For those of you who are new here and may not know, my family’s cottage on the Bruce Peninsula, Ontario is my favourite place on earth (actually, even if you are new here, you may already know – I talk about it pretty much nonstop – sorrynotsorry.)
Originally, Holden and I were supposed to go together in May this year – I was excited to take him to the cottage for his first visit, and then we were going to spend a few days in Toronto and go to a Blue Jays baseball game – I’d bought him tickets for Christmas. As we all know, that clearly didn’t happen.
I had to use up my remaining vacation days at work by the end of August, so I asked for a time off during the last week of the month and re-booked my flight to Ontario, with the option to cancel / reschedule it if COVID required.
I debated back and forth for several weeks before my trip, trying to decide if it was safe to go, if it was smart to go, if others would judge me for flying or for visiting another province during this time. On top of that, masks were now required on airplanes, and I get panicked enough while flying without the added challenge of having my breathing “obstructed”. (Let it be known right now that I have absolutely nothing against wearing masks or face coverings in an attempt to stop the spread of COVID-19, and I don’t really believe that they make it harder to breathe [for the average person]. However, in my mind, the anxiety told me that having something covering my mouth and nose would make it feel like it was more difficult to get air, even though that wasn’t actually the case.)
Eventually, I decided to bite the bullet and just go (as if we didn’t all see that one coming). I’ve been traveling to the Bruce Peninsula every year since my aunt and uncle first bought their place in 2006 (my parents have since built our own cottage down the road, so I had a separate place to stay and social-distance during this visit, don’t worry!), and I wasn’t about to skip my tradition. Plus, COVID restrictions were fairly open at that time, and I figured I’d better go while I still could, in case of stricter lockdowns happening again.
Moving through the airport and the flight itself both went much more smoothly than I had anticipated, and even wearing the mask didn’t bother me at all. My parents, on their way home from a month at the cottage, and I were able to briefly meet up in passing – me having just disembarked the plane, and them about to board it. My aunt and uncle had { very, very generously } dropped off one of their cars (a Jeep, naturally) for me at the Kitchener-Waterloo airport, and I grabbed the key from our pre-arranged hidden spot and off I went.
I spent the entire 3-hour drive up to the cottage with the windows down, blasting music, and beaming. It felt SO. GOOD. to finally be heading back to my favourite place, after nearly a year away. Sadly, with my vacation time this year, I was only able to spend a week there this August, instead of my preferred 3-weeks to 5-months of the past – but some time is better than none!
This year’s vacation was exactly what I needed – a perfect mix of alone time and time spent with family and old friends. 
I was able to watch a few sunsets with my aunt and uncle, hike + get some famous Tobermory Fish Tacos with my cousin, his wife, and their gorgeous Golden Mountain Dog, Milly, have a socially-distanced backyard pizza party with my pal Colleen and her parents, and do a bike-slash-hike on the Bruce Trail with my former work buddy, Christy (a more in-depth account of that in an upcoming post). I even got to watch Holden’s sister’s wedding via Zoom!
I also had several baths, spent tons of time reading outside on our back deck under a canopy of trees, went on a bike ride every day, cooked some delicious meals for myself, slept in, and just generally did a whole lot of nothing. 
I was sad to go home, as always. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the Bruce Peninsula is forever the hardest place to leave. Holden and I have talked about going out there after Christmas and spending a quiet New Year’s in the forest, but due to some potential COVID travel lockdowns and some definite cash-flow problems, I don’t think that’s in the cards this year, unfortunately. I hope to get back out very soon though, and to spend much more time there on my next visit!
