The Traditional Camp

In early August we decided that it was time to visit our traditional camp, which is a five hour and twenty minute drive from where we now live. It used to be around an hour drive from our country house, but no longer. The decision was made to wait until the first week in September to make the trip, when the weather might be cooler, and the roads would have less traffic because the school holiday would be over.

So yesterday, with the promise of sunny skies and a breeze, we set out to the traditional camp. The weather did not disappoint.

The last time we were there was eight years ago, on our second vacation.

The first vacation we had was taken in the early 90s with Terra, for one week. Terra didn’t enjoy that trip, so it wasn’t a stellar experience for any of us. After that we opted to give up vacations as a family or for ourselves, and focus on finding funds to send Terra to a YWCA camp for two weeks every summer. This was very expensive. She loved it, so it was worth every penny. We paid the full expense ourselves, and were happy we could find the funds to provide her with that experience.

Our second vacation was years later, eight years ago now, in 2016. That began pleasantly, we took Iris the trailer to the traditional camp, and were comfortably set up. But within days news came that my brother had suffered a heart attack, and was in intensive care in a hospital. We rushed home, and commuted to Toronto daily, where he was a patient, for the remainder of our vacation. I was so grateful that we were on vacation, enabling us to be with him every day before he passed away. Such a sad time.

We aren’t keen on vacations, with good reason.

Since we hadn’t been back to the traditional camp, the driveway we had put in had become overgrown with small trees. We knew that we could not park or camp there as it was, work was needed to restore the driveway, so we could park the car there, a first step.

We packed the chainsaw, a shovel, the weed eater, and a cooler with a few meals in it, and set out on a day trip to the traditional camp.

This is where we became aware of how handy a cell phone would be! We don’t do the smart phone thing, and haven’t felt the need for one. But yesterday we found a use for one! We could have monitored road and traffic conditions!

Our route included some travel on the 401. The 401 was closed along our route, but we did not know that when we set out. It was almost an hour and a half of inching forward on the highway, to cover a few miles to the first exit, which we took. Everyone was seeking alternative routes, so the exit we took was stop and go. It took another hour or so on clogged roadways to head away from the 401 and be on our way. We were not off to a good start.

Our route, which we used to commute between the country house and Mist Cottage for five years, proved to be less than ideal. We encountered three more closed roads with lengthy detours, as well as a half dozen road construction delays. It took over seven hours of driving to reach the traditional camp. We were stiff and tired when we arrived in the early afternoon.

It was impossible to park in the driveway. We drove down the road towards my Granny and Grandpa’s house, now owned by someone else, found a spot to get the car off the road, then carried our equipment back the traditional camp, and got to work.

And work it was. We spent just over three hours pulling and digging out hundreds and hundreds of large and small trees. Some of the came out easily, the rest Attila dug out with his shovel. After an hour of hard work, it was time for a quick bite to eat, then back to work.

A space large enough for the car to park off the road was cleared in the three hours we were there. It was back breaking work, but welcome after sitting in the car for over seven hours. Luckily there weren’t many mosquitoes, we only saw a few, and no ticks were detected.

We took note that all belongings left there had been taken in our absence This included a car top carrier, plastic dishes, and a half dozen concrete blocks. Not surprising, the place looked abandoned. Luckily none of the items were worth very much, as we had acquired all but the concrete blocks at the local dump. Actually, I was kind of surprised anyone bothered to take these things, as most of what was there was worthless. It would have been nice to have the concrete blocks though, lots of uses for them, but oh well.

While we were working our neighbour walked by with his dog, and stopped to chat. He was curious about who we were, as he had purchased his house since we had last been there, and knew little of the history of the area.

I took a break from the work, to walk down to my Granny and Grandpa’s house to have a look at what progress had been made on the renovations. The person who bought it is putting a lot of love into the project, but it is slow going as they are stripping it down to it’s good bones to start anew. It doesn’t look much different on the outside, just older and more worn.

The property has been of great interest to the public, widely photographed and claimed to be an abandoned building, which it never was. Since my Grandpa passed away it was used as a cottage by the family, so there were family staying there off and on. Vandals and thieves destroyed or stole almost all of my Grandparent’s belongings that were there, some doing quite a bit of damage, when the family was not there. I think this kind of criminal behaviour must have continued after the sale, because the new owner has chained off entry, put up signs to only take pictures from the road, and installed live video surveillance cameras in various locations. Good for them!! How people justify invading peoples privately owned buildings and property is beyond me. And I know they are ordinary people trespassing, because I’ve seen them on the internet, proudly displaying interior pictures of the house, taken as they trespass. They are not adventurers, they are trespassers. I often wonder how they would feel if someone came into their home while they were photographing our property, to photograph their private space to post on social media. There are no legal pictures on social media of the interior of the house, before it was sold. I hope the new owners are successful in their efforts to protect the property.

I stayed off the property, just looked from the road as requested, took some photographs, and cried a little missing my Granny and Grandpa, and all the wonderful times I had spent there. By the time the renovation is done, I doubt I will feel very sentimental about the building, it will have lost its original energy and history, and become something else entirely, a new history beginning. Such is the passage of time.

The trip from Mist Cottage to the traditional camp, when every aspect of the journey is ideal, is five hours and twenty minutes one way. Knowing this, we stayed at the camp working for only three hours, then rested a few minutes before saying goodbye and hitting the road to go home again.

We did not take our traditional route home, and were lucky in that no further road closures were encountered, and construction delays were minimized that late at night. Five hours and twenty minutes later, we arrived home, close to midnight, tired and dirty.

So that was our return visit to the traditional camp, 12 hours and 20 minutes travelling in the car, broken up by three hours of hard labour by the two of us, to clear a parking space on the driveway at the traditional camp. Not exactly recreational, but satisfying.

At home, we were greeted at the door by a very concerned feline. Ginger misses us terribly when we aren’t in the house. He is a very social animal, we are his people. We would take him with us if he enjoyed the travel cage and travel, but he hates it, so he stays home. He was lavished with attention for an hour or so, until we could not stay awake any longer.

Worldly

Weather

Mostly Cloudy
21°C
Date: 12:00 PM EDT Friday 6 September 2024
Condition: Mostly Cloudy
Pressure: 101.6 kPa
Tendency: Falling
Temperature: 20.7°C
Dew point: 15.8°C
Humidity: 74%
Wind: S 27 km/h
Humidex: 25
Visibility: 24 km

Quote

“The art of living easily as to money is to pitch your scale of living one degree below your means.”
Sir Henry Taylor
1800 – 1886

This only applies to people whose means include adequate food, clothing, and shelter, a globally small and shrinking demographic at the moment. It is a perspective only useful to privileged people with more than enough of everything essential.