September 7 Weekend Away - Kingston
- Kaylin M
- Oct 10, 2019
- 10 min read
Did anyone else feel like this summer just flew right past them? I felt like we were so busy with work and the new house that we didn't really do much this summer. Blake was especially disappointed that we didn't get to camp more. Our initial plan was to have one last attempt at summer camping, but with the unpredictable wedding lately, we decided to plan a mini weekend away instead. We decided to head to Kingston!
I've voiced my love of Kingston before on this blog and we were actually in Kingston one year ago that weekend! It's so funny how life tends to repeat itself. This year, Blake and I got to experience Kingston together. When I go somewhere, I like to go all out. I think that, even if you've been somewhere 10 times, there is still more for you to enjoy that maybe wasn't there the first time you went. So, I made sure to plan the full tourist experience.
Our original hope was that we would get to see my goddaughter, Elisabeth, and visit with my cousins since Blake hasn't seen them in more than a year. We were so hopeful that, since we would be there the full weekend, we would be able to have a visit - short or long, it didn't matter. All I will say is that it didn't happen.
All of our planning was sort of last minute, including our hotel. I put Blake in charge of reserving the hotel. He tried to get an AirBnB, but waited until the absolute last minute, so the host refused the request. We discovered this moments before we were supposed to leave. It was a stressful moment to say the least. Luckily, we were able to reserve a hotel room at an EcoLodge at the last minute. Surprisingly, we still left on time which is rare for us, but it was a small victory. The drive from Peterborough to Kingston is approximately 2 hours, so we made it to Kingston before 7 p.m. The EcoLodge was in a good location as it was right in the middle of Kingston. This meant that everywhere we wanted to go was within a 10 minute drive. I got Blake to check us in and we settled for a moment before heading out to dinner.
Blake had found a sushi place that had raving reviews, so we decided to give it a shot. The place closed at 9 p.m., so we were the last table seated. Shockingly, the small restaurant, was still full of people. Blake and I usually get all-you-can-eat sushi, but my co-worker had previously recommended that we get a la carte since it's (supposedly) better. We ended up having to wait over 30 minutes for our sushi, but the hostess was apologetic and brought us free edamame and gyozas. When the sushi finally came it was presented very nice, but it was probably some of the worst sushi I had ever had. We had ordered the sushi & sashimi meal, but we weren't able to choose the sushi that we preferred, so we ended up with quite the assortment. I'm not sure what it was that I didn't like about the taste - maybe it didn't taste fresh? I'm not sure, but I have sworn off sushi for a bit after that. (Note: I say this every time I have sushi, but it never happens.)
After inhaling our food, we headed back to the hotel to "hit the hay" for the night.
Saturday: On Saturday, I woke up before Blake and went down the hall to have the continental breakfast. It was basic, but I sat in the window and enjoyed the peaceful morning moments. After breakfast, I woke up Blake and we got ready for the day.
We started with heading to Juniper's Cafe at the Tett Centre. It is "Kingston's only licensed cafe with patio" as per their website. I've been so bad with forgetting my camera on these journeys, so my pictures these recent blog posts have not been ideal. Anyways, the cafe is super cute. It kind of has an industrial feel inside and it was so nice to sit out on the patio with Blake while we drank our "coffees" (mocha for me, espresso for Blake). The patio sits right on the lake and, although it was partially cloudy, it was beautiful. We were surprised by the number of sail boats out on the water. It was a great way to start out morning.
After a brief cup of coffee, we headed over the Fort Henry. We have been to Fort Henry in the past, but Blake has never been on their official tour and I've only been on their haunted tour (about 15 years ago). We were both excited to experience Fort Henry like real tourists. When we arrived, we had JUST missed their last tour, so we had to wait 45 minutes for their next one. We explored their little shops and enjoyed the views of Kingston. When our tour finally started, we gathered in our group and got started. All of the tour guides are students from the surrounding post-secondary schools. I thought that was very interesting. They all stayed in character during their tours and were very well informed. Our tour guide was able to answer everyone's questions and kept everyone's attention during every step of the tour. I won't spoil anything because I would definitely recommend this tour to people traveling to the Kingston area, but I will say that I had a total idiotic moment during the tour. At one point we were in the classroom within the fort and the sun was pouring in through the doors, so there was a glare at the front of the room. On the wall, behind the tour guide, there was a picture of a female - I thought maybe it was a school teacher from the time (not sure why I would have thought that), but I couldn't really see the picture very well. So, I asked who it was. The guide just turned, looked at me, and said, "That's Queen Victoria". I felt like a total idiot, not from his reaction, but just because I'm a total idiot. Haha. Afterwards, I went up close to the picture and it was OBVIOUSLY the Queen. Duh!
Anyways, at the end of the tour, we got to watch a demonstrate of some old/traditional rifles being shot. It was neat! After that, we decided to have a late lunch before heading over to our next destination ... Barcardia!
Barcadia is a bar that is also an awesome arcade. Blake had been there previously with a couple of his friends last year. It was great! They had a lot of the old school games that I used to play at the arcade in the Pickering Mall way back when! The arcade was made even better by the fact that all the games were still only 25 cents! Most of the newer arcade games are more expensive - like a dollar - so you can't play too many rounds. Here, our 10$ went a long way and we spend the afternoon like two kids in a candy store - running from one game to another. We got hooked on a racing game and played probably close to 10 rounds before two young boys came up and asked if they could have a turn. Blake and I turned to each other and started laughing. It was that moment that we knew it was time to leave. We cashed in our quarters and headed back to our hotel.
We relaxed in our hotel room for a little bit before we were out and about again. I had planned a chocolate making class for Blake and I via AirBnB that evening. When we got there, the doors were locked. We thought maybe the instructor had to come from home, so we waited a bit. Finally, Blake decided to call the number on AirBnB to find out what was going on. The lady was shocked when we called. Apparently, this was her first booking, as her class was very new on the site, and she hadn't received notification (the kink was worked out by the end of the weekend). She apologized and we worked around our schedules and rebooked for the following day. It was a little disappointing, but she couldn't have been nicer and more apologetic about it.
Since our chocolatier dreams had been put on hold for the evening, we decided to go out for a nice dinner. My dad used to go to Kingston a lot for business and he would always come home and rave about a restaurant called Bistro Stefan. It wasn't so much of a choice, but an obligation that we go to Bistro Stefan. Blake and I put on our nicest clothes that we had brought and went out for a romantic dinner together. Blake had shrunk my dress in the wash so the slit in my dress went up WAY too high for a fancy restaurant, but I didn't bring anything else, so I just held my dress closed while walking around. Neither one of us were very hungry because of our late lunch so we shared their house special - prime rib! We ordered the larger size and it was more than enough to feed both of us. At the end of dinner - which was delicious by the way - the waiter brought us each a chocolate covered strawberry as a special bonus. I think he did that for every table, but we still felt special. I can't remember our waiter's name, but he was amazing. We've been noticing that everyone in Kingston is so friendly and it really perked us up during our trip.
Once our bellies were full, we called it a night.
Sunday: On Sunday, I planned us a food tour. Anyone that knows me, knows that I love food tours. I also highly recommend food tours to everyone. No matter if you're in your hometown or on a weekend getaway or even on the other side of the world, GO ON A FOOD TOUR!!! Not only do you get to try amazing food, but you get to experience a place in a different way. Also, they aren't usually all that expensive and are a great way to kill some time. We met the tour group at the Visitor Centre in Kingston. A multi-cultural festival was also happening that weekend; as well as a market, so the area was hopping! We had approximately 12 people in our tour group. Our first location was a fish and chips restaurant right next to the Visitor Centre - Dianne's Fish Shack. We started off the morning with fish tacos (yum) and margaritas. I had a sip of the margarita and it was probably the best margarita I've ever tasted. Since I don't really drink, Blake ended up drinking (chugging) both of our drinks. Once Blake was feeling sufficiently carefree, we moved on to the next location. There were about 9 stops throughout the 3 hour food tour, each providing a delicious insight into Kingston's cuisine. We tried everything from pizza, to gnocchi, to traditional Quebec maple cakes (Blake while editing this: "The maple cakes were really good"). Everything along the way was delicious. We will also treated to a couple of secret, hidden gems within Kingston. Like I said before, I would definitely recommend going on a food tour wherever you may be. While on the tour, we also got to hear a lot about Kingston's history as a port town. It was all very interesting.
After the Food tour was over, we had about an hour before we had to head over to our chocolate workshop, so we decided to explored some of the stops that we have made while on the tour a little bit more. One of the stops was a Kingston bakery and if you know anything about Blake and I, you know that we love our bread. So we can leave Kingston without picking up a loaf of bread for each of us.
Now it was the finally time for our chocolatier dreams to come true. We're on our way to our chocolate making Workshop. As I said previously, this was the instructors first class booked through Air B&B so the three of us sort of winged the entire class. She had conducted other workshops previously through different means, but she had never had such an intimate class before...it was just Blake and I. She started by getting us to try different chocolates and try to guess the cocoa level. Blake was surprisingly good at that part; he nailed it almost every time. The instructor even allowed us a taste of a new rose chocolate that is relatively new to consumers but is naturally pink in colour. It had an almost strawberry flavour to it, as if we were eating white chocolate with strawberry flavoring. It wasn't bad, but Blake and I are more dark chocolate lovers. While we were trying these chocolates, we tried a fascinating one that literally changed flavors in our mouths 4 times. It was a trip!
Now that our palates were pros, she let us choose our preferred chocolates for our personal creations. We chose a basic 60% chocolate.
The instructor taught us how to temper chocolate correctly and then let us prep and dip strawberries into the melted chocolate. She taught us how to do it so that the chocolate was perfect. This is where I succeeded. Blake had a couple of causalities during his strawberry dipping adventures.
Next, we made our own literal chocolate bars. Really all we did was spread chocolate and then sprinkle lavender sea salt on top, but it was still a fun activity. For our third task, we were required to roll truffles in chocolate that we scooped into our (gloved) hands to coat the truffles. This job was a messy one, but hilarious to watch us struggle. The final lesson was to fill previous created molds with chocolate. The instructor (whose name, if you haven't already assumed, I've forgotten), had already created and decorated the chocolates, all we had to do was fill them. We decided to fill them with a lemon custard and strawberry jelly. The filling was probably the most difficult task because we wanted them perfect. After each one was filled, we coated the bottom - so all of the filling wouldn't fall out - and we were done!
We got to take it ALL home with us and she threw in a couple of extra ones since we helped her with a few prep jobs for her sale the following day. All of the chocolates were delicious by the way!
We left a little later than initially expected due to the change of date/time for the chocolate workshop, but we were finally heading home. Although the weekend hadn't been what we had hoped for, we experienced Kingston to its fullest. I had a lot of personal ups and downs, but Blake was by my side every step of the way. For that, I couldn't have been more grateful.
This weekend made me truly happy and appreciative for the relationship that Blake and I have created together and I can't wait to marry Blake next November.
Who else is excited?! (November 7, 2020)
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