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1 to 15 October 2014   16 to 31 October 2014



Wednesday October 1st, 2014


Michele has another appointment this morning.  This time it is a follow-up for her hearing aid, just to make sure everything is working great before we head down to Texas.
I stay home and get ready for when my sister Christianne and her boyfriend, Julien, will arrive this afternoon.
Our home.


Christianne and Julien arrived around 3:30 pm and we sure talked a lot before dinner.
Speaking of dinner, we had a nice egg raclette with red wine from Ontario and the girls had white wine.


We stayed up until midnight talking about everything and anything.



Thursday October 2, 2014


We had a relaxed morning at the breakfast table, good conversation, just plain old happiness.

We had to tour the park for Julien.
The two love birds.


Christanne really liked the blue heron in the park.


Christianne and Julien had to hit the road because they have other commitment in the next few days.


It is the first time we meet Julien and we really like him.

We should see Christianne and Julien in the spring 2015.
As usual, being Thursday I had to go to the "beer" evening at the community hall.  This time Michele stayed home.



Friday October 3, 2014


The weather is changing and I think the indian summer is over!



Saturday October 4, 2014


The weather has changed!
Windy, rain from time to time, not a pleasant weather.
Our neighbors, Claude and Johanne, invited us for a last pontoon ride for the year.  We accepted.
The water temperature is at +17 C, but the wind and light rain makes it on the cold side when it is +14 C.
Claude, the captain!  And the real captain, Johanne.
 

We stayed out on the water for about 30 minutes and got back home to warm up.

Tonight the park has an Halloween party.
Here is our president, Lisa, greeting us as we come in.


First, at 5 pm we had a free meal. Hot dogs, hamburger and Oktoberfest sausages.  Even the wine and beer were free.
The "chef" and the food "carrier" hard at work .
 

The servers, they all did a great job.  A big thank you to all the volunteers.


I almost forgot, the bartenders...


With the meal over, most people went home to get ready for the Halloween party.
This is a few of them.
 
 


We leave the dance behind us after an hour or so and the party is still going strong.
Halloween party and a full moon?


It was a great evening, lots of food and beverages.



Sunday October 5, 2014


This morning I am back at the community hall to help put away the tables and chairs.  The community hall turns into a storage building for boats during the winter.  One of the benefit I did not know about volunteering for this job is that they clean out all the food from the kitchen and we get to take some of the food home.

Later on, I gave a hand to Claude to take his pontoon boat out of the water.  I had to get in the water to line it up on the trailer.  We did good and the boat was out of the water quickly.

We spend the rest of the day indoor.  It is +12 C with high wind and intermittent rain.



Monday October 6, 2014


This is a windy and rainy morning.  I did the cans and bottles sorting as every Monday and let me tell you, there as a lot of empties.  The Halloween party must have been successful!

In the afternoon, we did some shopping for stuff we don't find in the US , but we really like.  Like VH soya sauce with low sodium and coffee filter #1.

Once back at the motorhome, I cooked the breakfast sausages and froze them.

I went for a short bike ride in the park and  we got invited at Karen and John's campfire.
We had a lot of fun with the people around the fire.
 

We got home at around 6:30 and the rain started about an hour later and did not stop until the next day.

We also spent time looking at what road we will be taking for our trip to Texas this winter.



Tuesday October 7, 2014


I finally got to fixing the blinds of two of our windows.


We fixed them a few years back and we taught it did not last very long.
Then, we got thinking that living fulltime in the motorhome is not normal wear and tear.  Most RV are used for weekend camping or 6 months of the years by the snowbirds.  So, the past 4 years for us are like 8 to 10 years of "normal" wear and tear on those blinds.
We have to remember that an RV is a "doll house" on wheels and every time we drive, it is an earth quake.

During the afternoon, I gave a hand to the owner installing some drainage pipes in the soil.  Basically all he needed was 4 hands.  30 minutes later I was back home

I also went to the Brighton ServiceOntario office to get information about the "E-Test" to be done on the motorhome before I can renew my plates in May 2015.  Without getting into the details, The lade gave me very good information and ways to make it easier to get it all done without having to come back to Canada before May 1st.  All done legally of course.  Talk about a civil servant working for the people of Ontario, bravo!



Wednesday October 8, 2014


We went back to Belleville for the last medical appointment for Michele, nothing special, just routine stuff and all is good.
We take that time in town to book an appointment for the motorhome E-test on October 17.
The wind is fairly strong today and a lot of leaves are flying around.  We still have a few trees with green leaves.
 


We are starting to look at our itinerary for our trip to Texas.



Thursday October 9, 2014


Last night it went down to +4 C.  That is on the cool side!
The max today was only +15 C.
We are still experiencing a lot of strong wind and it is not a pleasant time outside.

Quite a few seasonal sites became available at the end of the season for various reasons.  One of the un-expected effect it had was that some people that are staying are now moving to some of those available spots.  So this weekend and even during the week it is the waltz of the RV moving from site to sites.  This afternoon while I was biking in the park one of the trailer was moving and I stopped to talk to the neighbor. I got invited in for a beer so we could watch from inside.  Let me tell you, some people are completely clueless on how to move anything.  A good thing the owner of the park is the one moving the trailers.  I think they should have bleachers close by when a trailer/deck is being moved, quite entertaining.

Once back at home, I continued on my research on "Free Thing To Do" in all the cities we will be driving through.
I think we will skip stopping in St Louis because of all the racial tension currently taking place in the area.

As I was working on my laptop, I saw this fox just wandering around, not a care in the world, in the parking lot in front of the motorhome.
 

He even had time for a streeeech!


This evening is the last of our Thursday Evening Beer at the park and it was taking place at Millie's place.
We had a great time, but I much prefer the bar in the club house, mostly for the "bar" atmosphere.
We made it back home around midnight.



Friday October 10, 2014


Another cold night at +4 C and a day of +14 C.
Not much to tell you about the day, but we had a great evening.
We went to the Brighton Barn Theater.
It was the play  "The Dixie Swing Club".


Here is what it was about...
"Every August, a group of five meet for a weekend at a beach-front cottage to recharge their friendship, which began on their college swim team. The Dixie Swim Club focuses on four of those weekends and spans a 33-year period."

For $15 per person, it was worth every penny.
We laughed and even had a tear in our eyes at time.


Saturday October 1, 2014


This morning the owner was taking out all the docks from the water for the winter.
We were quite a few people to help him out.
The pier without the docks.


Another view from the pier.
 

Here are all the docks ready for the winter.
 

We started at around 8 am this morning and were done by 11:30.

We finally have a "plan" for our trip down south (Texas).
From Niagara we will go by Columbus, Indianapolis, St Louis, Oklahoma City, Dallas and finally we should be in the Rio Grande area by Christmas.


As we always say, "our plans are written in sand and it is windy".

We went to Belleville for another play, this one was written by Agatha Christie.


We enjoyed the play, but we do prefer comedies.



Sunday October 12, 2014


Thanksgiving Sunday and the weather was great.
We did some serious reading by the campfire.
 

Millie and Dean have invited us to the dinner with other people from the park.
Here, we were filling up the plates...


Blessing...


And, we attacked the food!


We had a very good meal and as usual we all ate too much...



Monday October 13, 2014


Some campers from the park organized a Prince Edward County wine tour.
There are over 35 wineries in the county.
A vineyard is a place where you only grow grapes and a winery is a place where they grow, make wine and sells wine.
For more information on the Price Edward County wines, click here.

Back to our wine tour, a van was rented and one of the camper, Paul, volunteer as the "duty driver" for the day.
We were a total of 8 in the van.
Let's go!


Our first stop was not in a winery, but at the Black River Cheese factory and the Galloping Goat.
The cheese factory has been in operation since 1901.


And across the road to the Galloping Goat.
It is a very eclectic little boutique.
 

We really liked this place, but living in a motorhome full-time, we have no room for any of the cute little things from this boutique.


Our first vineyard was the Devil's Wishbone.


The gang minus myself and Paul, but we were ready for a sampling of wine.


Good wine.

Lunch was at "The Inn & Miller House Cafe" on Lake on the Mountain.


They even have a brewery.


We had a very good meal for a decent price.

Our next stop was at the Closson Chase vineyard.
 
 

Really cute place and the wines were good (for us!), but still no purchases from our part.

The "Lacey" vineyard was the following stop.
We did buy the "Dorland Red" which is a little sweet and Michele liked it.


We were hard at work!


We only had to cross the road for our next vineyard, the "Lift Haus".


Once again, we were hard at work...


Myself and Louise were a little too happy?  We did buy a "Pinot Noir 2008".


Hinterland makes sparkling wine and it was good, but a little out our budget.


This was our next stop, "By Chadsey's Cairns".


The sampling room is located in an old school. It was a nice change from the barns from all the other wineries/vineyards.
 

Here is the PEC (Prince Edward County) wineries/vineyards wine tour gang.
Front row, Jan and Jannie, back row, Millie, Michele, Louise, Paul, Denis and Dean.


The second last winery, the "Keint-he".



The vines looking toward lake Ontario.


Our last stop of the day.


Everyone was very excited about this place, they told us this was the best place for wine tasting in the "county".
Welcome to Karlo Estates!
 

A little photo of us and of course the gang before the tasting.
 

This photo is just to poke fun at Jan and Jannie, we have nothing to add. LOL!


We ended this good day at Jan and Jannie's place for pizza and a few beers.

We had a great day, we have discovered wineries we did not know about.  As for the prices of wine, we are leaving to the USA in a few weeks, this is not the time to buy wine for us.



Tuesday October 14, 2014


This morning was the last time I sorted the cans and bottles for the park...

The sun was shining and it was a warm day at +25 C.
I decided to put away pretty well everything back in the basement of the motorhome.
They are calling for rain for the next few days.
I also took the time to change the air filter of the motorhome.
Here I was working from the inside (under the bed) to remove the air filter.


The filter is gone.


The new filter on the left and the old on the right.
 

The new filter in place.


I only have to place the bikes on the car and we will be ready for Friday...



Wednesday October 15, 2014


The rain started around midnight and when we woke up it was still raining.  We had a grey and humid day.
Off to Trenton we went for some last purchases.
It was still raining when we got home.

Until next time.

Life is good...



    
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