A rocky start to the 25th anniversary summer.

June 21, first day of summer, first visitors to the cottage (our Kevin and Jesse), I would have liked to report that we sat on the beach, swam, BBQ'd, ate outside and enjoyed the sun. Sadly mother nature did not cooperate, and due to the almost non stop rain, the weekend turned into  an indoor "Modern Family" marathon (think we have hooked them on the show) and some rousing games of Trouble. The rains did hold off in the evenings though and we were able to have 2 nice campfires, though it took herculean efforts to get the fire going after 24 of rain.. but therefore the campfire hotdogs tasted all that much better.  Everyone agrees though that the highlight of the weekend was Riley's imitation of a dead fish.  Yes, he found "something" rotting in the woods whose aroma must have been so intoxicating that he could not resist mashing his face, neck and body into it.  All I can say is thank God the dogs rode home in the truck with Mike and not in the car with Kevin, Jesse and I.  Here's hoping the weather (and Riley's odour) is better for next weekend's annual Canada Day Cassin visit!

No pic of camera shy guests, but Kevin did take this nice shot of the rainy lake

The many (non-motorized) watercraft of Lac Bitobi

When we were negotiating the purchase of the cottage Mr. Bond wanted to sell us his motor boat, and for two reasons we asked to have that excluded from the deal..one, to save money, and two, because the most experience we'd had boating to that point was on the Sea Spirit II

Our very first Lac Bitobi watercraft.  Although fun for short jaunts, we were quite excited to learn that the cottage did come, at no extra cost, with a wooden row boat. 

Where did Mike get that cap??!!

This let us travel a little further, but unfortunately we had to  christen that boat "The Sunken Dorey", as she was forever leaking and we were constantly needing to patch her up.

So we decided our safest bet was to buy something made completely of fibre glass, and we opted for the bright yellow paddle boat. 

Bianca

This was a perfect craft for the many wee ones we had up to the cottage over the years... and I must say some of the best times I had were getting to know my little nieces and friend's kids on long leisurely rides on lake, always listing a little bit to one side because their feet couldn't quite reach the pedals.

Alysha and Brandon

Ella MacDonald

The paddle boat has since been retired as there aren't many tiny folks coming up anymore.. so we have graduated to canoes and kayaks


My favorite canoe story is the weekend my co-workers from CIS all came up for the weekend and decided what our camp needed was a motor boat, so Tom and Denis and 2 24's of beer launched the motor boat at Big Lake Bitobi and promptly got lost for 3 or 4 hours (long enough to consume most of the beer).  Back on Little Lake, Sheila and Heather were becoming a little concerned about the where abouts of their husbands (especially since they were saddled with a couple of very tiny babys) so Marg's husband Ross decided he and Mike should take the canoe out for a search and rescue.

Ross and Mike to the rescue

Poor unsuspecting Mike hops into the canoe and is flung into overdrive as Ross - the ex-olympic canoeist, takes off at warp speed.  Never saw the canoe move as fast as that day.  End of story is that they heard the very loud and by that point quite tipsy lost boaters floundering on the the Big Lake and steered then home.  

The rescued Dads,. slightly fried and pickled, but happy

Not a lot of motor boating took place that day (husbands were immediately given kiddie duty), but it was the one time we had a motorized boat moored at our dock!

Despite losing the canoe a few time due to rising water levels, storms etc. we always found "No. 6" and although minus one seat now, she continues to be a sturdy steed.

I love our kayaks, they are much more stable than the canoe, and much speedier than the paddle boat.We have had many a lovely, calm, trip through the canal that separates Big from Little Lake Bitobi, and on to the Gatineau River (and some poor unsuspecting friends have been taken quite a bit farther than that, yes McCann, you know of what I speak).

Kids love the kayaks too and a few of our 

friends have brought up their own to join us on our little excursions.

In the end though I have to admit that my favorite watercraft has been and continues to be the Unsinkable Molly Brown.. simply my floating mattress, which is my all time best thing to do on the lake.. I think most of you have seen me here:

 That's it for this week.. bye for now:

A story of stairs and decks, more stairs and even more decks

Do you find that as soon as you become the proud owners of a property, instead of sitting  back and enjoying, your first inclination is add to it, change it, improve/ehance it. Well that's exactly what we did, and most of our big projects seemed to center around decks and stairs.  Stairs for the obvious reason..our land was at the top of a relatively steep hill, and decks because the gentle slope of the land toward the lake meant we were forever looking for level ground to sit on (Many a lawn chair gave its life trying to keep us level). At the cabin we built our first set of stairs with the assistance of Blair, Donna, Morry and Meghan Hayes.. and learned our first lesson: Make stairs wider than you think you need them.. because you do...and railings are a good thing too.

Mike and his brother Gerard built the first deck off the little cabin (though I think I helped nail in some railings)  It was a work of art and still serves us well today.

But that wasn't enough - we needed a deck to sit around the fire near the cabin, so with wood left over from the Woolco to Walmart conversion we built a  8 x 10 deck that shortly after we built it, we CARRIED! to our newly acquired cottage, thanks to the help of my brother, Ralph and his wife Suzie. 

The previous owners of our new cottage were what I can only  describe at "stair challenged".  Every set of stairs on the property were crazy steep, the steps were short and not a railing to be seen, so we thought we'd build some new wide gently sloping steps down to the beach, partly built by our nephew Allan and his buddies, and partly with our friend Kevin McCann 

 
 Sadly we learned out second lesson about stairs.  Ice is stronger than wood, as the first winter that they were up, they were promptly mangled by the ice.  What else to do but slap a railing around what was left of it and turn it into a deck overlooking the lake.
 

 












 
Back to the drawing board -2006 - a new set of stairs in a new location.. Once again with the assistance of Allan, Mary and friends, and so far so good, they are holding up well... except for a slight forward shift of one of the sections.. stair lesson number three.. the hill moves.

Latest project was built in 2008, new bigger deck outside the cottage..

It's been 5 years, so I am betting a new project is just around the corner..stay tuned!

Before I continue with a little Bitobi history, a quick taste of some good things to come this summer: The signature 25th anniversary dockside drink and dinner salad have been chosen.. picture strawberries and brandy, watermelon and avocado; The "Cottage Photo Memory Book" is complete and has been sent off for production...EVERYBODY is featured; a deal has been struck to get the "hill from hell" re-surfaced (yes those of you who were leaving their cars at the bottom of the hill, can once again safely drive up to the cottage parking lot). All good things that we can't wait for you to experience first hand!

Back to the saga.  About three years after we had settled into the cabin, we came up one rainy May weekend and saw a Remax For Sale sign on a tree next to the cottage down the road from us (and immediately took the sign down so that no one else would see it).  Not an easy decision, but in the end, we could not pass up such an amazing opportunity  That was 1998 and 15 years later we love our cottage as much as the first day we saw it.

Introducing the new cottage

..and brand new dock