Muskoka!

I gotta say everytime I think of the word Muskoka it reminds me of muskeg and I wonder why we're going.  Course, I'd seen pictures and today as we drove in I saw the real thing.  I know already why people cottage here.  While a place like Shuswap Lake may have homes on it there seem to be more shoreline here and therefore more waterfront homes.  We'll begin our touring tomorrow.

Firstly, a shout out to Milton Heights Campground.  The sites are nice with huge trees and we had full hook ups.  It's quiet at night and even until about 9am most mornings.  The owner rides her golf cart around ensuring kids are back in their own campsites by 9:30 - it's dark shortly after 9 so we were more than good with that.  Oh, I should qualify the "quiet" comment - we weren't far from the 401 so we heard that traffic but honestly I blocked it out the first day.  I went for many walks in and from the campground and the countryside is just gorgeous.  The campground laundry was excellent ($1.50 wash or dry), the pool was always warm (28-29 degrees) and the deep end is 9'.  Speaking of the swimming, the kids abilities and confidence levels continue to improve.  Katie is learning to dive now and Emily finds the deep end & swimming lengths to be no challenge.

Scott popped into Milton yesterday to order new tires for the trailer.  Turns out the tires that came with our trailer have a life of between 5-7 years and we're at 5 now.  With one tire blowing while we traveled through Saskatchewan a few weeks ago that was warning enough for us.  Also, the tire immediately beside the one that blew can't seem to hold it's pressure.  We pulled out of the campground this morning (sadly - I really wish we had more time there) and to the tire store where they put on the new tires. 

We were hungry when we left the tire place it was lunchtime but the decision was made to leave Milton and look for a lunch location roadside.  I thought I saw a good spot but as we turned off the highway it became evident that access to the location wasn't going to work so we continued driving away from the road we came in on knowing the GPS would recalculate our route.  That's when it happened.  A bell went off in the truck and alerted Scott to the fact that our engine was low on power.  We were still able to drive but on flat roads at no more than 50kmh (floored) while the uphills maxed out around 20kmh.  We weren't sure we'd make it up some but God is good and answered my prayer in the way I asked. 

Scott could tell on the GPS that we were coming into a town and that they had a Chev dealership.  Turns out the "town" was Barrie, a City of 200,000 and resources were available.  We were in and out of the dealership lickety split and were only charged for the air filter, not the labor. 

So, now we're in a very pretty campground in Dwight Ontario.  We don't have a lake but an indoor pool.  We're about to have supper (it's 8:30!  Yipes) so I'll sign off.   Wifi is great here and maybe we'll get a chance to figure out how to add photos to this new system blog.  Here's hoping!