Fall 2020

Tuesday September 22nd 2020

In just a couple of hours we will officially be into the fall season, we have already had some cold overnights, not freeze your water hose kind of cold but serious frost on the roof kind of weather. Not unusual weather for fall in Ontario, with warm days and chilly nights, we are yet to have that killer ground frost that kills all the plant life, no at this point the gardens all still looking good, and we are in for a sunny warm week, with temperatures around 20ºC (69ºF) through the weekend before the cooler rainy days that are forecast for next week.

We have been through a couple of crazy weeks, between birthdays, contracts, and the like, Laurie and I were excited to have a visitor on Saturday. My son Matt stopped by for a visit, which was a great surprise he also brought some craft beer from a brewery in Stratford, I have only supported local breweries this year and would have to give “Black Swan” two thumbs up. 2020 has been a year that we will all remember for ever, I still have not seen family since last fall, not having the ability to visit with family and friends, has made this a very long and lonely summer, with Matt being only our third visitor of the year, as we are trying to adhere to prescribed guidelines.

The park is much quieter now, with the restart of the schools here in Ontario, the play ground is empty and the pool which is still open, doesn’t see any action most days. The fall projects are under way, with lots of improvements scheduled in our extended season.

Ontario is seeing a huge increase of Covid-19 cases with the number of cases up around near 500 per day, not surprising with the actions of some, as premier Doug Ford said so eloquently, “these people are a few fries short of a happy meal” with private gatherings exceeding the limits and of course no social distancing as has been emphasized since March. Looks like the second wave is well upon us, as restrictions start being rolled back again to try to protect us from ourselves, I’m sure there will be lots of covidiots complaining.

I ventured into Goderich last week for some supplies, and young fellow at the vegetable market tried to explain to me that this whole Covid thing, it was all just a hoax, I and everyone else was being forced by the government into all these unnecessary actions. So I thanked him for his insight and told him that he was obviously not making the best use of this valuable information just selling produce at a roadside vegetable stand … I asked his name and was surprised when it wasn’t Darwin.

I spend yesterday installing the new breaker box in the basement, to allow the removal of the Hart 2000 watt inverter, which was replaced by the Victron 3000 watt pure sine wave inverter. You see the old inverter only powered up two circuits in the coach so the power supply came from the main breaker panel to the inverter then split to feed power to the two circuits with overload breakers located on the inverter, so now the power supply will go to the breaker box, then out to the circuits. Allowing the removal of the old inverter, reducing weight by about 20 Kg (44 Ibs), and allowing me to install a couple of new circuits, one for the basement fridge and also a waterproof exterior plug to save the cables from running out under the basement doors, which damages the cords while allowing a rodent access point … and it is the time of year that our little furry friends are going to be looking for a warm winter home.

I also have fired the boiler so that we are prepared for the cold nights, not only for our warmth but also for the heater in the wet bay that automatically turns on when the temperatures get close to freezing our water lines. As we have another six weeks I’m sure we will see some sub freezing temperatures and some snow before we hit the road.

Monday in the afternoon we spent some time on the beach, enjoying the warm sunny afternoon, the lake water is still quite warm, and Miss Laurie scored big with a handful of beach glass, followed by a couple of burgers and a quiet evening watching some television.