This photo does not show enough the potholes on the road leading into/out of the SSM KOA. This place takes the prize of being the bumpiest!Cloudy skies…
That peek-a-boo hole beside the lawn chairs opens up to the sandy lake.
Clouds reflected in the lake
We venture out for a walk and encounter yet another sign
Just passed the bear sign, we find the hiking trail that goes around the lake
Allan “Want to go?”
Me “Of course” while thinking, they wouldn’t really put a trail where bears hang out!
Beautiful, but looks like a bear would be happy in this trail…
We forge on. “What’s that rustling sound?” Allan researched what to do if you encounter a bear; do not turn & run. Stand your ground, make noise and throw stuff. Problem we have no stuff!
It’s a very scenic trail…
The trail opens up to view the lake
Back in the wooded trail
We make it out!!
Celebrate with, of course, a fire!
Turns out this is one of our favourite campgrounds.
I’m fascinated by the height of this train structure.
Parry Sound has nice trails. This is the first memory stone we saw. Searched for more but none.
Being a city girl there is much of nature I don’t know about. There are many trees that look like this. What is it?
Google helps. Turns out they may be either fall web worms or Eastern tent caterpillars. Enjoying our last night here. Next destination… Sault Ste Marie.
Away we go! Starting km 66,359 time would have been 940a but when the tree is factored in it’s 1028a
We are giving ourselves a month to get to our BC . Most stops will be for 2 nights. Exception are Banff, (for the sights) & Lethbridge, (visiting friends) we will be at each for 7 nights.
Our drive to Parry Sound takes us past my sister-in-law’s house in Utterson. Allan has fun blowing the Horn.
Allan can flick on the rear view camera so we can see Bob, we watch him…
We encounter the normal construction. There will be much more to come.Arrive at the Parry Sound KOA at 120p. We are escorted to our nice, long site.
This is the first un-hook and it is flawless 🙂
Did it!
This is what the power should be..
First on the road fire! It go flamier
Tomorrow we explore Parry Sound.
On the having nothing to do with nothing….What do you see?
Before getting back to Ontario, and after much discussion we decide to put our home up for sale. These are crazy, unsettled times – hard to imagine what lies ahead.
May 22, 2020 We contact our Ontario realtor, the very sweet Natalie Bonnell. A good thing during this pandemic, listing agreement was all done electronically – thank you DocuSign.
Sign on the door while selling
When we get back we begin to sell some minor stuff on kijiji.
Will the house actually sell? There is little available on the market, fingers crossed.
June 08, 2020 We are not held in suspense too long. SOLD
Deal closes…. August 04, 2020
Now the serious selling begins. We’ve been living in Bailey since December, she’s self sufficient so sell everything is on!
Amazing what you find when liquidating, Allan’s cub cap, so very cute. Almost perfect fit 🙂
I sold the kitchen table and chairs out from under Allan. Working away using the “MacGyver” method.
Allan brings me to the nicest places. Georgina dump!
Suspect we will have several more trips here.
Look what else we found
Online listed items are selling well, but so much stuff, we have the dreaded “garage sale”.
June 24 – Allan has been negotiating for a Jeep as we now need a toad. We started off wanting a 2 door but quickly determined there is no room in the back. 4 door it is. Allan loves negotiating – I strongly dislike it = Allan flying solo at the dealer while I continue the packing and garage sale organization. After many hours, Newmarket Chrysler agrees to Allan’s purchase price and the deal is written up. The Jeep isn’t on their lot, they have to bring it in from another dealer so we have to wait for it to arrive.
June 27: Garage Sale Day We practice social distancing guide lines. Allan measures out the 6 foot stand here lines. We allow only one person in the garage at a time.
We have aisles, in one way-down the other and out.
We had more people come by then we thought would. People just want to get back to “normal”, many said they missed garage sales. We were glad Allan had the 6 foot line markers in the driveway.
We give them each a spritz of hand sanitizer and in they go, wearing masks. There was, at times, a wait to get in – everyone was good with that.
Sales taper off about noon. Grrr, still lots of stuff. Another garage sale is in our future.
July 03 – Pick up Jeep Day!
September 2016, in Victoria we rented a Jeep. Allan was not a fan, saying it was just a bucket of bolts!
On our drive home I ask Allan “Well is this one a Bucket of Bolts?”
“Yes, it is” he chuckles. Meet Bob! Yep it’s an engine!
Because you haven’t seen one in a while! Fire time! Fire retardant gloves courtesy of Kyle and Megan for Father’s Day.
July 09, 2020 The hottest, most humid day of the year, 35c with humidity 42! Not only are our summer long electric problems continuing, Elm Grove Trailer Park just can’t supply us power. No, no discount as a result. Notice the indoor temps, 97, 103. We need at least 112/115 volts to run the ac. I have almost as many thermostat photos as Allan has camp fires photos.
We do occasionally, when our freezer is in jeopardy, start our generator but the asshat neighbours, Gary & Vickie, who are able to run their ac and could very well go in when we start the generator instead complain to the park’s owner. This couple is truly the ugliest we’ve ever encountered, ugly through and through.
Vickie never leaves their trailer, the furthest she goes is their side lawn. They sit under our windows and smoke non-stop. We can’t run our ac nor open the windows as then the smoke billows inside. Being that inconsiderate speaks volumes to who they are.
Gary is tasked with, every morning, rain or shine, driving to Sutton’s Tim Horton, he returns with 2 XL coffees. Gary also does the grocery shopping and pick up of dinners when they order in. No DoorDash for them, it’s GaryDash! Worth repeating! Vickie never leaves. They sit on their deck and just smoke and Vickie wearing her John Lennon glasses and pink baseball cap.
I know they are crappy photos but you get the idea. They have a yappy dog named, Baby Girl. You hear “oh Baby” a lot when she barks from Gary. Vickie doesn’t try to correct at all. Poor Baby never gets walked. Gary just brings her down the steps to the grass. Then you hear “hurry up”. Guess he’s anxious to get back to the deck.
We are counting down the days till we leave Elm Grove.
July 10th – Kyle has news and wants us to call. We tried yesterday but the service at the park is so shitty we couldn’t connect. We call, while driving to Newmarket.
Kyle’s news?? He has been selected to be deployed to the Ukraine!!! This news comes a day after we decide to head to BC for the Winter. Happy Face for Kyle being one of the few selected, Sad Face for us not spending the Winter with them.
July 15th – We learned Kyle will be going to Petawawa on July 26 for Ukraine briefing. Kyle will be a 4h drive away, he does have a rental vehicle. Fingers crossed he has time to visit.
July 27th -Today is moving vault pick up day using AMJ Campbell #MakeYourBestMove. We didn’t know what to expect – turns out the vault is in the 5 ton truck and gets loaded while in the truck. They arrived at 921a and leave with loaded vault 1135a.
July 28th – Off to the lawyer’s to sign the house selling documents. We wanted to do the signing using DocuSign, this was not an option. We were so glad this wasn’t our first sale as it was anything but informative. We have used this firm for all our legal requirements.
Dealings under the direction of the father were professional and somewhat fun. The son and his wife recently took over when the father retired and it hasn’t been the same. Using Covid as an excuse, they have a table set up in the back corner of the parking lot, like WTF?? What do they do if it rains? The assistant comes out, places the paperwork on the table and says to sign & initial each page. No review or explanation of any of the docs. Have no idea what we are signing, yep bad on us.
Kyle wanted to come visit for Allan’s birthday but there was a wicked storm a brewing. It ended up being, the worst storm of the summer. Torrential rain, stupidly high winds. We could barely see out the windows. I’m happy he didn’t attempt the drive.
August 06th – Bob gets to be a TT (true toad). Off to Hitch CityWe have the day to wander around Barrie while Bob is being outfitted.
Friday night was also karaoke at our neighbour’s, Charlene & Rod’s. Charlene belting out the tunes and then accompanied by her brother 🙂
August 15th – Sobey’s in Sutton spreading the love and the day our Blue Ox cover arrived!
August 26th – Last purchase of Kim wood.
August 27th – So hyped to be leaving. We are counting down the sleeps while still enjoying our Elm Grove friends. They will be missed.
The continues! Wonder what they will stare at when we are gone. Feel so bad for the unsuspecting new renters of our site.
August 30th – Last sleep! We are a little anxious never having hooked up Bob before. We book a RV site in Parry Sound a 3-1/2 hour drive, thinking if we have hook up issues, I’ll drive Bob, we’ll stop in Barrie at Hitch City to have them help out.
This year’s park rental agreement stated occupancy was September 01 2019 to September 01 2020. Normally, OK always, parks are from the Victoria Day weekend till at least Thanksgiving. All the rules of this lackluster contract are stated on the back of this page, it is totally blank. We decide there is tom-foolery at play. We hear Kim is renting a site for $950. for a month. No way would we pay that for this park. We opt to abide by the contract hence leave August 31 one day earlier then the end of the contract.
Oh no, birds, birds and more birds.
Scariest movie from my childhood is The Birds. Still cringe and cover my neck when I see a flock.
Hooking up Bob went well. Allan is very good at researching and following steps. Allan, smartly, checked the hooks up a few times ensuring all was correctly attached.
All set to go!
Kim had stopped by earlier in the morning to say he was getting our final hydro bill. We were leery to see it, last year our bill was less than the $350 deposit. The full timers were between $900 and $1300, Kim has the hydro meters under lock and key. You are required to just trust him.
As we are hooking up Bob, Kim drives by and gives us our bill.
Kim “You are going to e-transfer the money”
Allan “Of course!”
OMG! the bill is less than $265. We are happy to pay that. He increased the admin free to $50 from $45 and removed the delivery fee which was almost equal to the usage on last year bill. Maybe he took pity on us for not having hydro for most of the season.
Freedom!! We start our drive out of the park…
Not so fast!!
Are you freakin’ kidding me?? Kim chopped down a tree to block our exit.
Kim “You are going to pay the electric?”
Allan “Of course”.
Kim “Sorry about the tree, the tractor ran out of fuel. Someone is off fetching some”
Kim “Are you e-transferring?”
Me “We will as soon as we get to our next camp”
Kim “You have to pay before you leave.”
Any doubt on why the tree is down??
We hook up to the internet and e-transfer.
Transfer complete!
Without further ado, and NO fuel added, Kim jumps in the tractor and moves the tree!
Cloudy skies…
Getting closer.
Clouds reflected in the lake
We forge on. “What’s that rustling sound?” Allan researched what to do if you encounter a bear; do not turn & run. Stand your ground, make noise and throw stuff. Problem we have no stuff!
Back in the wooded trail
Allan has fun blowing the 
Vickie wearing her John Lennon glasses and pink baseball cap.
#2
under that mask. Other mask is checkered flags.
Allan.
