A weekend getaway guide to Muskoka

Are you sad that your garage band music isn't on it?

Nope. Simply stating the obvious about that list.

Those scones look heavenly. Is that jam and clotted cream on them?

What awesome, mind-blowing songs everyone loves would you put on, Que?

Hey AV - you know it's funny - this map I'm looking at shows Gravenhurst at the bottom of Lake Muskoka.

Webers is highly overrated.

Yeah thats some pretty awful music on there.

Yay! Let's all go down to mommy and daddy's cottage and mooch off of them some more!

The Me Generation is at it again, trying to live lives that they cannot afford.

BlogTO: will you ever try to address the sense of entitlement and the absurd spending habits of 20-30-somethings?

Hwy 169 ends at ... Hwy 11 before it even gets to the Muskoka Lakes area.

Jesus, inky... have a beer and chill already. It's an article about heading to the cottage. Grind yer axe elsewhere...

I wish I had friends with cottages.

You're hilarious.

Are you suggesting that we all become ruthless lawyers and make lots of money so we can purchase our cottages with cash and then go on blogs talking about how much more my net worth is than yours?

"Patio Lanterns", "Ahead by a Century", "Summer of '69" and, what the heck, "Call Me Maybe."

There's your cottage soundtrack.

CashMoney! replying to a comment from stinky inky / MAY 17, 2012 AT 12:18 PM
"Are you suggesting that we all become ruthless lawyers and make lots of money so we can purchase our cottages with cash and then go on blogs talking about how much more my net worth is than yours?"


Let me say this more simply, if I may: Stop spending money you don't have! Or, better yet, live BELOW your means--that doesn't include going to the cottage. And, if that fails, get acquainted with Thomas J. Stanley. That is all.

To those who always seem to pop up whenever Webers is mentioned on a blog, etc, please shut up. It's getting old. To say Webers is overrated is to first assume Webers and its patrons think it's the end all of burgers. Neither has ever made that claim. I, for one, think they're tasty. They're the burgers I grew up with and looked forward to every time I hopped in the car with the fam to spend our week o' fun up in Muskoka. I still look forward to them. The line is NEVER 90 minutes worth of wait. Not even close. We get it, you're far superior in your taste and appreciation of food to the point of labeling yourself a 'foodie'. Enjoy, knock yourself out. But please, stop thinking any of us lesser consumers of food give a crap, because we do not, you sad, little clowns.

Did anyone else think they'd be getting a lecture about ecomomics from ol' Stink Ink whey they clicked on this story about cottages and playlists? Sheesh...

Wow, you're a lawyer and you don't really understand how mortgages work, do you? The whole mortgage system worked fine for decades before the recession (and continues to work fine), and the junk mortgages that caused the recession were NOT normal. Based on your knowledge of mortgages I would definitely recommend you not get one until you talk to an expert (and that does not include the banker who gets a hefty commission if you sign one).

I'm sorry you think that someone's goal in life should be a high net worth. You're not exactly helping the greedy, soulless, lawyer stereotype are you? I don't know anyone that owns a cottage, that's what rentals are for. I also don't keep track of my friend's net worths', that would be insanely creepy. I don't know anyone my age (20's) that has a huge debt either. I'm pretty sure that's just a stereotype perpetuated by magazines and newspapers, because articles like that make people feel smarter than everyone else and feel worried about the future so they keep buying the newspaper to find out what else is wrong.

Cottage rentals are very affordable and are definitely not going to bankrupt someone or put them in a huge debt. Buying a cottage is another matter, but people don't buy a cottage for a single summer, they do it for a lifetime if they have enough money to afford a second home. Cottages rock! Nothing beats a nice long weekend cottage rental to get away from the city and chill with friends.

I clicked this link almost exclusively to make sure that a post about a Muskoka weekend included mention of Mad Tom. Nicely done!

Great guide.

For all of you that are worried about the mention of a highway that leads to Gravenhurst instead, you can drink Sawdust City beer instead.

And, while I don't mean to join the chorus of haters here, in terms of your playlist, why not just listen to Etta James and Ben E. King perform their own songs? Far better than any covers, in my opinion.

Weber's never claimed to be good at anything other than offering a place for the kids and family dog to stretch their legs and make a peepee. It does an excellent job of that, hence the long line-ups.

It also offers unremarkable but decent burgers, fries, etc. Here's a tip. Order the double burger. Much better than a single.

Webers is a landmark. It has been for many years.

It's food is not bloggable nor will it be reviewed by hipster foodies. It is the standard fare of burger joints pre 'gastro'.

It's consistent, fresh and ready fast. It makes feeding a hungry and excited carload of kids easy. There are no 90 minute minute line-ups. 9 minute maybe.

It is also nostalgic. It predates the internet and probably most of you reading this. People have been lining up for years for a reason.

What a mess of ocmments. Yikes. Let me add to the pile!

1) As a weekend guide, this post makes little sense. There is no route mapped out, and you have people going all over the place. (Bala, then Bracebridge, then back to Bala...) It should be arranged more like the "Best of" posts on Blog TO, with a map key so that people can understand the locations. Or make it route based.

2) Who is this post aimed at? A day tripper returning home for the evening? Someone looking for access to the water? Odd that you list no suggested accommodations or parks with public beaches (there are quite a few). It's a very incomplete list seemingly aimed at people who already have cottages, who will therefore already know all of these businesses.

3) Corrections: Don's Bakery is in Bala And yes, it is spelled "scones" though pronounced "scons". And they are nothing like actual scones, more like triangle-shaped dinner rolls, soft and fluffy. (see bags on bottom right of this image: http://bit.ly/Lm58ns) I have no idea what your picture is of, but that is not what local cottagers think of as "Don's scons". Maybe we've just been mixing up rolls with scones all these years... Also, there is no town of "Bala Falls" (unless you are referring to the actual rapids near the bakery). Ice Dreams is not in a former creamery but in the former Don's, vacated when Don's moved to the former supermarket years ago. Still super cute place though.

4) Lexicon: Muksoka is a tricky word, and you should be careful to clarify what you mean. "Muskoka Region" means both the "Muskoka Lakes" (Muskoka, Rosseau, Joseph) and the lakes around Huntsville/Lake of Bays and all the stuff inbetween and around them. This post seems to only deal with the loop circling Lake Muskoka proper (Gravenhurst-Bala-Port Carling-Bracebridge). Is that the intent?

5) Webers: seems overrated if you go all the time, but live elsewhere for a while, come back, and you'll savour every bite. So good. Should make mention of the Key Man (you can identify him by his button), who has been flipping burgers there for decades and will give you a nod if you go, say, a couple hundred times. The guy is awesome. Other Weber's trivia -- that orange bridge is the original bridge over the railway that used to connect the CN Tower to Front St. Weber's bought it when the convention center and Skydome changed the area -- people kept getting hit by cars crossing the highway. And the railcar theme came from surplus boxcars being the cheapest way to create refrigerated storage back when Weber's first opened. Only in recent years did they add more train cars for washrooms, seating, etc. Rule of thumb - if the line is more than 6 or 7 people out the door, it will be a long wait. Otherwise they move at rocket speed, taking payment long before you get to the counter and opening the second side when it gets busy.

5) Highways: Even in the strictest definition of the word "Muskoka", it is perfectly correct to refer to Highway 11 as the way to the region. It's been that way for nearly a century and even after highway downloading the main route for anyone on the east side of the Muskoka Lakes or anyone headed to Lake of Bays/Huntsville is still to take Hwy 11. (The western side now has the new Highway 400 extension as a back door to Bala, Port Carling, Lake Joseph, etc.) As for 169, which for people too old to read this blog would have been the original Highway 69, it was killed by downloading and is now only informally called "Highway 169". Technically it is now Muskoka Road 169, though no one actually calls it that. This was and remains the upgraded version of the Bala Road from Gravenhurst. (It continues as a Simcoe County road south of Gravenhurst heading SE to Hwy 12). If you want to get a sense of what a provincial highway looked like in the 1960s, take Old Torrance Road as you approach Torrance from the east. This short section of road is the original and untouched highway that used to run into the (abandoned) middle of Torrance before heading back out to its current route. Narrow shoulders, high grades - picture 3 or 4 hours on that in the back of a station wagon and you'll get a sense of what driving to Muskoka used to be like.