During the process of purchasing Adriana we were invited to visit Bill and Shoni at their home approximately 100km from Wiarton back down the highway towards Toronto.

We stopped for a quick breakfast on the way, I was excited to have pancakes with maple syrup from an authentic Canadian diner, Craig found this quote on the wall which he thought was quite apt.

It was an absolute privilege to be invited to Bills house and we were given a guided tour of his amazing property.  It’s set on 80 acres, the house is an original farmhouse that has been lovingly remodelled over the years using timber sourced and milled on the property.

Bill drove us down to his Maple Syrup sugar shack where he explained the process of how the maple trees are tapped, the sap is collect then reduced right down to leave the sweet syrup.  The ratio is 40 litres of sap produces 1litre of syrup. 

Bill has hand built the sugar shack also from timber sourced and milled on his property. 
We then had a look through the cottage that he hand built, it’s nestled into the surrounding bush land and it’s the cutest little house it reminds me of little house on the prairie, so simple. it was even warm inside with no heating on and it smelt divine.

There was a huge pond with a creek flowing through it, with a boat landing and a bridge, Bill casually mentions “oh yes I hand built the pond using stones from here”.  
Did I mention there was a small quarry that provided shale for all the roads and paths on the property.  Alongside Bills land his church has a holiday camp that he and his sons helped create, an amazing place for children to come and experience nature at its finest. There were also skidoo and cross country ski trails. There was still snow on the ground, it was so pretty.  

After an enjoyable look around the property we shared a hot bowl of homemade soup and we left with our arms full of sailing charts and a huge bottle of maple syrup.  

Another trip we made while waiting on the snow to melt was with Bill and Sue, we went to  Blue Mountain Ski Resort. 

Sue’s childhood best friend lived close by in the adjacent suburb of Collingwood.  Josie and Martin have done lots of sailing so were happy to share their knowledge on traversing through the lakes and canals, they were just about to hop on a plane to attend their sons wedding in Sydney Australia.  

We had a lovely afternoon drinking beer in the sunshine.  It was the end of the snow season so most of the village bars eateries and shops were closed already but we managed to find a bar and try the local delicacy beaver tails, puff pastry base with your choice of sweet toppings.  

The village was incredibly pretty much much bigger than Mt Buller, the Victorian ski resort where Craig and I met.

What was interesting to me was different sides of the mountain were owned by either a lift company or a ski club.

When we left the ski field area heading across country to a favoured pizza restaurant we were still at a really high elevation, it was cold and the snow was still thick on the ground.

Driving home from Blue Mountain there was a beautiful sunset, living in Wiarton we are on the wrong side of the peninsula for sunsets but one evening we went to Sauble Beach, which is a good 20 minute drive across the Bruce Peninsula, Todd and Heather kindly took us for a drive so we could see the beach, the sunset and have pizza at another favoured pizza place.  

Sauble Beach is just like an ocean beach even though it is  Lake Huron.  The sand is just like beach sand, it stretches for miles there were people out on sup and kayaks or canoes.  It was still out of season so most of the businesses were closed but you could see why it would be super busy in Summer, Todd was telling us a lot of Americans come over to the Bruce Peninsula for the long weekends and summer holidays.