A Craft Beer Getaway

Summer. When the weather is off or on any day if local craft brewed beer is your thing, drop by one of the small breweries in cottage country. Tours and tastings are free and you can buy a case or two of British-style ale or a great lager to enjoy back at your cottage or resort. It's a good way to meet the locals and get some tips on what to see and do in your neighborhood. You'll also pick up the basics of brewing you might try out at home.

For a long time the old regional breweries were being bought up by the big labels to churn out more industrial lagers while eliminating the competition. Since the 1980's there's been a renewed interest in what was almost a lost tradition. New craft breweries have sprung up all over southern Ontario and the Great Lakes.

If you'd like the easy tour all in one place, go to Bracebridge August 29, 2009 for the First Annual Muskoka Beer Festival. Hosted by The Griffin Gastro Pub downtown, about 24 craft breweries from Ontario will be participating at nearby Annie Williams Park with non-stop beer and bands. Check out The Griffin anytime for a memorable pint, a good chat with friendly locals and the great food. It's a bit of old Bracebridge down Chancery Lane, cozy, intimate and casual. Live music Thursday evenings and Saturday afternoons. The outdoor deck out back has a touch of grunge, but you can smoke at least.

For a map to most of Ontario's cottage brewers and some essential beer lore see OntarioCraftBrewers. If you're driving out from Toronto, try stopping by one en route. Once in Muskoka, the nearest craft brewery is Lakes of Muskoka Cottage Brewery in Bracebridge, with tours and tastings on select Saturdays all summer through September 15th. Their Muskoka Honey Brown is no more expensive and way better than the big commercial lagers. In Ontario some of The Beer Store(s) carry it and their full line including their excellent Muskoka Cream Ale.

My beer adventure started recently while out west on a trip to Grey County near Durham. Charlie MacLean of MacLean's Ales in Normanby showed me around his new micro brewery you can visit at his hobby farm. Built last year and only open since January, The Battleaxe Brewery is producing a half-dozen traditional British beers. Local demand is so strong just on word of mouth that Charlie's already planning to expand. It's a testimonial to his many years as a brewmaster, not beginner's luck in case you'd like to try your hand at commercial brewing. He got his start in craft brewing in England back in 1979 with the Real Ale Movement. Brits even in Britain were grumbling over their beer, most of it mass produced not only off the shelf in bottles and cans, but even the keg beers at the pubs. An insipid pint of bitter had invaded the colourful local pubs as more and more and more of them were bought up by the big brewers as well as their smaller suppliers. The industry wanted economies of scale and big profits, more bland lager everywhere for the younger less discriminating crowd of Euro imbibers.

The subtle satisfying flavour of bitter from an unrefrigerated keg, pumped up by hand from the cool cellar below, with its modest but sticky head, was transformed into a lifeless flat and warm poor thing in a glass better suited for washing the mud off your boots. Or gassed to death with carbon dioxide for a pump and miles of foam like some ne'er do well Guinness bastard. Dreadful to see grown men weeping. But progress and profits did spawn a generation of Punks, Punk Rock and Wine Bars.

Back in Canada Charlie continued brewing. British-style pubs were making a comeback, now imported lock, stock and barrel with pressed tin ceilings, Pig and Whistles and all, into big Canadian towns. New breweries for British beers were starting to make inroads. Charlie wrote a beginner's guide to home brewing he couldn't get published. Publishers/Agents apply to charles.maclean(at)sympatico(dot)ca

Perseverance paid off, and after 12 years as Brewmaster of the F&M Brewery in Guelph, another craft brewery you can visit, Charlie started his own MacLean's Ales in Grey County. Talking to Charlie it all sounds simple enough. For ale you cook your local select barley and 90% of your hops in a copper kettle, then cool that down and filter, before you transfer it to the stainless steel fermenter and add brewer's yeast and the rest of your hops for more flavour. Keeping the temperature rather warm at 22 C you watch the fermenting for 3 or 4 days and then filter again before cold conditioning and then the bottling. About 2 weeks work for a batch. The result: about the best beer you can remember. Try MacLean's Farmhouse Ale for a country smile. If you want a lager, it's a slower cool fermentation that makes it happen, but not at MacLean's Ales.

In case you think stainless steel is cheating, fermenting in wood barrels was a tricky thing to do, often marring flavours and adding nasty bacteria. Even in the old days brewers used pitch to line their barrels, says Charlie. Did it taste pitchy? No says Charlie, the barrels left to cure a bit before use. So a modern craft beer is near to what your English ancestors were drinking if you have any, though their beer was cloudy with all the yeast still in the beer. Charlie does brew some keg conditioned beer without filtering, if you like your beer cloudy. No one thought of filtering beer in England until cheaper industrial glass replaced ceramic mugs, he told me. Seeing how cloudy it was in a clear glass changed our habits. Now we admire its translucent beauty, though the stouts are as dark as ever.

Today you need to insure your craft beer is not only good, but free of contaminants, meeting government standards during brewing and lab tests. Craft brewing means first class sterile equipment and bottling, and a lot of care, not what you can get away with in home brewing. That way too unlike the commercial beers, you avoid Pasteurization and wrecking a lively beer. To make it work you need some passion for the art as well as methodical patience. Of course the real secrets are the ingredients and the formulas, how to tweak them to get the kind of beer you want. Charlie has the experience and is very particular about his ingredients, preferring local barley and even growing some of his own hops.

But it's also fun and satisfying to be your own brewmaster. Having a perfect pint is a close second. If you're thinking this could be your new hobby, it's easy enough to start with all the brew your own beer stores that supply the equipment, their premises, and the know-how.

Going for your own brewery as Charlie found out, is a bigger deal than you might think, even if you're a brewmaster. Before starting to build make sure you can build. It's not only zoning laws that could stop you, it's also the quirks of old laws on the books that can make it illegal to build a brewery near a school or church. In Grey County your brewery has to be at least 2 kilometers away from either. If you're stuck with a church close by you might be able to get their permission to go ahead. Other permissions might apply too. If you have commercial zoning, are you sure that includes retail so you can sell your beer on site? Behind every pint there's a story.

If you're in the Durham area, Charlie MacLean will be glad to show you around or sell you some of his brews by appointment via his email above, or in a pinch if you're nearby you can call him at 519-369-5061. He still does consulting for F&M in Guelph and the new Highlander Brew Co in South River, Ontario, so you could sample some of his beers that way too.

If you're not close enough to get in on the Ontario brewing action, try Quebec or around the Great Lakes in this free guide by Great Lakes Brewing News.

Still too far away? Brewing News regional guides cover most of the beer frontier in the U.S. and Canada.

Cheers!

Dragon Boats And A Great Steel Band

Summer. Summer's back again in Muskoka. A bit late getting here and on the heels of the most dismal Spring we've had since oldtimers can remember. The good news: cold days and frosty nights knocked the blackflies and noseeums from a 6 week vacation down to about a week about 2 weeks ago when we had a warm spell.

Cottagers still came early, but it didn't help their humor much. Too blasted cold to do anything but complain. A disaster too for gardeners who planted early and found their flower beds burned by regular and nasty cold snaps.

Now you'd never know. People are smiling, flowers replanted, kids out of school and the cottagers back in action on their seadoos and power boats. A close shave though for the Annual Parry Sound Dragon Boat Festival which looked like it would have been a bust just the day before with thunderstorms brewing that never showed.

Turned out to be a great weekend, well better say an okiedokie Friday for the first day of the Festival and a really great Saturday for the races. Beach weather and ice cream, plus hundreds of folks showed up from the town and as many from out of town, and a few Dragon Boat Diehards from Toronto.

Up until this year it seemed it would have been just a local thing. Suddenly it's the big thing with more boats, more teams and more races. Can't say there was a lot of excitement because you had to be rowing for that, knowing whose time you had to beat. Not a conventional race, but boats going out and circling and coming back and teams changing at the dock and the new teams heading out in the same boats. Best time wins. And various races for various classes, from high school kids racing each other to corporate races for the big box stores and local larger stores and businesses, the newspaper, the radio station, the big drug store. But you couldn't tell who was going out and who was leading, unless you were at the dock asking questions or following the action with binoculars and some guy at your elbow telling you what's happening. Though there were was a big network of pro equipment PA boxes barking out the action, that didn't seem to help. A printed program would have been an idea and maybe somebody had one but you couldn't find anything except the big board for the races that looked Mesopotamian.



No one cared anyway. It was the local color that counted. Being out on a great day at a big event with a lot of people where you could get something to eat for a change at Waubuno Beach, wow, even get a $5 beer at the beer tent and listen to some free live music.


That was the other big thing going on, a gigantic steel band from Sprucedale, the Northern Lights Steel Orchestra. Boggling after seeing little enough live music anywhere. Fiddlers at the Canadian Legion Hall or a rock band at a pub for under 25ers. Suddenly there's 60 guys playing on fancy chromed steel drums from batteries of giant bass drums to small snare steel drums with congas and a drum kit for the beat.

A tinkling and rather mellow Sunday Concert In The Park experience. None of the hi jinks and whistles from the steel bands you might have seen in Jamaica or Trinidad. More like Broadway Show music and old faves translated for a giant steel band. La Bamba was about as far south as we got, but it was still mesmerizing.


With so many drums and so many musicians it cut across expectations and the people at the adjoining beer tent were having fun. Those in the band were concentrating eyes closed, playing without sheet music, so they had to be in on the vibe or they'd get lost, especially when there wasn't a band leader with a baton to wake you up. Yet they put out a professional sound and nobody got lost and nobody wandered from the melody. Kind of inspirational, with a wide cross-section of people from a few youngsters to old folks and everybody in between, few of them with any steel band experience except for the few black guys playing, and most with no musical background either.


So how did they do it? Well they learned on the job. About 10 years ago Mervyn Jordan in Sprucedale started up the Northern Lights Steel Orchestra. With a place to play, some steel drums and free classes on how to play, it grew from there. Not commercial, not subsidized by government, not a charity either as it's a real charity where everyone kicks in their own time and money to make it work. A few private sponsors do the rest. The Northern Lights Steel Orchestra plays for free too. If you want to have them over for a public or private event in Ontario they'll come if you cover their travel expenses and renting a truck. The Orchestra supplies their own tent and equipment.

I should have told Larry Shepard who runs the show that they ought to record and sell CDs. They're that good. I did say though I thought they should expand their repertoire towards the calypso and reggae scene,

but then he shrugged saying it would be a big departure from what they've been doing and it seems that most of their musicians aren't into that sort of rhythm being from white Anglo easy listening backgrounds where you don't build up a sweat if you can help it.

They've been invited every year to play Toronto's Caribbean carnival, Caribana. So far they've declined. Not what you would call a strictly family event, with the music loud and raw, and the crowds at a hot million partygoers, sometimes raunchy and rough. A flashy and electric spectacle, to catch every summer if you don't stick out like whitey's sore thumb and make a habit of treading on toes.

What makes the Northern Lights a formidable experience is you can join. Members come from across Canada and the U.S with some from the Carribean. If you showed up at your local symphony without a horn and no musical experience, how far would you get? You can check out their website www.nlso.ca on how to join and drop Larry an email at info@nlso.ca Sponsors, private and corporate are welcome. Check the NLSO website for a bit of 'steel pan' history and scheduled concerts happening about every week throughout Ontario during the summer and into fall.
















What you need to join the Northern Lights is just the time you want to invest in taking free classes at Sprucedale, Ontario which run year 'round and when you're good enough you can play with the Northern Lights as they travel around Ontario during the summer through October. All you do is cover your own expenses, meals and accommodations. It's
like a music camp that goes on tour.

Rosseau Antiques Fair

Summer. Rosseau Antiques Fair. On weekends local dealers set up their tables around the big antiques barn on the main drag, the 141. It could have more pizazz. It looks more like a flea market, but you won't find DVDs or T shirts. The antiques are the rummage sale variety, in a case you're looking for a Van Gogh cheap. More the nick-nacks you might find in your garage, but among the stencilled dinner plates from the 1950s, the carpenters' tools, the folding rules, the glass and pots, the box of paperbacks, the rusty egg beaters, the old luggage, the wagon wheels, the bits and pieces from an old house, you'll find something you could use at the cottage, or if you get lucky there might be a valuable broach in a glass case of costume jewellery. With me it's been a habit to wander through the tables of bric-a-brac from garage sales to church bazaars or these outdoor fairs, though I'd say a real find over the years is more and more a rare thing. The good stuff winds up in the pricey antiques shops, because the dealers skim through their stock more carefully. Seems too, there's less available even in country antique galleries, with their best pieces going up for auction in the big city. Probably it's the Antiques Roadshow effect. There's also more of a mania for anything old, because it's collectible and a better deal or
investment than something new everybody has. The mania for anything new that started in the 1950s, only survives in electronics. People tend to hang on to what they've got. So the best places for an exciting bargain are the estate sales where most of the dealers go to find their odds and ends, while looking for the best pieces they can turnover fast. So prices are up, way way up. The glut in antiques that also started in the 1950s dried up by the early 70s. The best deals and in enormous variety came from Cuba, with Cubans and foreigners fleeing the Revolution.

A heady time for anybody in the antiques business. The quality of real European antiques was exceptional and the prices were ridiculous, an enormous amount of furniture you think no one would have the time to pack, showing up in gigantic dealer warehouses in New York, and from there everywhere else. You could get a Steinway Grand for a grand, a Majolica pot too rare for an orange tree for $30, an inlaid Boulle desk, maybe by Boulle himself, for $500. For 3 or 4 years it was buyer pandemonium. Dealers buying all this stuff by the truckload, mortgaging themselves to the hilt, couldn't imagine it would end. But to fuel the buying, one thing was missing: Prices didn't go up. Many dealers found themselves stuck with huge inventories, their buyers saturated. With no profits,
buyers lost interest and the bubble burst. Banks foreclosed on cash-starved dealers. The sad thing was that these were mostly the old school connoisseurs, who really loved what was fine and beautiful, and were in the antique business, not really for profit, but to preserve and pass on this legacy to their clients. Their precious finds in the hands of the banks, were knocked down at bankruptcy auctions for next to nothing, a desperate slash and grab by their own business partners, these once friendly bankers. It was a betrayal that's now familiar in these tough times of foreclosures. By the mid 80's there was a recovery of sorts in the antique market, new people in the business and a new breed of collectors and speculators willing to buy paintings by the yard for their bank vaults.

Austin Clarke's Bajan Birthday BBQ

Summer. Leacock Summer Festival, Orillia. The writer himself, Austin Chesterfield Clarke. Earlier in the day at Bala, I had something of a literary relapse. It started with one of the cottage summer weeklies you find in bright boxes on the street. The Bala Triathlon had come and gone by eleven o'clock, as I read the one line event over a rare and excellent double espresso at Olivers almost in the laundromat. Archers on bicycles fording a river? I'll never know. Nothing much else, the Wet T Shirt Night at The Kee, tomorrow or Roller Skating Monday, Ball Hockey Tuesday, Bala Lions Dance Saturday, and the oddest news and features in the paper, like "Inflationary trend dominates bond market future" or "Bracebridge firm fined $1,500 for aggregate pit operating without licence". One piece of real cottage news: "All I can say about this summer so far is that it has been buggy and wet. . ." writes Peter Sutherland elsewhere in the Muskoka Treasury. At least it was hot and dry, rain only threatening on the patio. Looking through the tabloid for what else I missed, of course, the Leacock Summer Festival, about a half hour down the overcrowded, way too fast and nasty narrow and harrowing Hwy 11, the trucker's favorite. Watch out for deer and bikers and the OPP. The wind nearly tottered my cardboard coffee cup. I suppose I should have stayed safely at home, or on the beach with the dogs frisking about, in contravention of beach rules posted, but then dogs aren't noted for any sort of literary sense. Nearby on the patio cement, I noted another from the clan of canines to confirm my uneasy thoughts. In-ev-ita--boo-ull, this big mutt might have wined, but well enough leashed to restrain any idea of a fortuitous double-pawed leap into my lap. About to roam further into Bala, I caught myself in time. One more go through the where was it article in dreary past tense. Opened Tuesday, and it's Sunday, a 6 day event. Which Tuesday? Is it too much ink spilled, is it overly verbose to add some Arabic numerals? MT published when? July 24, no year, no page numbers, and what blasted day was that, in 2008 wasn't it? I needed a calendar to calm me down, something solid and familiar I could trust. It always happens with a strange juxtaposition of events. Prickly heat in combination with a lack of journalistic common sense bordering on journalistic misdemeanors. I made the calculations, on my fingers, going backwards and forwards to double check them. Maybe I was in luck. Perhaps this spell of missed and misspent opportunities that seemed to dog me every weekend for years, was finally about to break? A closing gala barbecue, what, afternoon? Evening? Lunch? With whom besides Mr Clarke, but of course the Giller Prize Winner, so readable enough, writers often more interesting than their work, quite opposite to actors. All ego or not enough loose change in their conversation to talk about anything other than other VIPs, like name-dropping asides to their entourage in tow. An exception though for Film Festivals, the crowds, the glamour and film fanatics who know how to gush or be cerebral. Not exactly like that at literary readings. Subdued, humming at best. But for a writer, absolutely an exciting prospect, literary people, a bar and BBQ. Though would any be there after the Hwy 11 ordeal and other delays, like where exactly was this BBQ? Orillia, a vast metropolis to the uninitiated. The MT was sure to get a snappy Letter to the Editor, even if they no longer published any. I would see to that at least, especially after I arrived and no one was to be found except myself. Or in the other noteworthy case, an unhappily misfiring literary boondoggle, which should not have been newsworthy of even a Page Zero. Perhaps it was all part of a premonition I was having? Something seemed to be transforming about me, a subtle alteration of consciousness perhaps, like a chameleon changing colors, though that no doubt was due to the empty tube of SPF-30 still in the glove compartment. Finally, it struck me. I was having a literary relapse. I had to go to Orillia or else.

An uneventful arrival, except for 3 conflicting versions of what had happened, or might happen and where Austin's Birthday BBQ might be, if it hadn't happened, from friendly natives of Orillia who all agreed that I had missed the Leacock Sidewalk Sale yesterday. Down a long winding path along the lake, more the smooth asphalt bicycle or rollerblading variety, to Old Brewery Bay, maybe a 15 minute walk from the dock and past entire Chinese families 3 generations strong, fishing excitedly along a promising stretch of 18 inch sandy beach. To Museum Road, though no one mentioned it, the obvious dirction to Leacock House and Leacock Museum past Leacock Point Estates, barely estatical, and the Job Fair yesterday at the giant long-term care facility, and on and down to the lake again after being mislead by a sign pointing left, away from Museum Rd, now more the half hour walk with misdirections. But worthwhile with the sky clearing and a friendly bit of sunshine sparkling off the water. Though you could drive and get lost too, but not in any sort of charming way.

In luck at last. A tent extending to near Old Brewery Bay from the visitors' center and restaurant, was overflowing with literary personages. A stately columned mansion across the drive, Leacock's splendid home he'd had built 80 years ago. People weren't eating yet, a good sign I was in time. The excitement mounted. In the back of my mind I thought I might run into Patrick Crean, the distinguished Publisher and Editor of Thomas Allen & Son, where I had recently submitted my novel, Up On Seven Dollars. Hadn't heard back yet, but it was still early. The wheels were turning, but would they engage? Wasn't that Jane Urquhart in white? But having had to go through the preliminaries, like purchasing a ticket and staking out the last possible desirable seat under the tent instead of the stuffier main dining room, she was gone. But I'd found a friendly long table and the good humor was contagious. Dinner ready, a long line formed instantly for the buffet, presided over by our chef and host, Austin Clarke in dreadlocks. I nodded appreciatively, plenty of jerk chicken and roasted pork tenderloin, plus the earlier rum punch. A mellow evening on the way. After the food and a warm official welcoming from the Stephen Leacock Museum people and the Barbados Tourism Board, partners in the event, Austin took charge. If his wordless manner was engaging, the long stride in his words and pauses awoke a magical sense of time past, of the days of storytellers and balladeers, the accents Bajan, from his island of Barbados. Though he had been away a long long time from his ancient roots and the tropical sun, he might have arrived only the other day to tell us a bit about drawing breath and living life in a gentler way.

Leacock Summer Festival, http://www.leacockmuseum.com/
Orillia, Ontario, Canada, http://www.city.orillia.on.ca/

Art In The Park

Summer, Harper Pottery, Parry Sound. This is the potter himself, Jonathan Harper. Every summer, about 50 artists and artisans descend on Market Square, by the old firehall and the new library, to show us their stuff. Fairs like Art in the Park, in some of the bigger towns throughout cottage country, are about the best place for something special to hang on the living room wall or put on your table. There are some remarkable finds like Harper Pottery, really stiking, moving and beautiful. A lot though is crafts and knick-knacks granny and the kids might like, a garage sale of new junk, or better hand-made, sometimes quite special, geegaws. Sunday painters also show up with a mixed collection of the good, bad and the ugly. But there's plenty of solid work you'd be happy to find. Since the higher end arts and crafts are mostly sold by art galleries and pricey shops, the show and sale prices at these events tend to be a bargain. And with the economy stagnant for years now, prices haven't gone up much either. Jonathan says that what's hurting is cheap and recently better quality pottery from China, aimed at his clientele and even copying the designs of artisanal pottery, knockoffs like of Gucci, now swamping the artisans too. Next time you're thinking of crockery, look for the real thing from your local potters. The quality, esthetic and collectable value only costs a few dollars more. Contact Jonathan at Harper Pottery in Waterdown, Ontario at (905) 690-0049.

Ivan Trotter works in Toronto, but tours the fairs in summer. Painting professionally for the last 15 years, he now concentrates on French and Italian motifs, which sell better than Spanish or Greek scenes, with Canadian and American too familiar over here to be sought after much. That light and color he sees in the lush landscapes of Europe, also suits water-based acrylics he uses now instead of oils and turps, a health hazard endured by many old painters. It always surprises me in modern art how much an artist's work can vary from picture to picture, never mind from year to year. Many don't seem to find a groove or a style which could make them popular and collectable. Contact Ivan Trotter at http://www.artbyivan.com/

Stoney Creek Woodturning. For John Van Kessel, a hobby became a second carreer after he retired from education in London, Ontario. He has the knack of a true professional, whose work speaks fondly of the woods he uses. You might think he wanderers the forests, but through connections in his town, he manages to find most of his wood from trees that have been cleared from city streets. Since he was a high school principal, I couldn't resist asking him what he's seen happening over the years with kids themselves. "Worst than they've ever been and better than they've ever been. More mature and socially conscious or completely out of control." No surprises, more or less what I thought. Contact John at Stoney Creek Woodturning, in London, Ontario at cvkessel@sympatico.ca

Brigitte Nowak works in Toronto. But she's had solid connections with Parry Sound for 50 years, coming up every summer to her family's cottage. She's seen the big transitions in country life, lately she comments, "Like the BMW's and their high-profile people who like to spend their money." Meaning further south especially around Port Carling, where her work sells well at an art gallery. Here it's still mostly pickups and SUVs, but she does agree, "Parry Sound is special, a Frontier Town mentality," she says, (Gateway to the North-- you get that in tourist brochures) "with much the same feeling as Yellowknife." That's about as far north as you ever want to go. Brigitte wasn't kidding. She knows Yellowknife. I do sort of, after several hours of Margaritas in Mexico with this hard-drinking gal from Yellowknife. ¡Viva México! By the way, I'd like to say hi to all my friends in Puerto Vallarta, Guadalajara and San Miguel. ¡No perderéis Guanajuato! And to thousands more new friends over there who read this blog, I was pleasantly surprised to find out recently. ¡Hola muchachos y gracias, todos! Anyway Brigitte's work has a wide range beyond country landscapes which she didn't bring along. Contact Brigitte or see more on her website http://www.brigittenowak.com/index.html

Aspen Valley Wildlife Sanctuary

Spring for a change, from a visit today to the Aspen Valley Wildlife Sanctuary, near Rosseau, with Audrey Tournay. You don't necessarily plan on these things. Life happens when you're thinking of other things, an echo from John Lennon. Audrey was a schoolteacher in St Catherines when in the mid '60's someone gave her two orphaned skunks. "They're almost as nice as beavers, and funny too." Now it's 400 skunks later, and only skunked 8 times. It took a few more years and buying an abandoned farm to set her on her way. A vet from Parry Sound kept dropping over with various adorable wild animals he'd doctored, but not yet strong enough or old enough to get back to the wild. No one, Audrey found, not the government nor any other agency would care for them. So she wound up doing the job herself on her 800 acre farm. All sorts of animals, mostly local, some exotic like a lion she has now from BC, that grew too big for a pet. Animals with hard luck stories, the majority not injured like you might expect, but young and orphaned, parents killed by cars, but mostly by hunters. Bears for instance, about 90 today in a woodland pen, black and brown, really the same species, even born together in the same litter, are common guests. At about 18 months they go back to the wild. Documentary film crews have showed up for the emotional moment. Deer, wolves still, though with so few now, they're mating with coyotes who've moved north, even with dogs. Audrey's is part coyote, as it happens. Like her other friends, from around 200 in the spring to a thousand by fall, her dog found her too. And just about any other wild animal in these parts, from raccoons, to deer and owls. Audrey never turns a wild animal away.

Beavers are Audrey's favorites. Any current resident would make himself at home in your lap, and do in hers when pint-sized, feeding and nuzzling. Since they're to return to the wild, close human contact is kept to a minimum. They're as wonderful as Grey Owl says they are, the one who used to be a trapper and lived around Parry Sound. His cabin was loaded with them, very sociable and unstoppable. Can't sit still for a minute unless they're sleeping in your bed. If you're a cottager, they could wind up gnawing your furniture. See the Aspen Valley website on how to deal with furry and feathered visitors, in a kindly way. There's a downloadable pdf, Living with Wildlife. Animals should be respected and protected. With a little understanding, they'll mind their own business, even bears.

Deer are still a delightful sight, prancing across roads and highways, so always be prepared to stop in cottage country. At Aspen Valley, unlike many zoos, they're happy here. For one thing, they're in the country, and penned in very large woodland enclosures, and that only for a time, so they can go back into the wild when they're big and strong enough. The Sanctuary is open to the public from Victoria Day through Canadian Thanksgiving, admission by donation. It's a great outing for kids and not a commercial venture. Bring a picnic lunch and roam around. Visit some animal friends. It's amazing to be able to get close to them. Over the years, as more wild animals have descended, still with no other place to go, Audrey's had to expand. Fortunately through donations and sponsors, but still no money from the government, she's been able to hire a small staff and enlist some volunteers. They're an enthusiastic lot, usually a half-dozen students from Germany, Switzerland and England, some returning year after year. It's the enchantment of the wild and wide open spaces and of course the animals. If you're a cottager, staying for the summer, check out the Sanctuary's nature study courses for your kids. Drop in and see Audrey, a great and gracious lady. She's an artist and storyteller too, inspired by her bears and beavers.

Kids And Boats And Steamships

Summer. Lake Rosseau. Could be the old days, except for the boat and clothes, when there were more families. In back, an original boat works of which there were a lot. Muskoka was famous for canoes and launches. You should check out an exceptional boating museum in Gravenhurst, Grace and Speed, the Muskoka Boat & Heritage Centre, down at the newly redeveloped wharf, a pretty classy affair. Loads of perfectly preserved boats and canoes, some in water, a 6 million dollar jaw dropping experience. Also commemorates the old steamships and grand hotels in Muskoka. While in Gravenhurst, a bustling metropolis in comparison to most other Muskoka towns, like they say on game shows, you've just won a fabulous boat trip on a real STEAMSHIP! Check out the RMS Segwun from 1887. Sail to delightful Port Carling and Millionaires Row. And you can, for real.

The Tourist Invasion

Summer. Fairs and Events and how to find them. Look for a lot of parked cars. Community Centres usually doubling as ice rinks are worth a detour just to see what's posted or maybe you'll get lucky and run into a dance or show. This one in Bancroft, hosts Canada's biggest Rock and Mineral Show, the Gemboree, a must for rock hounds who drive in from all over the continent. Tourist Info booths will load you up with brochures and booklets. When you wade through all the advertising, you'll often find something where the blasted date is missing, with no contact information. Or a number that doesn't answer. Talk to a live guide if there is one. Locals will oblige with approximations, like their street and road directions. Local newspapers are usually the best source for events and any large town's Chamber of Commerce. Better still, talk to the hotel or resort desk before you reserve and see how helpful and professional they are. In the country you're not going to find much, maybe roadside stands for berries and corn, and the occasional auction and artist's studio. High quality handmade pottery right from the potters themselves, with some interesting technical information on how your piece was made, will give you years of pleasure, as a genuine souvenir of Muskoka. Painters are even more numerous, but the emphasis is on fairly routine landscapes. Finding something great is the adventure. Consider yourself a treasure hunter and you will find one or at least some memories to take home. Good luck.

Little Daredevils

Summer. TugFest, Parry Sound. Tugboats from all over Georgian Bay, and that's as big as Lake Erie, chug into harbor to hang around and show their stuff. Retired now like most of their skippers who rescued them from the scrapyard, now carefully restored and freshly painted, they're back in action as little daredevils who can go just about anywhere. Friendly too. Climb aboard for your own personal tour. The Mink Isle is Parry Sound's own, the most photographed and painted. A score of amateurs retired from city and town, even cottagers retired from cottaging, have found a new life as artists, painting her and Ontario's longest train bridge, the one in back.

The Not So Wild Wilderness

Summer. Kids from camp, Bala Beach. Now that I think about it, the kids were only tired. I remember a camp like that where if you weren't huffing and puffing up the trail or you didn't get your lean-to up before dark, well, you weren't having any fun.

Bored or Exhausted

Summer. Kids from camp, Bala Beach. If you're a parent, then you know about all these weekend events for visitors, from family lunches and golf at the posh camps, to pork and beans and potato sack races. There's a score of camps and summer schools, and with water all around, the regatta is the big thing. Camps on a budget, it's two or three canoes and qualifying rounds. Here it's neither. A wilderness field trip in Muskoka, kids bored, not even parents around to make them embarrassed.

The Cardboard Canoe Race

Spring. White Squall Paddling Centre Open House, near Carling, and not Port Carling. If you're feeling reckless and you're handy with duct tape and cardboard, build your own canoe for the big race. Odds of sinking, about 50%. A fun day and kids welcome, plus coffee, food and a band, from the good people at White Squall Outfitters, Parry Sound. For May 2008 and beyond, it's going to be the big weekend deal, souped up to the Georgian Bay Kayak & Canoe Festival with hands-on workshops. Bring your wetsuit.

Surviving Your Wilderness Adventure

Spring. White Squall Paddling Centre Open House, near Carling, and not Port Carling. One thing you could do is try out a canoe or kayak at their idyllic paddling school or sign up for a course on surviving your wilderness adventure. It's the best place to buy your gear, small boating or camping, either here or at their store in Parry Sound, a half hour away.

An Ocean Liner Deep In Fresh Water

Summer. The Columbus at the town dock, Parry Sound. Every year the Germans land, twice in August going out and coming back from the Thirty Thousand Islands. It's impressive especially out of context, an ocean liner deep in fresh water a thousand miles from New York harbor. Would be nice if you could meet the Germans, but a Customs fence keeps them at bay during the 2 hour stopover. Probably it's the same Germans every year.

A Splash Of Color

Summer. Shriners in full regalia, Parry Sound. A monument dedicated to the Waubuno Shrine Club and members past and present. For a small town of 6500, there are clubs for everyone. The Lions, Rotarians, the Masons, the Optimists, and another half dozen big ones, the Royal Canadian Legion, the Curling Club and a few more purely local Friends Of and Seniors' Clubs, dominate the social scene like hockey does at the BOCC (Bobby Orr Community Centre).

Being Spontaneous

Summer. Dragon Boat Festival, Parry Sound. It's the spontaneous moments that make us happy. A vacation spot makes it easier. Travelling might be best. If you think back to your last trip and check your photos, you should find plenty to remind you of them. Since we can't travel all the time, though we need those bursts of fun, really we should try to be more spontaneous. In Canada, that's tough. Beyond a smile, nod or wink, maybe Canadians should rehearse or go into therapy, at least Americans tend to think so, but they say whatsamadder with these people? A one way conversation overheard outside a restaurant in front of the menu under glass: They got steak and seafood? Know this place? When was the last time you? Oh, so you're a tourist around here. Where you from? We came down from, where was it? As for packing in more memorable moments into an everyday routine, I've rediscovered taking a compact camera everywhere I go. Looking around for a subject to snap, you wind up finding them. It forces you to pause and think and sometimes meet people and share a little something beyond the weather. Plus you've got the pictures.

A Blue Ford Pickup Is Blocking A Driveway

Summer. Dragon Boat Festival, Parry Sound, Opening Ceremonies and the Dragons. Usually I tough it out on the bleachers with everybody else. Only chance to see certain notables in sweaty suits or the guy who needs to move his car, and chat under your breath with who's there. You can always check your watch every 5 minutes while the paper dragons are getting ready, kids supplying caterpillar feet for the dance.

Seen It All Before

Summer. Dragon Boat Festival, Parry Sound. Gifts and souvenirs, the Chinese connection. I remember the good old days, Made in Japan.

The Kids Steal The Show

Summer. Dragon Boat Festival, Parry Sound. The crowd, the beer tent, and band later. The kids steal the show. Volunteers put everything together. There's such a lot of volunteering going on that there aren't enough paid jobs and 20% of the town's on social assistance and unemployment benefits during the winter off season. A trend happening everywhere. Started with bored seniors and housewives in the '50's and now it's the leading growth industry. I have a feeling low unemployment statistics from Washington to Ottawa factor in working volunteers, inventories and projections nobody could trace. Now, of course, we need and appreciate these volunteers, government quite happy to cut back on social services to make room for them. With festivals it's a different story. Socializing the majority of people has never been a government priority. Perhaps the anti socials they are supporting in jails, on welfare, in therapy, wouldn't be so antisocial if there was a public social life for everyone. Thanks, volunteers.

And No Thai Food

Summer. Dragon Boat Festival, Parry Sound. The ladies. Oops wrong festival, but top marks for trying. Who cares anyway. If you can mix the Bobby Orr Museum with the Bobby Orr Hockey Hall of Fame (so far so good) at the ahem, Arts Center for Wannabes & Soundalikes, how can you go wrong? Though there is a bona fide music festival early summer at the most 'pensive barn in these parks, as Charlie (Parry Sound's own, like Bobby and all the Orrs including the gang in Orrville) Farquharson would say, scratching his noggin on it. This is the one to fly to from anywhere you are, to hear Anton Kuerti play piano like Mozart, Chopin, Shubert, Beethoven, at The Festival of the Sound, in a splendid, once inside, boutique concert hall, The Charles W. Stockey Centre for the Performing Arts.