Parry Sound Adventures

I recently had the opportunity to go visit Julia's place and family in Parry Sound. It was great! Parry Sound is a beautiful area of Ontario, placed in a labyrinthine interchange of rocky, wooded land and the deep, blue waters of Georgian Bay. It's an outdoorsperson's paradise. The town itself is smaller, but nice. Julia's family was, of course, very nice and hospitable. It was a fun time, with good food, great people, and, later on, a very nice cottage on Georgian Bay.

As much as I could talk about many things that we did, it was my introduction to kayaking which was particularly memorable. As Julia is a kayak instructor, and I had never kayaked before, I wanted to get out on the waters as soon as we got to the cottage. After a brief lesson on shore, we took to the waters on a beautiful day. Naturally, I was awesome at kayaking and got the hang of it quickly. On the way to a bridge we were trying to reach, I saw an island which had flowers growing on it. I told her to go ahead of me, and that I would catch up. Suspicious that I was going to relieve myself, she did not hesitate to make a break for it. I got the contraband and set to get back into my boat, noting how clever I was. As I am used to canoes, I braced my hands on the gunwhales while getting in and proceeded to flip the kayak. After doing this a second time, I called her back to give me a hand and took notice of the fact that my foot was stinging. She laughed at me, and when I got back on land, I noticed my foot was bleeding, with the middle toe cut to the point where I could see the white tendons inside. When we got back to the cottage, Julia's dad, a physician, cleaned out my foot and stitched it up on the back deck. Without anaesthetic. It hurt, but being a male, I was thrilled to have the experience and feel kind of tough.

Lesson learned? I hate zebra mussels.