Wasaga Beach visit one

After leaving Kingston we headed out to Wasga Beach with one stop planned in Trenton to visit an old friend. However I didn't realize how short of a drive it was from Kingston to Eric's so by the time I left him a message saying we were on our way, to the time we arrived...we missed him :( About 45 minutes past Trenton, Eric called after returning home and we decided we would try to get together later in our Ontario visit.

Sorry to have missed you Eric but I am positive we will find a way to get together soon to catch up. (Eric lived 3 houses down from where I grew up in Torbrook Mines and other then good old facebook we haven't seen eachother since grade 6!)

Off we continued to Wasaga Beach to visit my dad. Dad has been in Ontario for many years but in December he moved from Peterborough to Wasaga Beach.

My Dad and step mom Bev

We of course spent time at the beach. Ian has finally proved his point to me. The lakes here in Ontario are so much warmer then in BC. Our lakes in BC are beautiful, usually surrounded by gorgeous mountains...and all glacier fed and therefore freezing!

Dad and Aayla wading in

A few years ago Bev found her son (whom the dad had abducted when he was little) and instantly had 2 beautiful grandchildren...MaKayla and Chloe who just happened to be visiting when we arrived and are staying for a week or so.

Chloe, Aayla, MaKayla and Sierra having fun at the beach

Sierra, Chloe and MaKayla surfing while Ian and Rob keep a look out...
either on the kids or at girls going by ;) who knows

Aayla wanting to try out her surf board like the big girls

MaKayla and Aayla...they were instantly the best of friends

We spent a couple of days here catching up and spending time at the beach. We will use Wasaga Beach as our homebase and will come and go from here to visit other family, friends and look for land near the Muskoka's while we are in Ontario.

This past week we have traveled to Barrie to visit Ian's brother Mark for the night.

Sierra trying to rollerskate with a little help from Daddy and Uncle Mark

Mark and Corey have some vacation time this week (and also they are kidless this week) so the next day they came to visit us at Wasaga Beach along with Ed and Heather (Ed was the master of ceremonies at our wedding and Ian is good friends with Heather from highschool) and we had a great day together at the beach.


Aayla making a sandcastle in Auntie Corey's hand :)



Aayla's the queen of her castle

Sierra having a blast on the turtle with daddy while Uncle Mark chases her

I am so impressed with how well Aayla is now doing in the water

Daddy and Sierra relaxing and watching Aayla swim

Whoooooaaaaaa! Surfing Aayla

Sierra and Ed hanging out on Mr Turtle

Ed taking Mattea and Sierra for a ride on Mr Turtle

Heather and Nella

We are still trying to figure out who had more fun out there...the girls or Ed



Cheese Nella!



Cheese Aayla











Aayla is worn out from a long day at the beach



Uncle Mark is burying Sierra

 Uncle Mark playing a trick on Sierra...everytime she went to sit down, he'd pull the chair and she'd fall...gotta love uncles!   :)

Mark made up for it...he pulled Sierra around the beach spelling her name
and then of course Aayla needed a turn too!

Look mom we spelled my name

We also spent time this week looking at some acerage. There was one I liked with a river but we walked the wrong way because we came to an abandoned house that wasn't on the property listing so the realator will look into it further and we will so see it again.

We saw a couple other ones we liked as well. One with a seasonal pond and rock outcrops, but not really any area to make into a pasture or hay field easily.



This grassy area is a big pond in the spring
but gradually dries up over the summer



Sierra the explorer trecking through the ferns

Mr Toad

Aayla rock climbing

And another very thickly wooded 97 acres.

Indian Smoke Pipes

A tiny little tree frog

 Which across the main road there was another 44 acres with this bit of cleared land and a lake made on it so we got to envision what the land could look like with a lot of work.

When we got back to dad's after seeing the properties I quickly put Aayla to work stacking wood...she might as well get used to it :)

 When her stacking wood chores were done she got to spend some time playing with MaKayla :)

Tomorrow we head to Orangeville for a few days to see Ed and Heather and then we are off to London to go camping with them for the long weekend. Hopefully we will get to see Jay and Liz tomorrow too. Next week after camping we will be back in Wasaga Beach for another little visit.

Ian and I have basically decided that we probably won't buy land here right now even if we see the perfect lot as it would be a shame to buy it then have to leave and not come back for a year. Instead we are getting a feel for areas we like and will go back and look at land in BC again aswell while we pack up and sell off the house this winter before making any final decsions as to where we want to build our earthship.

We probably won't have internet while camping so I might not be back for a week...until then safe travels, happy journeys to you all.

Warm welcome wishes to Ira and Vicky. Thank you for joining us on our journey. If you have a link back to a blog of your own, let me know as I'd love to go check yours out too.

Rideau Acres Campsite REVIEW

While in Kingston we stayed at Rideau Acres Campground. You can see their map for better directions on their website above but it is located on Cunningham Rd off of Hwy 15, only 1 mile North of exit 623 on the 401. 

Value 2.5/5
For us we prefer to have less and pay less when we are just passing through or have other things in the area to do. We paid $45 per night to camp here. It is a Passport America site however they do not allow discounts in the July and Aug. At 1/2 price this rating would be higher as the park did have lots to offer but we are not typival RV park people so paying $45 per night just about kills us!

Site Quality 4/5
Our site was level, full hook ups, mature trees, small fire pit and a picnic table available. There were many year round trailers here which were all taken care of nicely and not used to just store stuff as we have seen in other year round places.

Facility Fun 4/5
With swimming, mini golf, banquet hall, playground, volleyball nets and lots of different boat rentals available the park had a lot to offer. We were just using it as a place to sleep while visiting relatives so it was pricey for us but if you want a vacation place, Rideau Acres would be a good destination. There is also a campstore and I think laundry facilities too.

Natural Surroundings 4/5
Beautiful mature tree, grassy lawns and nicely landscaped, lake access and pond on property made it a very beautiful place to stay.

Bathrooms ???
They have them and have hot showers available I believe for free however we were busy with family that I forgot to check them out. I didn't see bathrooms by the pool but they might have been on the other side of the building???

Staff 3/5
The staff at the store was pleasant enough when I went in to ask about Wifi and campfire wood ($8a bundle). The staff at the entrance gate all 3 times I went there seemed a bit frazzled. Each time I went she was occupied on the phone and it would ring again while there so I guess the place gets quite busy. She could maybe use some help at the registration booth during busy times. She was friendly enough she just seemed flustered a bit.

Location 4/5
At less the 10 minutes from Kingston it's location worked well for us. Kingston apparently has lots to do but to be honest we were just there to visit family and didn't venture into Kingston at all.

Overall 3/5
For a weekly getaway for locals this place is great. My uncle used to have a seasonal trailer here for years and found it a great way to get away, yet be close enough to home that he could run to work if he needed at the spur of the moment. There is lots to do and it had a community feel to it for the seasonal residents who all know eachother. It was too expensive for us for a 2 night stop over ($90) to visit family (they had no room to park our 56') and look at some nearby acreage. Also the wifi was a problem for us. The park does offer wifi but you have to go up to the little room off of the store to use it. It does not extend to the campsites. Personally for $45 a night I think wifi should reach to each site. The other thing that bugged us is visitors to the park have to pay a $5 entrance fee.

Our site E8 from the edge of the next site. Nice grass area for the
girls and nicely shaded with mature trees.

Looking into our site, lots of trees around

Looking down the road. Nightly spots to the left and year round trailers on the right

Some of the other sites in the campground

This is the banquet hall and the pool is right behind it where the bike is parked :)

This is the store and the building closest to you is the internet cafe area

Playground which the girls had to themselves most of the time

Our time in Kingston, Ontario

We left NS and said our goodbyes to family and friends...and to out of this world milk prices! The maritimes was horrible for the price of milk. In BC we pay $3.59 for 3.6L (1 gallon jug). In PEI we paid $6.59  which we thought was high but since it's a ferry trip over it made sense...I guess. Then we went to Nova Scotia and had to pay $7.83!!! Not sure why NS is even more expensive since they produced their own milk! Lets just say we were glad to be back in the States and paying only on $2.25 as we drove across to Ontario and once in Ontario their 4L bags of milk are about $4.59...there's my rant for the day!

When we left NS we left later then planned and stopped for the night again at a highway pull off close to the border in New Brunswick. We crossed the border with about a 10 minute wait and only a couple of questions and were off. We drove all day and stopped in Vermont at a little pull out on the side of the road. The road wasn't too busy so it was pretty quiet.

In the morning we got up and drove until we were in New York State, just below the Kingston border. We had plans to meet my uncle the following day so we stopped early at a roadside rest stop overlooking the river and 1000 island area. It was so pretty. There were no signs posted saying no camping or no overnight parking so we decided to give it a try and sure enough we didn't have any problems and we stayed there from about 4pm until the following morning.

The girls rode their bikes (scooter and trike) and Aayla is finally learning how to pedal. Usually she scoots her feet on the ground to move, but now had figured out that she can push forward for 1/2 a pedal, then reverses it and does a 1/2 pedal again and she slowly moves forward!

 In the morning we got up and looked for a sani dump and found one at a state park just up the road from where we stayed the night. It was a beautiful little park with many sites along the rock formed shore. We had to pay $7.00 to get into the park but that allowed us access to their dump station and gave us a spot to get rid of our garbage.

Then we were off to Kingston...with another smooth border crossing and met Uncle Marty and his son Jason at Denny's for lunch. Sierra and Jason had a lot of fun drawing pictures during lunch and it was good to catch up with Uncle Marty as I haven't seen him in about 15 or 16 years! We had planned on only staying for the day but decided to spend acouple nights in Kingston so we could see Auntie Karen and Amanda too. Also Uncle Marty is a real estate agent in Kingston and offered to get some properties together to show us the following day (we are considering buying land in Ontario to build our earthship because it is cheaper here then in BC and the lakes are supposidly warm and more usable then in BC)

Uncle Marty suggested a nearby RV park so off we headed to get a spot. We enjoyed the pool while we waited for them to come by and visit us after Auntie Karen got home from work and Uncle Marty had time to get some properties together for us.

Sierra is doing a fantastic job at getting her face wet in the pool. She jumps in, goes under, gets soaked and comes up OK and doesn't run away screaming anymore. She has learned finally that pool water doesn't hurt her eyes like salt water and is doing great in the water now.






A lady at the pool saw the girls with their Ariel suits
and brought them over an Ariel book that her daughter didn't want.




Trying to swing on the bars






This is the smartest set up I have seen for an older slide.
All kids LOVE the big slide but this way there is
no worry of a big fall.



Ian shaving outside with the truck mirror :)





We had a great little visit with Uncle Marty and Auntie Karen and the girls had so much fun playing with Amanda.

Uncle Marty and Auntie Karen

The next day we got up and went to look at some properties to get a better feel of Ontario land/prices to have a better idea then comparing BC to the Muskoka's where we are interested in land.

We saw one peice I really liked. It was 187 acres and had 1/3 ownership to a lake. The only drawback was it had a hydro easement near the roadfrontage of the property line in the hayfields. Once back by the lake it had more small hills and you could get out of site of the hydro lines and it was so pretty.

We saw a couple other properties but the other one I liked was swarming with horseflys. So much that we couldn't take the time to try to get back to find the lake access.

Ian swatting the flies away as we try to walk around the property

 



The horseflys/deerflys were CRAZY! As we drove away
 swarms of them followed us. There would be no peace at this property!



We got to spend another night visiting with Uncle Marty and Auntie Karen after looking at the properties and then we were off in the morning to go see my dad...Wasgag Beach...here we come!