Yogurt in a Yurt

This past weekend Dave and I drove four hours north to Killarney Provincial Park. Our quest? To go winter camping in a yurt. What, you may well ask, is a yurt? To me it sounds just like yogurt, or something you might pick up at IKEA, but a yurt is a slightly more permanent version of a tent. The ones in Killarney and in Algonquin parks are insulated and come equipped with an electric heater and lights. So no big roughing it, sleep-wise. Bathroom-wise was another story. The nearest outhouse was a quarter of a mile away. When it's cold outside, you want to make sure you really have to go to the bathroom before you venture to the outhouse. If you're like me, cold air makes you want to pee all the more so, technically, you could walk a quarter mile to the outhouse, pee, walk back and realize you have to pee again, walk back to the outhouse, pee, walk... well, you get the idea. The best thing I brought along was a pee pot – more valuable than gold when your bladder is full to burst in the middle of the night.

This is Mohawk. He was a regular visitor at our campsite, chattering our ears and giving us crap as red squirrels are wont to do. Dave nicknamed him Mohawk because of his weird tail. It looks like he had it cut and dyed at one of those metalhead smoke shops downtown. Not that I would know anything about such shops.

The yurt came with several amenities including a barbecue, electrical outlets and mattresses but, alas, it didn't come with a dishwasher. Luckily I brought my own - the Super Duty Dave. See the toboggan in the background? That's how we hauled all our gear from the parking lot to the yurt, a distance of about three-quarters of a mile (the park roads are closed in winter so you have to hoof it.) That wouldn't be too far if it was flat ground but flat it wasn't – there was a mighty big hill up to climb and I was out of puff just bringing the crap in and out.

There wasn't a lot of snow in Killarney (the lady who works in the park office says they don't get much, for some reason) but there was enough to strap on the cross-country skis and give it a whirl. And here I thought I was in shape.... pffft! My legs are still killing me from a few hours out on the trail. Why do I keep thinking I'm 25?????

Handsome hunkaroo husband extraordinaire out on the trails. He does improve the scenery, don't you think? We saw a ton of animal tracks while we were out and about: white-tailed deer, marten, otter, fox, partridge, wolf or coyote, and plenty of red squirrel. Deer tracks were everywhere but we never did spot one. They're like ghosts in the forest; or statues. So hard to see. But they were watching us – a half an hour after we passed one area, we returned to see fresh deer tracks on top of our ski tracks. 

Our yurt! Isn't it cute? 

A little fuzzy, but I thought you might want to see inside. Bunk beds, plastic chairs, plastic tables, a heater and a shelf. That's it! And, I've gotta say, the yurts aren't cheap: two nights cost nearly 200 bucks. For that kind of money you could get a nice hotel room for the weekend – one with an indoor pool, a jacuzzi and an inside toilet! 

Dave eating yogurt in the yurt. For some reason we thought we were just hilarious saying that. That's my coffeemaker I dragged along on the toboggan. I brought a fancy coffee for the excursion. Muskoka Roastery's maple flavour. Yum-o.

We also did a lot of reading on our Kindles. Dave was reading Quick and the Dead by Louis L'Amour and I thoroughly enjoyed Blood and Fire, the cool new offering from Carrie Clevenger and Nerine Dorman. I flew through that puppy. It was almost as delicious as my coffee, and that's saying something! Carrie has promised me an interview with her lead character, vampire Xan Marcelles, in the near future. So stay tuned... Speaking of reading, I want to thank everyone who read my Friday Flash last week. It was the first one I wrote for ages. I had been talking to Carrie and she was saying how much she missed the Friday Flash crew, being such a busy novelist now. I realized I missed it too, so sat down and wrote Funeral Sandwiches. I didn't get a chance to read other people's flash because we were internet-less in the yurt, but I will this week, I promise. I also have something exciting planned - Letters from a Friend, a series of letters from some of the bloggers who have had the biggest impact on me. I've received the first one from Laurita Miller and it is FABULOUS. Brought me to tears, it did. I can hardly wait to share it with you. For now, I'm off to work. Happy Monday, everyone!