Longpoint Provincial Park – Playing with FIRE!

Longpoint Provincial Park is the fourth oldest park in Ontario, boasting over 1.5 km’s of sandy beach!  It is one of my favourite beaches in Ontario and I have been camping at Longpoint for about 8 years straight now.

The tradition was started by my friend Cynthia, who used to have a group of her friends join her there annually, and has continued on with our volleyball group, spending a few days of fun in the sun, playing games and enjoying life together! On any given day during our stay there we will participate in Beach Volleyball, washer toss, ladder golf, dice, yahtzee, beersbee, euchre, crazy 8’s, football in the water, frisbee in the water, wave slamming,  bocce ball and pretty much any other game we can think up and compete against each other in. I’m quite sure over the years, there are days where we have played all in one day!

I left work on Thursday at 430, headed home to pack up the cooler and headed out to the Park!  From St. Catharines, Longpoint is only a 2 hour drive, as long as there is no construction going on along the way.  This time there was, so the trip there took about two hours and twenty minutes but close enough.  The other 4 people in our group had arrived earlier and had set up most of the camp, so when my friend and I arrived, we had little to set up, so we got started and got it done quick! Cynthia had booked sites 278 and 279, not our usual sites as they had been snatched up in March when Cyn went to book them, but still very good sites indeed!  Our sleeping tents were all put on 278 and 279 was used for our kitchen/fire site as it was the last row in the campground and behind it was the public beach parking lot.  This way we didn’t have to worry as much about making noise at night as we only had one neighbour to our left and no one else super close by.  It was a great set up and worked out really well!

After set up we enjoyed some mountain pies as it was pie night tonight initiated and carried out by our awesome organizer, Cynthia.  If you’ve never had a mountain pie, you are missing out. They go by many names, mountain pies, pie irons, pudgy pies, campfire pies, etc, whatever you want to call them, they are delicious and they make a fabulous dinner, lunch or snack!  Basically it’s like a grilled sandwich, you use bread, sandwich bread works best due to the size, and the pie fillings.

You can create it several ways, today we were buttering the outside of the bread and placing them in the irons. After that you add whatever you like for the filling.  Thursday night my pie had mozzarella cheese, a bit of pizza sauce, mushroom, pepperoni and green peppers. We also had dessert pies with apple pie filling! So good!  My favourite pie is nutella and strawberry jam.  You can use anything in them. For lunch one day I had oven roasted chicken and cheddar cheese. It was also delicious!  You can be as creative as you like and put whatever you want on them.    Pie irons like the ones we used can be purchased at Outdoors Oriented and other camping supply stores.  Here is the link if you want to check them out Pie Irons!.

After dinner we had a modest fire, as believe wasting wood,  is never necessary. We played a campfire drinking game called ‘i never’. Basically, you go around the circle and say something you’ve never done and if you have or anyone else has, you have to take a drink. it didn’t take long for the alcohol to take effect as it seems there were a lot of things mentioned I have done! lol. Around midnight we were all pretty tired from our long day so as tradition, we headed to the beach to get a good look at the stars and I am so thankful we did!  Last night was the Persied Meteor shower and we were fortunate enough to see about six of them tonight!  I don’t believe I’ve ever seen one so it was a huge treat for me! Sadly I do not have a camera that is capable of photographing the night sky yet, so you will just have to imagine what it looked like. Hopefully, you were able to see a few yourself somewhere?

I woke up at 5:40 am on Friday.  Something my body just does, so I grabbed my camera and a jacket and headed to the beach to see what I could see.  I was rewarded with so many beautiful views I had a very hard time narrowing it down to just a few pictures.  Hope you enjoy them!

As we were beside the public beach parking lot I took the small path to get to the beach and back as the access was the least energetic way there.  On the way back out I took a photo of the store and restaurant located here.  It is a great place to go for ice cream, deep fried pickles, french fries, hot dogs, etc, and we ventured here on one of the nights to have a little snack.  I highly recommend the deep fried pickles! lol

I got back to the site around 7:15 and everyone was still sleeping, so I went back to bed for a bit and then got up around 9. We made breakfast and it was delicious!

After breakfast, we set up the massive tarp I’d brought as we were expected to have thunder showers this afternoon and again this evening and possibly tomorrow.  Better to be prepared and ready then scrambling for cover in a downpour.  We discussed what we thought was the best way to put it up and Ritter and Steve put it up while we got ready for the beach and finished up with breakfast duties. They covered the fire just enough that it wouldn’t rain on it and the tarp was high enough it wouldn’t melt or burn.  It was big enough for everyone to comfortably sit under without any issue and I was really happy with it when it was up!  Perfect coverage for uninterrupted fun! yay!

After our chores we hit the beach, happy to discover the sun was out, even though it was a bit windy.  We relaxed for a while and then started the bocce ball game, playing for an hour or two before the rain came in and sent us back to enjoy our shelter we’d worked on just a few hours before!

I received a gift from Outdoors Oriented on my last visit for being an awesome customer!!! I advised that from now on, it would be accompanying me on all my adventures, so today, it hung out at the beach with me, and seemed to enjoy it very much! Thanks for the gift Jamie! 🙂 I will get a lot of use out of it!

The rain continued heavily for about an hour and then on and off for another. We made lunch and then thought about what to do?  This was a great opportunity to check out Ritters’ fire bow and see how to make fire with it!  He got it out and showed us how it worked and myself, him and Brittany gave it a try, with him and Brittany finally having success in the end!  Here are some pics and the video showing how it works. HUGE THANKS to Ritter for making something so cool and sharing it with us!

 

Shortly after our foreshow, the rain ended and we all wanted to play some Beersbee, but it was far too windy at the beach, so, we hit an empty site that was right next to the water, surrounded by dunes that blocked the wind.  If you’ve never played beersbee, and mind you, I’m not entirely sure I’m even spelling it right, I will tell you the version that we play, as I know there are many.  What we do is use 2 poles at each end, topped with an upside down red solo cup atop each one, with the poles placed apart just a bit wider than the width of a frisbee.  You have two people at each end on the same team. During the game you have to hold your drink in one hand and throw or catch with the other.  One team throws and tries to get the frisbee through the two poles (3 points) or hit one of the poles and knock off a cup (1 point). If the receiving team catches the frisbee, the throwing team has to drink and gets no points, if the receiving team does not catch the frisbee, they must drink and the throwing team gets their points.  If the throwing team knocks a cup off and the receiving team catches it, same deal, if not, the throwing team gets one point and the receiving team must drink.  It sounds a bit complicated, but it really isn’t and if you suck at frisbee or catching, you are in a for a tipsy day!

 

The sun remained to stay out and it was really hot so we headed back to the beach to go for a swim.  It had turned back into a beautiful day and we were all very pleased, and due to the rain, the beach was now basically empty and we had it all to ourselves.

We had a great dinner planned today! Fish friday.  I had brought a piece of salmon from home, but my friend Brittany had a beautiful Rainbow trout. I always love the way she prepares her fish so I took a shot of it to share.  She stuffs it with lemon, onions and seasoning, then wraps it in foil to be cooked on the fire.  We had local corn and had soaked it in water for the afternoon, then cooked it, husk on, on the fire.  We also had rice as a side, mine was pre cooked and Brit’s was made there, but they were both great! The meal was delicious and we were all stuffed afterwards.

After dinner was spent sitting by the fire, roasting marshmallows, making s’mores and chatting, followed by card games. I was exhausted and as the rain had started back up shortly after dinner, there was no stars to view, so I hit the hay and got a good sleep in.  It was a great day and it was awesome falling asleep to the sound of  the rain hitting  the tent. My favourite!

I woke up at 6 and hit the beach again for some pics.  I got a few decent shots but the sky just wasn’t as colourful as the day before.  Not every sunrise is amazing, probably why when they are amazing they are more special!

I headed back to camp and made some breakfast and get ready for the day.  We decided to go to the beach and play some volleyball, a sport most of us in attendance are die hard fans of, and play quite often.  We had a blast and played for a few hours before the wind started to pickup. By then most of us were exhausted anyways, so we took the net down and continued with football and frisbee in the water and spent the afternoon swimming and relaxing, walking the incredibly long and beautiful beach and playing some more bocce ball.

Around 6 we headed back to camp to make dinner.  Tonights menu plan was steak and roasted dill potatoes (the dish I was making)  but this time I added a bit of  a twist and they came out even more awesome than Killarney, almost tasting like perogies.  I sliced the potatoes thinly,  added italian dressing, olive oil, garlic powder, green onions and dill and once they were cooked added crumbled bacon (leftover from breakie) and drizzled ranch dressing  on them.  With that we also had mushrooms, cut up tomatoes, cucumber salad, corn and roasted veggies.  WHAT A FEAST!! So good!

After dinner, as stuffed as we were, we somehow managed to have a few s’mores.  The gang stayed up to play cards, but my eyes were so sleepy I was dozing off at the fire so I headed to bed. It was after twelve and I did get up at 6, so I figured I’d put in a long enough day.  I was excited and happy to get in bed and head off to dreamland!

Upon waking up and heading to the washrooms, I heard a different sound coming from the road and discovered this walking past.  Shortly after that I saw two rabbits, but was not fast enough to get a shot of them.

I got back to camp and discovered everyone waking up already which impressed me as they were up until like 2 or 3am!   We had a quick breakfast (I had nutella on bread!! Thanks Steve!  YUM!)  then we all tore down camp as we had to be off the site by noon.  We were done around 11, cars packed up and ready to go.  Four of our group of seven hit the road and the three of us remaining went to the beach to enjoy some sun and swimming before heading out. Today was expected to be extremely hot, in fact, there was a heat warning out so no better place to be, I thought. I planted myself in the water and just enjoyed the quiet time, the heat and my gorgeous surroundings!

Around 3 we hit the road and headed back home.  It was another great annual trip to Longpoint and I enjoyed it immensely! Thanks to Longpoint for a great weekend, Mother Nature for some pretty amazing weather and my wonderful friends who always make it a special weekend!  When it’s 35 degrees and sunny, this is definitely a place you want to be at!  If you’re interested in booking a site at Longpoint Provincial Park, you can click HERE for more information at Ontario Parks!

Thanks for reading my post! If you have any questions, suggestions, comments etc, please do not hesitate to contact me! I am always happy to hear from people who’ve read my blog!

Happy Camping!

Camper Christina