Fall camping - the edge of madness!

To celebrate my b-day this weekend (yay me!) I convinced Glosette Girl and Margot to try fall camping with me. We've done fall camping twice before, but never this late into the season. Our target: Reserve Faunique Papineau Labelle where the temperatures were forecast to hit minus three degrees celsius at night.  A little bit crazy? Not for an Ottawan!

I'm not sure what the technical difference is between a park and a reserve faunique is in Quebec. Without googling the answer I'm guessing that the answer is that "parks" have more facilities and are geared towards camping and hiking, while "reserves" target hunting and fishing. And when I say "target" I mean target: just a couple of minutes past the reserve entrance we saw orange clad hunters in full hunting gear. The lady at the reserve check in also cautioned us to wear bright colours if we took a hike as it was boar season and she didn't want us to get shot. 

...

We decided to pass on hiking.

Fortunately our campsite was really pretty and didn't require us to explore too far. We started our day by reading by the shore. It was very peaceful.*

We ended our day eating fire-cooked hamburgers and roasting marshmallows. A real bonus was that the night was very clear and the stars were out. For the first time ever we got a chance to see the Milky way.**

Fortunately our tent was bright orange!

I was a little worried that the cold at night would be unbearable but we were smart enough to pack tons of blankets and a couple of air mattress. With all three of us bundled up under the covers it wasn't too bad.

Reserve Faunique Papineau Labelle is just under two hours away from Ottawa. The campsites are super secluded (only five where we were [at Lac Ernest], compared to hundreds of sites at some of the local Ontario parks). I 100% recommend going...if you have bright clothing.

Morning mist by our campsite

* we only heard two gunshots far in the distance! 

** for astronomy geeks: we live in the Milky Way galaxy but I'm talking about the band of hazy light that is visible across the night sky if you go far away from light pollution.

Guest Post: a 10-year old's thoughts

Well, I enjoyed picking Glosette Girl's brain in last week's post, so I thought I would continue the fun with another guest post - this time from Margot's perspective.

First question: "What do you like about your cat, Panda?" (sidebar one: two great joys in Margot's life right now are horses and Panda)

Second question: "What do you like to do after school?" (sidebar two: a bonus of these guest posts is that Margot tells me what's going on in her life without too much pushback. Parent score!)

Third question: "Do you like mornings or evenings better (sidebar three: trick question - evenings during weekdays, mornings on weekends!) 

Fourth question: "What is the square root of 361?"*

Ha fooled you. Bonus Panda question!

* It's 19 if you're curious.

Guest Post: Fall ramblings

It's been awhile since I had a guest post here on Tough Cookies: Hintonburg Style, so I thought I'd check in on Glosette Girl and see how she's handling things.

First question: "How is the teaching going this semester?"

Hmmm honest answer! (p.s the heavy breathing you hear - that's Margot. She could hardly contain her laughter what with our cat Panda cleaning himself throughout this performance. She was also the camera man on set).

Second question: "What do you think about autumn?" (Glosette Girl always tells me autumn is her least favourite season). Panda makes a guest appearance in this one too.

So now I know Glosette Girl really likes soup and thinks Margot and I are holding her back from her soup escapades. Wait...wasn't my question about autumn?!