Hellloo my blossoms! Spring hopes eternal, and I’m starting to think we might emerge from this strange, frigid non-season after all. I’m well over my Mother’s Day hangover, and gearing up for the long weekend ahead. It looks like we will be going to our cottage after all, humbly and a little furtively, but with great excitement.

 

To recap, we have a cabin that is more or less off the grid, three and a half hours north of the city, not counting the 10 minute boat ride you have to take to get there. No, it’s not an island in Muskoka, or Georgian Bay. It is simply a property on the north shore of a big inland lake. There’s no road in, so we have to park our car in a lot at the south end of the lake, pick up our boat that’s kept in a small marina there, load it up, drive across, unload it at our end, and Bob’s your backwoods hillbilly uncle.

 

There’s a lot of acreage there – it started out as two concessions that John’s grandfather bought back in the 60’s (or won in a poker game, or killed a guy – the legend only grows). The land was split between his two daughters, and then we severed a piece from John’s mother, and built our own cottage, so now we have a place on one side of the bay, John’s sister has the original cottage on the other side, and there’s a lot owned by the cousins who rarely use it.

 

When I first started going up there, as John’s new girlfriend, there was no power, no plumbing, and certainly no internet. We used outhouses, propane fixtures and appliances, and played cards. We still play cards, but otherwise it’s a lot more comfortable: we have a sauna, and air conditioning (in one room, anyway), and a big screen TV (much to my mother-in-law’s horror, RIP). That being said, it still takes a lot of effort to open, close and maintain. Most of the time, it’s worth it. On certain weekends, when it’s cold, rainy and buggy all at the same time, I wonder why we do this. Here, have a look at the place last weekend, May 9th, in a photo take by one of neighbours:

 

 

That’s right. Snow AND maybe blackflies, like some sort of salt and pepper horror show. The snow should be gone this weekend, but there will be other obstacles, as there always are on opening weekends. In the past, we’ve encountered a cutlery drawer full of live mice, carpenter ants in the ceiling, bats in the roof, and, once, a dead body in the wood stove (it was a bird). We have to put the water system in, put the dock in, make up all the beds, clean the place top to bottom, then go home.

 

This weekend will be further complicated by the fact that we are practicing safe Covid measures. It’s just our household, although the extended family will be up at their cottage across the bay, so no socializing. The marina will release our boat, as they are allowed to do, but other than gas, there will be no other amenities. Everything we need we will bring up from the city. It will either be too cold, or too buggy, to do much outside. The water will be hypothermic. Did I mention no internet? Still no internet, just a DVD player and spotty cell phone service. But judging by the level of anticipation around here, you would think we were going to the French Riviera, and that’s not a bad thing. I can’t complain, and so I won’t, although I suspect that’s sort of what I’ve been doing, overprivileged cow that I am.

 

Anyhoozles, that’s still a few days away. In the mean time, have you ordered your Hearts and Smiles T-shirt and mask? Do it now. All the cool kids are doing it. Just the thing to welcome in true spring.

 

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