Hurdie Gerdie at the Trailer

Around the fire at the trailer

Life would be uninteresting were it not for those "characters" we come across from time to time.

We went to the trailer at Bayfield for a few days, as Bruce had taken some days off work. The weather had

cooled somewhat with the temperature not going much above 25ºC, and over the next few days it got cooler as another cold front passed through.

Across the little lane from our trailer was an old couple, Mac and Gerdie. Gerdie seems to be a bit of a restless person and often walks about the park, telling people odd little bit of information ranging from her past personal life and what's happening in the district. These snippets can be quite surprising to outrageous. We were often left with a puzzled feeling about why we needed to know what she told us, but that's Gerdie.

The last time we were at the trailer, poor old Mac had a fall. He got up too quickly to see what Gurdie was calling him to see on the TV inside, and banged his head and back, and cut his arm. That weekend was the annual camp lights competition - people dresses their trailers and the lanes with fairy lights. Gurdie had asked Brad to help light the candles in the brown paper packets all along our lane. This was fine, except she seemed to get more and more anxious about lighting the candles as the afternoon wore on. I remember telling her we would light them when it was getting dark as there would be no point lighting them while the sun was still shining!!!  When the time came to light the blinking candles her lighter didn't work and anyway all the other people in the lane had lit the candles outside their trailers (as I thought they would). Poor Gurdie seemed a bit disappointed.

This weekend she came over with a newspaper with a picture and article about an old man who had made some unpleasant remark to some girls who called the police. He had allegedly been beaten up a bit by the police. I had to keep a straight face when Gurdie said she thought he had "dimensions" (sic) or "old timers".

I started to tell Gurdie about a recent incident in South Africa when police dragged a felon behind a police van, when in mid-story either her concentration levels dropped to zero, or she'd remembered that she was going to throw the papers in the waste bin because she turned round and walked away. My sister and I just looked at each other in surprise. I said, "Oh well, that's the end of that story."

Quick practice session before
the game

It rained during Friday night and Saturday morning, so we all slept in. The trailer committee had organised the annual golfing tournament for the afternoon. The weather forecast predicted thunderstorms later. One of the organisers confidently told us it was already clearing in Michigan across Lake Huron. What bothered me was, and I am a stranger to Ontario, the wind and clouds did not seem to be coming from across the lake to the west, but from Ohio and Lake Erie in the south.

We took a drive onto Bayfield for brunch and on the way back stopped at the playing field in the trailer park for Glynis to practice her golf swings as she hadn't played since last year. Well I can sympathise as I don't play, so won't comment.

I stayed at the trailer with Brad and we watched the clouds getting darker and darker and eventually it poured, with much thunder and lightning. I wonder how the golf went?

On Sunday the sun shone a bit, but the wind was still chilly - well for this South African anyway. Bruce and Glynis seem to have acclimatised to the Canadian weather so didn't find it cool at all. A humming bird came to the feeder in the little garden outside the trailer. Unfortunately I was not able to get a nice photo of it as it was so small and too far away.