Dry Stone Canada put on a workshop in October 2023 for beginners (me) and intermediate dry stone wallers in Georgetown, Ontario at the Scotsdale Farm heritage site. The goal of the workshop was to take down a section of stone wall (which was broken in to three pieces) and rebuild it in two days.
So, I thought the workshop would be a fun thing to do and I could visit my cousin who lives only 30 minutes from the workshop site.
Day 1 Thursday – Travel Day
My first mistake was leaving my phone at home – which I discovered while standing in line at the TSA check point at Austin-Bergstrom airport. Guest Services at the airport came to my rescue when they saw me wandering around down by the empty baggage claim area (it was early) looking like a pitiful old lady trying to find a public phone. Kenneth and Lauren (heroes of Guest Services) let me use their own cell phones to try to reach my husband. I was so stressed I could only remember my own phone number. Steve eventually answered my phone once he got back home and then drove back to the airport with it. What a great start (face-palm). At the time I didn’t think a beer for breakfast would make the day any better, but it probably would have.
The flights to Toronto went smoothly. I was seated next to a nice lady, Dawn, flying out of Austin. She and her friend were going to spend some time in the Chicago area. It turns out she has a booth at First Saturday in Wimberley near where I live.
I eventually got through friendly Canadian customs (eye-roll) and wandered around the airport for a while trying to find the car rentals. Apparently, they were very busy because of Canadian Thanksgiving travel. My reservation was for a sedan, but the final insult of the day was a Kia Soul – the hamster car – so embarrassed to drive that. Steve laughed, my cousin laughed, I laughed later. That car tried to steer itself, no wonder hamsters can drive them. I fought the car and complicated highway system to my cousin’s house. Thank you, GPS. She was surprised I was brave enough to do that. Not sure about brave, dumb might be a better adjective.
The travel day ended with an excellent all you can eat Japanese Thai food dinner at the Spoon&Fork in Oakville. With my cousin. And a beer. Okay, two beers.
Day 2 Friday – Georgetown, ON
We started the day with dog walks. Yay, dogs and walking.
Canadians have the best system of neighborhood parks and walking trails. Urban planning, what a concept – I’m looking at you, Austin TX.
Here is a photo of Tater. What a beautiful girl. So Sweet. Love her face!
Next, we hid the embarrassing hamster car in my cousin’s garage, and she drove us out to Georgetown in her car to scope out the workshop site, the hotel I had booked in the area, and a cheese shop.
The Mill Street Cheese Shop (https://www.millstreetcheesemarket.com/) was lovely. My cousin said she would go back to Georgetown just to visit that cheese shop again. They had cheese, deli meats, platters, gift boxes, pantry items, and some of the biggest charcuterie boards I’ve ever seen. You could make a mantel piece from one of those beautiful boards. Just kidding. The charcuterie boards were from Ottercreek Woodworks (https://ottercreekwoodworks.com/).
We had a light lunch at a pub called the Shepherd’s Crook. I also had a beer. Flying Monkey. It was so good. I took this picture because the glass has a ‘Re-Order Line’ near the bottom. I did not re-order. Lol.
Finished the day with more dog walks and dinner at an Italian food restaurant. A good day.
Days 3&4 Saturday & Sunday – Scotsdale Farm
Scotsdale Farm is a beautiful 531 acre working farm that was bequeathed to the Ontario Heritage Trust to protect and preserve it. The Bruce Trail and the Bennett Heritage Trail cross the property allowing hikers scenic walking in the Niagara Escarpment area.
Time to get to work. In a good way.
The portion of the wall we were restoring was broken in thirds. The capstones were mortared in previously restored portions of the wall, but when taking down this section we found mortar was poured into the center as well. That took a little extra time to get down and we lost some of the stones embedded in mortar.
We were working over a ditch on one side and a slight slope lengthwise. We learned about stepping the trench for the slope and worked at 3 different levels.
Two string lines were used on each side to aid in sighting down the lines to make sure the face stones were in line with the batter. Two rows of face stones were laid (mostly 😊) lengthwise toward the center and the center was filled with hearting. The wall was so low that we did not use through stones, the capstones will hold the two sides of the wall together.
There were also demonstrations on stone shaping that were very helpful. I will try again to shape some of the stone in my backyard. I mostly gave up on shaping because the limestone I had at my house was so hard.
I am so glad I got to work with all the wonderful people who came to learn. It was an enjoyable two days! Special thanks to Menno, our instructor, and all the people from Dry Stone Canada and Ontario Heritage Trust that made this event fun.
I made a slideshow from some of the pictures I took, some provided by Dry Stone Canada and a workshop participant named Ann.
Day 5 – Niagra Falls
It turns out my brother lives in New York not far from Niagara Falls so we each made the hour long trip to meet up at Seneca Casino in New York. We had lunch, talked, and played some video poker. It was great hanging out together for a couple of hours. Harry played the dollar slots on the way out. We took this selfie right before he hit a jackpot! The icing on the cake.
Day 6 – Travel Day
The flight out of Toronto was at around 11am. I left the hotel in the hamster car early, because I was not sure how to get back to the car rental drop off. GPS took me right there, only I was on the top deck at the airport instead of the lower deck where the car return was. I tried to circle around myself without the GPS and ended up totally lost and lined up in a parking lot that looked like where the airport employees went in. I finally got the GPS reprogrammed once I knew the address of the rental return. I only wasted a scary hour lost in Toronto or Mississauga or wherever I was. Passed on the beer for breakfast again and knitted instead.
The flight from Chicago to Austin was delayed a couple of hours due to a bird strike on the plane we were supposed to fly out on. This time I did have a beer (okay, two beers) and hoped I would not regret it. My boarding pass had me in the last group, naturally. When I finally got on the plane and walked down the aisle to my seat, there was Dawn and her friend again. I said, “You’re not going to believe this Dawn” we were all sitting together again and we had a good laugh. See, I really am going to First Saturday to meet Dawn again. It looks like it was destined to be.