The Thousand Island Area in Canada

Canada was wonderful! That's the only way we can describe it. The Canadian people were so kind and sweet and the scenery was sooo verry verry nice and beautiful.

Jo and Bob told us about the Thousand Island area that is on the St Lawrence River between New York and Ontario, Canada. (Ontario is one of the Canadian provinces... similar to one of our states). Both Jo & Bob said that we would absolutely love the Thousand Island cruise if we decided to take it. They were absolutely right.

So, Mom, Dad & I drove through the New York countryside, crossed into Canada and stayed in Canada for 2 nights. Gananoque, ON is a small Canadian town right on the St Lawrence River. (It's basically across the river from Alexandria Bay, NY). Dad stayed with Cubby while Mom & I took the 2 1/2 hour cruise on the river. Mom said the cruise reminded her of the Dayliner that they'd take from Albany to New York City on occasion up the Hudson River. And, she said that as kids they used to go into the Hudson River to enjoy the waves when the dayliner went by. It used to suck up all of the water and then would come back in a rush toward them as it passed....but, it brought with it orange peels, toilet paper, etc.....sounds to me like something no one should have been in!! But, Mom survived through all of that. Our Canadian cruise was a real cruise. There were only about 20 people on the 3 level boat. It could hold about 400 people, so you can see that we had all of the room in the world to roam and look out the front, back or any window that we chose. It was like a private tour in many ways.

The area is called the Thousand Island area because of the number of islands that are located in the St. Lawrence at that point. There are actually more than 1500 islands. Some of the islands are just large enough to hold one tree. A few have no trees, just rocks. Some are very large and have multiple homes, including permanent residents. Most are covered with beautiful trees. It was gorgeous. The sky was a beautiful blue color with large fluffy white clouds. And, while some of the homes are more modest, others are on what they call "Millionaires Row". Based on their size and location, I'm sure that you'd have to be very wealthy to be able to afford one of these homes as a summer home location. One of the pictures shows a home with a Victrola dog on the lawn...that used to be Irving Berlin's home and it's said that he wrote a couple of his more famous songs there...my memory fails me, I just can't remember which songs at the moment! Oh, well...another senior moment....one of many that at least one of us has experienced on this trip!

Thousand Island dressing was invented by one of the chefs who prepared food for one of the wealthy residents in the Thousand Island area. One of the ingredients was chopped pickles (to represent the treed islands in the area) and he would swirl in a chili sauce at the end to represent a gorgeous sunset in the island area. Thousand Island dressing is my Dad's favorite, interesting to know its origin.

My camera battery died half way through the trip, but I was able to get quite a few shots, including shots of Boldt castle which is huge and really looks like a castle...the man who built it started it for his wife, who died before its completion in the early 1900s. He left the home unfinished, but then it was finished later in the 1970s. It's open for tourism, but we did not do that.

Another of the pictures shows Mom enjoying the cruise. She's holding a $20 Canadian bill (with a picture of the queen, of course!). Mom was kind of confused by the different money here. She kept asking if she should use her Mexican money when paying for something....It all worked out OK. We now have all U.S. cash again, so no more confusion!! The final picture shows Mom trying to look through the peep hole while standing on here toes in the motel room. Cute!