The um, lovely beach area

Late Monday night, the dog looked pretty tired. Likely because we had a busy long weekend! Saturday we made it up to Orangeville to visit their Farmers’ Market. We came home with a bunch of veg, shortbread cookies from Wicked (which were really good – and, especially the lemon square) and a Raspberry pie. Sadly, I found the pie waaay too tart. I should have got either the Apple Crumble or Maple Apple pie. Stupid brain. After wandering around OV we were pretty hungry. Fortunately, Rays accommodated us with our dog. We sat at the back and took the scenic route to our table. It was a good meal. I enjoyed a Helles Yeah and their Veal Meatballs. (Should have had the Chicken Parm – sometimes I find Veal a bit gamey…) In the past, Ray’s would alternate their menu quite a bit, now it has become a fixed menu. *shrug* It sure felt like it has been a long time since we ate at Ray’s.

Since we were in Alton, of course we wandered over to the Mill. It was pretty quiet there, like surprisingly quiet for a long weekend. Their outdoor venue had a significant upgrade since our last visit. It used to be an open air venue but with some government grant money they have closed it in. It is impressive! If it was around when we were married I’m sure we would have opted for it.

The Mills covered venue

Sunday we planned on kayaking at Rockwood. It didn’t occur to us that the park could reach capacity. Well, it did… So we arrived there all ready to go with our friend (Hi Brian!) following us and, yeah no admittance for anyone.

YOU SHALL NOT PASS!

So, that was a massive bummer. We took a brief look at the park in town that ran along the river but it was very rocky, there was no parking and it has a really small paddling area. So, we did some googling and eventually found this VERY useful page that shows the current capacity status of parks in the Grand River system. Had we found this page earlier it would have saved us a bunch of time and limited our headaches. We decided on trying Guelph Lake since the website was showing that it was still open to day use. After waiting in a 401 parking jam like lineup for about 15 minutes we got into the park. We had the dogs with us so our only real option was the launch area near the end of Conservation Road. It was not lovely sandy beaches and clear water. No, Not by a long shot. It was a massive slopped concrete drive into the water that was muddied and dark. Bleck, but we made the best of it. We got some paddling in and the dogs enjoyed the water. I even got a very short loop hike in with the dog. It was good for people with dogs but otherwise I don’t think I’d return to this area. I couldn’t understand why people without dogs were setting up their chairs etc. on the concrete? *shrug* It was a hot day and I got a little crisped. We passed through Erin on the way home and toyed with getting take-out, from the very busy Tipsy Fox. We however decided we’d rather get home since we really needed a showers and were all really tired from the long day in the Sun.

Yesterday was mostly a yard work day. I finally trimmed the ‘weed trees’ that annually break through our back fence, cut the lawn, did some badly needed weeding in the front yard, laundry, dinner prep… A lot of the Sunday tasks now on a Monday. Over the weekend I finally found a full length anime movie I could get through. I really enjoyed Green Snake. I’m a bit surprised by the poor RT reviews… Sure the story was a bit lackluster but the visuals and pacing, I though, were really well done. I’m very particular about what Anime I like (apparently) and Green Snake was certainly geared toward a more mature audience without all the ridiculous melodrama ‘teen’ anime characters I can’t stand. ⭐⭐⭐½. Lightyear was another animated gem, but this one we watched together. The characters were awesome (where can I get a Sox?! meow-meow-meow), the animation was spot on and all the homages to Sci-Fi were a great nod to the genre. We both really enjoyed it. (You know it is good when Bdot agrees to stay up late to finish the film) ⭐⭐⭐⭐.

The Yellow marker loop at Guelph Lake

UPDATE!

During the week we finished the very disappointing Netflix series Paranoid]. The characters were horrible – Nina – just wow. The dialogue was baffling or even cringe at times. One of the weakest crime dramas we’ve watched. A generous ⭐⭐. By contrast I enjoyed the Netflix documentary on Woodstock ’99 – Trainwreck. What a tragic event. For all the greed the promoters had, it certainly came back to bite them on the ass. Not providing water when it is over 30C out, no proper washrooms, insufficient security, massive food price gouging… Jez… And then to be so stupid as to give the attendees candles? WTF. The behaviour of a lot of concert goes was equally reprehensible. I mean women were raped. People DIED Jez. The documentary was enlightening and really showed how greedy some people are. Shame, with a little effort it could have been worthy of the name Woodstock. ⭐⭐⭐½.