The Art Of Cottaging

Summer. A bower of flowers, off a dirt road, Magnetawan. Wannabee cottagers hope for a backyard like this and a lake out front. They're not disappointed if the money works out. They'll overlook a lot of other things too when the weather's good. Like filling up their cruisers at the local marina at $170.00 a pop. Country life isn't exactly cheap, not if you want the glossy magazine version. With boats though, you should be able to get a good deal, used. Always more for sale, and you don't wait months for delivery. For the first big splurge, do your research and you could be grinning on a budget. Careful, the used ones have their secret histories like cars. Cottagers are forever trading up, or trading down when the wife files for divorce. Be brave and remember winching in and out of boat launches, the trailer usually parked outside your garage, boat tarped over in case of rain or mice, might qualify as that thing outside we never use from the soon to be ex-wife and why don't you rent a berth? The $20,000 adventure could be Boat For Sale, by fall, especially when the kids go to college. Cottages too, crest the same waves, but the glamor and high prices don't fade. It might be a sweet deal if you're part of a big city clan rolling in for the weekends. Otherwise you might be surprised at what a big and expensive deal it is to run your dream hideaway. But new cottagers show up all the time to take up the slack. With a little cottage fever and visions of barbecues and beer by the dock, the boating and swimming, the easy life of a Muskoka summer, they keep on retreading the cottage experience at least for their kids. It gets out of hand when the cottage turns into a long distance suburban chalet sprawl out of a cookie-cutter kit catalog like your neighbor's giant A frame over the living room, with the big triangle windows that look way better from the inside. Some days it's all worth it. Great weekends eventually do happen when everything's just right. Before the flies in spring while you're still hassling with the overwintering dust and must or maybe late summer when the bugs have been burned out by the hot sun, and everybody's favorite people do show up together, and no one forgets to smile or shrug.

A Lazy Day On The Lake

Summer. On the big arm of the Magnetawan near Lake Cecebe. Once we're in the city, we can get back to the country in comfort, some of us with the money. That's driven prices sky high in Muskoka and many other nice spots, near or far from the city. It's not fair to the locals who have to adjust to this city economy. Used to be they could save for something they could build on a lot somewhere, a cottage or a new home. Lots are just as juicy as cottages, when speculators find them and hang onto them long enough. Now the locals are mostly stuck in low-end housing in scruffy towns that cottagers wonder about. Why do these people live like this in the country? As if country people are rather stupid and want to live in a ramshackle bungalow on a postage stamp lot by the railroad tracks. If there is any real basis for resentment, locals for city slickers, this has to be it.

Bird On A Wire

Summer. Magnetawan. Only because Goldie Hawn lives a stone's throw away. If you listen closely you can hear a $5,000 wine cork popping. Celebrity watching is more meaningful when you find them live and not just on TV. Though why we bother at all is another modern mystery. Scholars and Social Scientists would say that glamour and pageantry go way back before Elvis. It's a proven social need to see Kings And Queens among us. Since we knocked them on the head to make way for rather dull democracies and even more lackluster politicians, we've had to reinvent them as folkloric heroes, Captain Ron, a scallywag who makes good. Or Kurt the knight in shining armor rescuing the damsel Goldie even if his faithful charger, the Mighty Dakota, breaks down and his trusty cell phone is rusty without a brazen tower in sight. It's their movie personas larger than life on the big screen that blaze somewhere in our imagination. If you bumped into them before Laugh-In, or if you'd left the TV off since then, would they stand out in a restaurant? Not unless Goldie dropped every plate in the house. In real life the breakables would have been soberly added to their bill in the best case scenario. Funny, we can't seem to have any fun in public. Seems we pay other people to have fun for us and laugh in anonymity in a darkened theater or in our private living room world. Or pay them to be glamorous for us. Locals like anyone, love these Real People from Hollywood a heartbeat away, but they can easily tough it out on Hockey Stars alone. And we've got 'em. Check out the 8X10 b&w glossies at the bars, autographed.

Lots Of Coffee And No Rush To Go

Summer. If you've found the right place to eat driving the long and winding roads of Muskoka, it can make your day. There aren't a whole lot of really great places, but a fair number that you'd feel good about. American, German and Italian restaurants are about what you find, some Chinese in the bigger towns. Count on lunch for the most variety when a lot of them are actually open. Tea rooms and delis vanish at 4:30 and 3:00 on Sundays. Family Restaurants are the mainstays, meaning respectable, no boozers and bikers, rather than kids throwing their food on the floor. Don't pass them up. Something more flashy or appealing is going to be hard to find. Besides, most of them deliver a square meal and the ambiance can be better than the steakhouse scene. But get there early, 8:00 at the latest. The best places are like this one, the Magnetawan Inn, been around a long time, homemade pies, lots of coffee, no rush to go.

Full Throttle

Spring. The Mag at full throttle. Every time I look through the viewfinder, I try not to settle for a jigsaw puzzle or picture postcard. I couldn't resist this one.

Down A Cottage Road

Spring. The waters start to flow. A lake off the Seguin River. In these remote spots, you can get lucky and find some British couple who've built their dream place, a marina, a restaurant, B&B, or a nest of cottages. Follow the signs for their side road destinations, though be prepared for some odd encounters with crusty old locals who might prefer the dilapidated cabin fever style of hospitality. What you'll usually find are cottages and more cottages on both sides of the road. Of course you should have got your coffee back in town. Stopped at that gas station. Now there's no place to stop. You keep driving, hoping for a public beach or at least a boat launch. After a half-dozen of these cottage malls, you realize they don't have any, every foot of lake and riverfront, private property. Locals and cottagers walking along their gravel road visiting each other, will be friendly and puzzled. A what? Oh, well, no, not over here. Try that next town. But keep going and you'll get lucky somewhere.

The Milk Run

Spring. Canada Geese on the big arm of the Magnetawan River to Lake Cecebe, near the friendly pocketsized town of The Mag. You always see the geese and ducks circling, assembling in the fall. When they return in spring they must sneak in. A few here, a few there, along the Muskoka route home. The express out and the milk run back. The trees always remind me of people.

A Slippery Walk

Spring. Not a lake, but a lot of snow turned to ice and melting into slabs, in the Magnetawan.

Terra Incognita

Spring. An anonymous lake in the Magnetawan mellowing in the warm April air. Even the best map you can find won't give you a name or the one lane track to it. There are thousands.