Thousand Island

Zach and I took Connor along with us yesterday for a tour of the Thousand Islands Region, which is a couple of hours northeast of us. (There actually are over a thousand islands in the region.) It was our own little "staycation." I actually hate the term "staycation." I don't think there's a trendier or more overused word out there these days. It was like one day we woke up and couldn't watch a newscast without hearing the word "staycation" five or six times.

Anyway, we started off with the Two Nations Tour, a big boat ride that starts off in Alexandria Bay, NY, and travels across the St. Lawrence to the Canadian side of the river and eventually stops at the Boldt Castle. Connor was great during the whole trip, except for when he had a big blowout on the boat that left him without pants for the rest of the trip. Most of the islands are big enough for just one house to be on the island, which means that they have to create their own power and store their own trash and sewage. The homes are primarily built by people that have more money than they know what to do with, the Boldt Castle being the perfect example.

Time for a little history lesson. The Boldt Castle was built by a man-named George Boldt around 1900, and he was building this 127-room castle as a monument of his love for his wife. (He actually named the island Heart Island.) All construction was stopped a year before it was scheduled to be completed because his wife suddenly died. A lot of the structures slowly deteriorated over the next several decades until the late 1970's when the castle became open to the public and work was started to try to preserve and restore the structures. Everything looks amazing on the outside, but most of the actual castle is not finished on the inside. It was still fun to see, though, and it's crazy to think that there are places like this in our neck of the woods.