(Cole Lake, Ontario, Canada)
As the leaves have suddenly become very colourful, we decided to resume our ongoing hike of the K&P Trail between Kingston and Sharbot Lake. Today’s segment started at the (former) village of Cole Lake, which is just north of Godfrey.
It’s been a while since I’ve posted about the trail (here’s one from 2016, and here’s one from 2014), which follows a rail line that used to run between Kingston and Renfrew. As we complete more of it, we have to drive farther and farther to hike a section that we haven’t done before. Even though the skies were overcast today, I brought my camera to capture the fall colours….if not the blue skies. While we encountered a handful of people on the trail, it was *very* quiet. Almost too quiet: more than once, we were startled by a sudden noise.
After walking the trail, we took an indirect route home. We passed through Bellrock, where I found a couple of very imposing swans beside the historic Bellrock mill. We also passed through places such as Chippewa (which I had somehow never seen before), Enterprise, Moscow, and Yarker.
In these COVID-19 times, travel plans remain almost impossible to execute. However, I recently made arrangements to rent a winterized cottage near Haliburton, Ontario, for a few days this winter We’ve never done that kind of a holiday before: my winter travel usually consists of a ski trip or a big city cultural (usually food!) getaway.
Renting a cottage within a resort is kind of the ultimate COVID-19 holiday. Help is never far away, if needed, but you also don’t have to worry about crowded indoor spaces. And we are not limited to the cottage: there is a host of outdoor activities both onsite and within a short drive of the resort.
The big adventure is going to be a half-day of dogsledding! But we also hope to skate on the lake outside the cottage, cross-country ski at the trails across the road, and do some snowshoeing in the Haliburton Highlands…outdoor winter activities that pose a very low health risk even if no COVID-19 vaccine is yet available. There’s even a small downhill skiing area nearby, but I think I’ll focus on other activities for this particular trip.
In the meantime, we will continue to “train” for our upcoming holiday by regular extended walks in the local area. By the way, Tom the Wild Turkey is *still* living a couple of blocks away: I hope he made it past Thanksgiving without any close calls.
Even when we walk locally, we can still talk about prior trips. I may eventually post some of those ruminations on this blog. Our walks are also a time to think about what will be important when we are able to travel again in the future. So much has changed since 2014, when I started this blog. Not just politically, but also in our motivations for travel. I also hope certain over-touristed places will emerge with a more sustainable model for future travel.
Hoping to read about Prague? I will return to my 1999 Bavaria and Bohemia trip in my next post!