Tag: whitney

While in Algonquin Park, we quite often do day trips to places like Dorset, Lake of Bays, Bracebridge, Gravenhurst, Barry’s Bay and a lot of trips to Whitney.

Whitney is located at the East Gate into the park, approximately 1200 residents. They have a couple of restaurants, gas station, grocery store and the other usual amenities. One of the spots we love to go to is Bongopix Tavern. It’s a very unique spot and I forgot to get a photo of the building from the outside. Bongo and Andrea own the building as well as some cabins across the road. They rent out rooms and cabins as well as work in the Tavern. They are such great people, smart, funny and very hard working. I have never met such welcoming people so that it doesn’t feel like going to a tavern, it feels like going to a friend’s house. They make really great sandwiches, coffee and delicious cocktails and of course they have beer! There is entertainment 3 nights a week from Bongo and Andrea and anyone else who wants to pick up an instrument and/or sing. One night we went to play Trivia, I love playing Trivia. I believe there were 9 teams, most had four people but of course, we were only two. I called our team No Hope but we did have hope because we actually beat 3 or 4 other teams which we did not expect! It was a great evening. Trum even went in one night to meet Bongo.

We like to drive to Madawaska for the day and the day we did that, we decided to keep going to Barry’s Bay. As we drove through Barry’s Bay, I noticed an outdoor patio and as it was “beertail” hour, we decided to see what it was like. We had some great beer sitting outside on the patio of the Balmoral Hotel built in 1892 The owner served us and she was from the local area but her husband is from Belgium so they have a great variety of Belgium beer. (He is also the chef) We ordered Belgium beer and she gave me one that she said was ranked number one in the world. It was a pretty good beer, not sure how they rank them though but I’d like to get in on it. We ended up staying for a dinner and we both ordered a pasta dish and they were both very good.

Perhaps next post will be some wildlife photos………..we’ll see………..