In 2017 there was a total solar eclipse just south of us in Oregon. For a number of reasons, we were not able to go and experience it and I regretted missing that opportunity. This year, there was another solar eclipse, with totality able to be seen across some parts of Southern Ontario. As it happened, our friend’s Risa and Jeff’s home was sitting right under the path of the totality. So that seemed like the perfect excuse to plan a trip - total solar eclipse and a chance to visit family and friends.

We were in Ontario for about 10 days, and not surprisingly I have a lot of photos to share. So I will break this up into a series of posts to try and keep it manageable.

Vancouver Spring Blossoms

Before we get to the Ontario trip, I thought I’d share some photos of Vancouver spring blossoms. We’ve had a pretty good start to the spring, with it warming up earlly and many of the blossoms seemingly early. Here’s some pretty flowers…

The magnolias are some of the earliest spring flowers for us. 7th Avenue, just up the hill from us is one of the most beautiful streets in Vancouver in the spring, and this huge tree always produces a brilliant display.

There are many different species,

This is our new flowering cherry on Galiano - I think we’re going to miss it flowering this year.

Some cool hyacinths on Galiano.

The whole street is a sea of pink blossoms.

Many of the flowering cherries produce these huge, multi-clustered pink flowers.

I’m not sure I’ve ever seen tulips in such amazing colours and patterns.

Just stunning!

Flowering crab apple. We just planted one on Galiano - hopefully it will give us some blossoms like this!

Back to Ontario - First Stop, Waterdown

While the eclipse was the primary reason for the trip, we also wanted to take advantage of being in Ontario to meet up with family and friends. We had a lot planned and crammed into a short amount of time. The plan was to go to see Justine’s mom and dad in Waterdown for a couple of days; then head out to Prince Edward County for the eclipse and to hang out with Risa and Jeff; then onto Stoney Lake to spend a couple of days with Carolynne and Graham before heading to Alton to spend a couple of days with my family.

To maximize our time, we booked a redeye from Vancouver that left Wednesday night, putting us into Toronto early Thursday morning. Everything went fairly well, and we were able to pick up our rental car and headed for Waterdown. It was still pretty early when we arrived, and we spent the first day getting onto the right time zone (read: napping) and catching up. It was a good, relaxing start to the trip.

Thursday we went ofr a drive out to wine country, which is pretty close by. There’s a winery called Peninsula Ridge that Maureen and MIchael like, so we thought we’d head there for a bite and some wine.

It was pretty quiet - we were pretty much the only people there. It’s a lovely spot, with a nice view and good wine. We each had a small flight to try and we ordered a charcuterie board of local meats and cheeses to go with the wine.

Everything was excellent, and we had a nice time sipping wine, eating charcuterie and catching up. It was still a bit colder out than we would have liked, but it was still a fine day.

Of the wines I had, I felt like the whites were a bit better than the reds,and they had a sparkling wine that was probably the best of everything. So much so that we bought a couple of bottles to take with us - one for Waterdown, and one for celebrating the eclipse.

Michael took the photo-of-the-day!

Lots of wine to be had!

After our stop at the winery, we headed over to a nearby distillery. Dillon’s has long made one of our favorite gins, and since we’ve never been, we thought it would be worth a visit.

It’s a pretty cool spot - great tasting room.

The tasting room is very nicely done, with many great displays. The bar was particularly nice.

They make lots of cool things!

A closer look at the bar.

Justine’s favorite - the rose gin.

We were able to taste a few things and we were surprised by the variation and number of different offerings. There were some good ones (cucumber, melon gins) and some odd ones - dill pickle vodka. In fairness, that latter one would make a good caesar (which is what it was created for). They also are now making a rye whiskey, which was really good. We ended up buying 3 bottles, so it was a fruitful visit.

The rest fo Friday and Saturday was spent relaxing. It was good to have some down time and just relax. We did manage on Saturday to meet up with Sandy and Tanya and had lunch in Guelph. The visit was too short as always, but I’m glad we fit it in. It was also great catching up with Justine’s mom and dad and helping them out with a few projects around the house.

I’m going to break out the posts here, and we’ll move onto the next leg of the trip in Prince Edward County with the next one!