Childhood memories of the cottage

There were so many. At the time, it was heaven. From 1960 until I moved to Ottawa in 1981.
For only $2000 Mom and Dad bought our swamp-ridden lot.

I spent entire summers at the cottage. All of July and August. Long, lazy days filled with reading, swimming, hanging out. Then there was the boredom and loneliness!

While my mother worked the other three seasons, she took summers off to stay in her beloved Muskoka. My aunt and uncle, and another uncle and aunt, both had cottages a several of doors down. Dad commuted every Friday and Monday morning went back to work in Toronto.
It wasn't until I was older that I realized how much I missed by not going to camp. I realize how much the solitude shaped my personality. My brother went off to Air Cadet camp. I did not! I have never been camping.

Dad built a dike

Still not great in large groups, I prefer socializing in small numbers.

I just listened to This American Life:

109: Notes on Camp

JUL 26, 2013

Stories of summer camp. People who love camp say that non-camp people simply don't understand what's so amazing about camp. In this program, we attempt to bridge the gap of misunderstanding between camp people and non-camp people.

Ira Glass is right. It is a different summer experience. My kids attended camp. Jesse went to Scout camp, and later he worked as a camp counselor. He took kids for two-week canoe trips in Algonquin Park.

We couldn't afford a deck in the first years (1960-62)

Mom, myself, my brother and Aunt Adie

My cousin taking us canoeing

Eventually, Mom and Dad added sand 
to fill in the swamp.
It would be highly illegal these days.
We are losing precious shorelines, 
habitat upon which critters depend.

Dad in his beloved sailboat!

When I was a young child, it was a grand time. My cousins would turn up on weekends. They would take me boating. I remember water skiing behind their boat, using my great grandmother's wooden ironing board on which to kneel. Sadly, I am no longer in touch with my cousins, who are 20 years older than I am. We had some differences of opinion and they no longer speak to me.

Dad loved having a flag. You can see what was swamp.
It was the least amenable lot at the time. Dad worked hard on it.

The bullfrogs were huge and plentiful

The days were spent longing for friends, watching the frog pond, catching snakes, watching tadpoles. The flora and fauna were much more plentiful. I remember all the blood suckers. There were so many in those days that we kept a jar of table salt down be the lake shore. A bit of salt on the sucker and that sucker was a goner!

Jeremiah lives in my goldfish pond

Daisy is fascinated

How the 1% lives in the region of Muskoka!

I cannot imagine the energy required for this...
Check out a cottage on Lake Rosseau in Muskoka, Ontario, with a private water slide and rock-climbing wall. Lake Rosseau is the play place of the rich and famous, as well as those with less affluent means. Rock stars, film stars, rub shoulders with us lesser folk.

With Earth Day approaching, it is shocking!
Most cottagers are anticipating their summer fun, but the energy required to maintain multi-million dollar 'cottages' is amazing.
 

Do you have a favourite body of water?

Do you have a favourite lake or pond?  This Nature Canada blog post inspired me. I've sat on it since November, 2011, waiting for spring.

I do have a fave. Long Lake, where we cottaged for 50 years! Knowing it intimately, I canoed every inch, and even the surrounding beaver ponds which fed this lake.

I loved spring, when the ice began to thaw, and eventually sank in the warmth. Lakes have a constant temperature of 4 C., down below in winter. This lake is 200' deep.



I loved the fog dancing on the water.

The sunsets.

One of my favourite shots.
Juxtaposition of late winter, early spring!

I loved the ducks, who would do fly-overs, searching for open water.

I captured the sunlight dancing on the waves.

In September, things quieted down!

Once the ice melted, everything began the frenzy of procreation.

Mallard male duck

Not true, as we enjoyed all 4 years
that we lived there full-time.

We did grow tired of the disrespectful sledders, jetskis doing figure 8's, fireworks every night for two weeks on a work night, and the poor treatment of the loons who tried to share our lake. Snowmobiles on thin ice, leaving behind pollution. Melting ice is an accident waiting to happen!

I think this was Eddie and Eva, and off-spring.

Eddie and Eva, who visited every year!

The heron visited often.

We left with no regrets, but some tears.

Here is why we moved closer to Ottawa!
Granddaughters, Isabelle, born May, 2010

Farewell, ducks! Caitlin and Josephine.

Farewell lake!

They trusted us and knew we loved them.
I hope the new owner respects wildlife as we did.

Incoming mallards!

Still as glass in September

Cottage life - Muskoka 1960

Cottage life was different then. We had a hand pump, using lake water, and an outhouse. (A two-seater!)  Mom and Dad cleared the land in 1960, then, when enough money was saved up, they had the cottage built in 1962.

This is a Viceroy cottage, with 4" tongue and groove cedar walls. It smells gorgeous.
When our kids arrived, we would all crowd in, rain or shine. Playing in the sand and water, or building tents under blankets indoors.


In 1991 Mom and Dad built their retirement home attached to the cottage. They had lived on Walker Ave., in Toronto, for at least 55 years, or so.  But summers, we headed for the lake.

 I remember watching the thunder and lightning across the lake.

Muskoka lightning bolts

Another storm in Muskoka. I set up the videocam on my not-so-trusty antique tripod and let it run. 

Oliver came down to the cottage with me - to check for mice. He is an excellent mouser and nothing was to be had this day. It is our ritual. My late mother used to go into the cottage after they had the house built, and just sit in her swing rekindling memories of the long, wonderful summers here. Cousins, who were speaking to me then, 20-years my senior, took me water skiing.

Aunt Adie (1905 - 2001), who showed me how to paint and who left us many paintings, including one of our old Toronto home, as well as the Muskoka Lake scenery. This is her painting, I must have been about 13 years old. She was painting the 'climbing tree', a tree long since dead and fallen.

We met Dad every Friday night of the summer as he drove up from Toronto for the weekend. Rain or shine, we would wait at the highway for him, cheering as he arrived. He would leave early on Monday morning, to arrive in time for a 9 a.m. start for work.

I remember fishing with dad. Here we are at my cousin's dock.

I remember the sadness as we left the frog pond, lake and cottage for the last time in the fall. It is time for change, as the seasons change, our lives change. Many in Muskoka want to retire here. We did, too. And it was a delightful 4 years, yet our grandkids call. There is nothing more important than family. We shall leave this house, and find another place to lay our heads.

Honouring Muskoka's pioneers

There are many.  A trip through the Torrance cemetery reveals much about our community.

This is the grave marker for the contractor, Hal Grossman, who built our house in 1991!

Thanks to G8 Tony Clement signage!

A ripe old codger, he fled Germany. He was also a taxidermist, and had many critters he'd hunted and killed. I remember seeing them in his house.
Hal, as we all called him, was in the German youth organization. He had no choice.

He settled here in Bala and his fine work can be found in many Muskoka buildings. He bought land here, about the same time of all of us old geezers, in 1960 or so. He built a chalet, then built a larger home having married a Brit, they wanted a larger house. He used to blast German music from loudspeakers down the water front, when the lake began to be more populated. He liked his lake quiet!

Hal Grossman, circa 70s, with Aunt Adie

Hal cleans up a dead tree for us!

We'd arrive for a vacation, and he'd complain about the 'G. D. tourists' arriving, smile on his crusty old face, waving a paddle at us!




My parents had Hal build their cottage and subsequent home!

Me at the cottage

The cottage, 1960 caption

Cottage 1970s

There are some very old stones, reflecting the nature of Muskoka's pioneers.
Little babies, far from health care, who died in infancy.

A recent tombstone, Patty Parsons. This is the woman after whom the latest Habitat Muskoka build is named.

And here is the stone marking my parent's grave. It is a beautiful spot.

Josephine & Isabelle visit great-gramma/grampa's grave

Mom & Dad