amazing. They say it takes a hour or two to go through the museum, but we got there a few minutes after it opened at 10am and didn't leave until 2pm. They have so many canoes from dugouts to birchbark to wood, to wood and canvass. They are all so beautiful. They even have Bill Mason's red canoe. Everyone at the museum was amazing and friendly. We saw someone working on building a canoe in the shop that is in one corner and we looked through the doors. He saw us and stopped what he was doing and came out to talk to us for a while. He was building the next canoe to be raffled off (we talked to Jeremy, the one on the left). We will have to go back again.
After the Canoe Museum we grabbed some food and headed home. We had a great time and got some valuable experience traveling with Eli.
