On November 29th, In Canada, lol, I set out to paddle Lyons Creek in Niagara Falls, Ontario. Yes, I was wearing snow pants, a very warm ski jacket and a toque, but I was going paddling and I was stoked!!! On Thursday I had gone to Outdoors Oriented and picked up a pair of Marmot Connect Gloves. Whenever I am at the store, I always get valuable advice from someone there, this visit was no different. [...]
After publishing my post on the Marmot Connect Gloves and finding the ones I had too large for me and not as effective as I'd like them, I spoke to my favourite outdoors store contact, Jamie at Outdoors Oriented. He advised that the gloves did indeed look too big for me and he wanted to resolve the issue for me. Hence, why I love this place so much! I went in on Thursday after work and Jamie [...]
On Sunday November 22nd, I went on a very chilly paddle on Richardson Creek in St. Catharines, Ontario. The paddle was absolutely stunning and as I have this blog, I spent a huge amount of the paddle taking photos! (plus I just love it!) Four hundred and eighteen photos to be exact! As I take all my photos with my iPhone, I can not do so without taking off my gloves. My hands started to get numb [...]
I purchased my kayak in the spring of 2012 from Outdoors Oriented at their Pack and Paddle day they have annually. It's such a great idea! They set up a bunch of booths and have some of the line reps come out and they have a bunch of their boats at Jordan Harbour for people to test them out. It's definitely hard to try a boat in a store and this is a great solution for that! [...]
Thanksgiving weekend I was in Mckellar, Ontario at Glenwood Resort with my adopted Up North family, the Burnetts. I brought my kayak up and paddled all 3 mornings I was there, along with a few evenings, and took quite a few fall photos. I thought it would be fun to share them here with you in a photo blog. Hope you like it! Last year when I was here, I took a picture of [...]
I have been hearing about the great Bon Echo Provincial Park for many years now. I had wanted to explore it and seeing as I had a free weekend in September and a willing and eager camping partner, the time to visit there had come! I did my best to research Bon Echo but other than the Ontario Parks Website and a few posts here and there, I couldn't find a whole lot. I contacted Bon [...]
In 2002, I completed my first backcountry trip in Algonquin Provincial Park. It was awesome and I was immediately hooked! Over the years, I have completed approximately 25 backcountry trips and have loved every single one of them. I have gear to both backpack into the backcountry, or paddle in to sites, however, I much prefer the latter as it is a lot less work! I love the solace of the backcountry but do not need [...]
It's funny the reactions you get from people when you tell them you are going on a solo backcountry trip! I'm not 100% sure if it's because I am female, or just because people don't really understand what spending time in nature does for your soul? From the very first time I went backcountry camping in 2002, I was hooked! On that trip I was in for 5 days and stayed on 4 different lakes. [...]
Every year I take my mom to the Parkway Cottages & Resort in Dwight, Ontario. I went there in 2001 after my very first backcountry trip in Algonquin Park. Five days of roughing it, followed by 5 days of cottaging. It was a great trip and since then I have been going back occasionally. One year, I decided to take my mom for her birthday and she has wanted to go there every year since. [...]
On Saturday August 1st, I put my kayak up on my truck and headed to Outdoors Oriented http://outdoorsoriented.com to meet my friends Andrea and Kim. We had made plans to go for a paddle today at the Welland Recreational Canal http://www.canalcorp.ca/site/home, but after checking the weather forecast, I needed to make a tough decision. Do I risk paddling with new paddlers in 33km gusts in what people have called 'a wind tunnel' in an area I've never [...]