Emerging Willie & did you see how many teeth that man had?.......not many!

We were on the beach early today. One of the first in fact. We took with us a picnic lunch as we knew the best weather would be in the morning and the afternoon was promising to be a bit 'iffy'.

Marching off to the beach

The boys were in the lake before we had even put down our chairs, picnic rug and umbrellas.

It wasn't so wavey but it was quite blowy. We managed to get the umbrellas up but were not convinced they would stay up so we left them down. The water was cooler. The sand not so hot. Huffle and I watched the boys swimming. Smallest and Huffle played on the swings and Small and I went swimming. brrrrr. It was ok once you were in but I knew as soon as I got out that I wouldn't be going in again today.

I got to read the end of my book whilst the boys played Boules.

Small using the 'force'

Huffle giving them expert tuition

 

Huffle and Smallest then went swimming.

 

Small and I built some sandcastles

While Huffle and Smallest were in the water there was a flock of Canada Geese flying by.

Smallest kept finding crab feet and started chasing me around shouting "shrimp, it's a shrimp". The more I ran away, the more he did it. He thought it was hilarious. We had our picnic and watched a tractor going up and down the beach (not sure why), we watched a kite surfer doing tricks and then we moved off the beach and came back to the house. On the way to the car, Smallest had a little tantrum and refused to get in the car with us. He started to walk away so we got in the car and drove out of the parking space. He soon came running.

Smallest walking away from us.

After our showers, and a bit of relaxing, we got in the car and went for a drive. We were planning on looking at a waterfall and then go in search of Wiarton Willie - Ontario's Groundhog. Huffle has been reading up on Wiarton Willie and how he came about. It's quite interesting. All started by a group of men in a pub! We passed on the waterfall as the weather was looking a bit ropey and carried on to Wiarton.

We parked the car. It had just started to rain. Smallest followed the groundhog's footsteps.

.....and then we found him. I was just telling Small that we may not see the proper groundhog when there he was...... I was disappointed that he was stuck in a small enclosure. Poor thing. Has to stay in there all year and then once a year he is pulled out and everyone decides whether spring is on the way or not purely based on the fact of him 'whispering' to a man dressed up! Poor thing ran away when we came near and hid.

The boys found a park to go on and we looked at the view whilst sheltering from the rain. It stopped and started and stopped and started. We talked to a local (with not too many teeth!) who told us many places to visit and all about Wiarton Willie. He thought we were Australian.

Small tells us that See-saws are called Teeter totters. Huffle wonders what the nursery rhyme See-saw Margery Daw is out here then!

Wiarton Willie sculpture up close

......and with the bay in the background

Small reading about the previous 'Willies'

.....and the plaque beneath the sculpture

The kids found some fountains to play in

Then we walked around a bit, looked at the fish, walked to the end of the boat jetty, then it started to rain a bit more so we took shelter again.

Georgian Bay

While keeping dry I noticed this green thing on the bench. I took this photo and then looked at it really close up until it jumped at me and I ran away. Ugly thing. We think it might have been a leaf hopper, in that it looked leaf like and and hopped! AT ME!

We couldn't find anywhere to eat but Small did find a shop that sold all sorts of things. He bought a new Monopoly game with his money. Yaaaay.

I liked this car.

We drove to Sauble Beach area and had dinner in a pub. There were some pictures of Elvis on the wall. Small asked "who is Elvis?". We told him he was the King of Rock and Roll and he said "oh yes a boy in my class loves him - in fact he loves all music from the eighties!". We had to tell him Elvis died in the seventies! By the time we came out the rain was torrential. We ran to the car and drove back. We got an ice cream (yes another one!) and sat at the lake edge (in the car) and watched the water, the rain and the storm.

We came home (luckily we bought the stuff in off the line and closed all windows before we went out). The storm was loud, the water ran down the roads like a river and then while the boys watched a movie, the water started coming through the front door. Oh dear.

This storm is supposed to go on through the night........ And maybe tomorrow........and maybe Friday. . Oh well, we've got a new Monopoly game to play and maybe the boys will get their wish and we can go to the cinema to watch Ice Age 4.

 

Please don't use my photos without asking first. Posted with Blogsy