The Cottage

The main building is a 1965 Panabode (solid cedar) cottage that smells just lovely and sits 60 feet from the shore of Lake Joseph on Avon Bay. We've been at this location since 1998 and the previous owner was a fellow by the name of John Anderson who played for the Toronto Maple Leafs. I had the chance to sit down with the famous Paul Coffey who also has a cottage on the lake and he told me that he spent quite a bit of time in ours.

The Cottage Part 2

Bedrooms

There are 3 official bedrooms, each with a very high quality mattress (1 King, 2 queens and a double loft bed that is suspended from the ceiling), and the Muskoka Room has a queen Murphy Bed that folds down - its maybe the nicest place to sleep because of all of the windows - especially during a thunderstorm.

Two bedrooms face the lake and one faces the back lot and forest behind the cottage. The master bedroom has an ensuite 2-piece bathroom that also can be used by anyone sleeping in the bunkie by the lake which can hold up to six people (if they're younger and don't mind that kind of vibe).

The master bedroom has a heat pump so it has extra heat on cold mornings and air conditioning on hot nights. We leave the door open on really hot nights so that all three bedrooms have air conditioning, but each room also has a ceiling fan and windows.

At the end of the hall there is a glass door that, when closed, keeps the sound of people in the living room watching tv or talking from disturbing those still sleeping. There is a 3-piece central bathroom for the two secondary bedrooms.

Click to view larger images with captions

We share our driveway with our awesome neighbors who you will probably get to know (if you want to) while you're at the cottage. The sign is a several-levels deep play on words.

The lot has a nice mixture of open spaces and shade

The cottage is close to the dock and there are no steep places anywhere

Our really nice big deck is a perfect place for coffee in the morning, hamburgers at lunch, and wine at night

The sand around the dock is lovely hard beach sand and its the perfect place for wading, sitting on chairs in the water and playing volleyball

Our outdoor shower has both hot and cold water

The entire cottage is made from solid cedar - the place smells amazing!

The Muskoka Room is a breezy (or air conditioned) place to eat, sit and chat, or sleep in the queen sized Murphy Bed

Large windows look out to a really lovely view from the Living Room

We've worked hard to keep the lighting subtle and tasteful - the camera brightened the lights a bit here

The Cottage Part 3

Muskoka Room

The Muskoka Room is, as mentioned, a great 4th bedroom, but its also the place we gather for meals and long discussions. I built the table in there out of the old cedar dock boards we had originally and the light above was cut out of the centre of a tree we had to cut down. It is a wonderful place to have breakfast while looking at the lake, and dinners there are epic. The homemade Banquette serves both as seating for the table and also as storage for blankets (used out on the deck at nights or on cold days) and a bunch of board games and such.

As mentioned, the Muskoka Room has a Murphy Bed for extra sleeping, but when up, there is a nice place to have a conversation between two people that is a bit more intimate than in the living room. There is an outside door at both ends of the room, one lake side and one at the back. The lake side door is the main access to the deck and lake from the cottage.

Living Room

The living room has big Lazy Boy couches and a flat screen TV with hundreds of DVDs you can browse through in the evening or on a rainy day. The big window looks out onto Avon Bay and its where we love to sit at various times of the day just watching the birds, boats and other goings on. Also in the living room is a Vermont Casting stove that we use in the early spring and late fall when it gets really cold. We don't use it much in the summer because, if we need a little heat, each room has electric baseboard heaters.

Dining

As mentioned above, the Muskoka Room is now our favoured place to gather for dinner. The table seats 10 people easily, and when we have Thanksgiving or other big events, we re-configure the Banquette out, add the picnic table and then can seat a whopping 17 people (which we've already done several times).

Some people, for a quick snack, use the original dining table in the main cottage, however that is destined for the scrap heap of history as we are planning to replace it with an Island. The plan is to have stools for 3-4 people, but the main goal will be to store pots and pans, and all the other stuff that clutters up kitchens.

Kitchen

The kitchen is pretty small, but well-appointed because we are foodies and we cook quite a lot. The stove is a good electric model, there is a Vita-Mix blender, decent knives and all sorts of other stuff you need to peel, slice, dice, ladle, flip etc. There is a granite counter for food prep and the kithen has good lighting. The water pressure in the kitchen isn't fantastic but it works pretty well. Sorry, no dishwasher.

We used to drink the lake water, but found it a pain in the neck to constantly have to send water samples in for testing, so we refill water jugs from the Port Carling town office and the water is spectacular so it just isn't a big deal for us to change. The water jugs will be full and stored out on the back deck in a little shelve unit so that they stay sterile (sunshine is wonderful for water cleanliness).

Bunkie

Finally, there is a bunkie that is close to the lake that sleeps up to six people - as mentioned, this is generally for the younger crowd, but the roof at the front of the bunkie is a wonderful place to sit and chat either when its raining or if the sun is too hot - there is usually a lovely breeze. In the case of storms, we added 'the storminator' which is a rolled up vinyl window that we put down to stop us from getting soaked when the wind howls and the rain comes in sideways.