3CATS!/Countryside=VehicleEssential/NoPay
We have a modest house built by my husband on a modest acreage, near where he grew up in the cottage/lake area of Ontario, halfway between Winnipeg and Thunder Bay. This region is popular for bass & walleye fishing, & has many types of fishing & hunting lodges, guides, float planes for charter... There was a mill but it's closing so the tourism will likely become ever more significant. There's a bordertown (Ontario/Minnesota) a half- hour drive away, of about 8-10 thousand residents per side. There is some selection of gyms, grocers, gas stations... but not tons, and only one cinema, few ethnic restaurants... it is the normal small town experience. For emergency need like gasoline, milk or rum, there is a tiny general store about 6 miles from our house, and a simple little grocery store in a town of a couple thousand, 10 miles more. We usually go to the bordertown though, because it has everything on the shopping list.There's a Safeway, Canadian Tire, Tim Horton's, WalMart. My point is that this place is NOT Manhattan, ha! But if you like to fish, hike, kayak, boat, waterski or canoe, you'll find lots to do. Or if you lose yourself in music or books you'll enjoy the solitude. There are pretty scenes everywhere begging to be sketched or photographed by the artist, or examined by the naturalist. We love to visit there for a month a couple times a year (we have a room in the basement but share the kitchen, washroom, laundry etc with you when we're there) but unfortunately it's in the middle of nowhere! We work in Alberta, road trip a lot... we don't want to be tied to it full-time. Right now it's halfway through some renos, and there's still old flooring in the kitchen, spare bedrooms and washroom (we can't decide on flooring!) but recent bamboo flooring in the master bedroom & its half-bathroom, and in the living room. It is very low VOC so there is no "new floor stink" to worry about. That brings me to the subject of my chemical sensitivity. The problem with our current caretaker is (on top of her lack of ability to do even minor repair and maintenance work) her refusal to give up her use of chemicals that make me sick, like fabric softeners and room scent. I am not extremely ill- I can handle many milder chemicals (you would not be expected to change deodorants or hand lotions for instance) but we definitely need you to use unscented laundry products and avoid perfume/cologne, scented candles and most especially, "air freshener". I have worries about these chemicals being used even in my absence because they soak in to the house and furnishings and would then be impossible to eliminate without renovation. Smoking of course must be done outside in the sunroom, which though fully enclosed is unheated, and furnished with only a picnic table. There is power out there so I imagine a portable electric heater could make it tolerable in winter, should our next caretaker happen to be a smoker. Don't imagine anything very fancy! The heating is a wood boiler in the yard (it heats water which is piped in - safer than having the actual fire indoors!) so you'll be feeding it a couple log meals a day. There is the option of heating with electric heaters should you wish. The water comes from a very mineralized well, so there are devices to be tinkered with, like an iron filter and water softener. My husband can teach some of the basic maintenance stuff but we hope to find a fairly "handy" person who will be confident taking care of their own little upkeep things. The garage is full with my husband's old cars and his waterskiing boat, and workshop, but you have use of a breezeway to plug in/ keep your car snowfree (Speaking of winter, the driveway is too long to self-shovel but the municipality does a good job plowing, usually). There's good skidooing in winter or quadding/dirtbiking in summer. The house has a nice sized lawn for sunbathing in the summer, and a sunroom which is nice for barbequing out of the bugs. Ah, yes, I must explain the bugs, ha ha! This is wet country so the plants are very lush, and the flies, moths, mosquitoes & spiders are more common than in an average place. Unless you are phobic, this does have some appeal. It's kind of like a jungle, though with the normal Canadian plants- pine, poplar, clover, roses, willow. We have a loop trail in the woods that's long enough for a good daily walk, with wild berries during mid summer! We have a clothesline which we enjoy because while hanging clothes one gets to smell the clover & hear the birds... it's an indescribably soothing experience.(yes we have a machine if you fail to see the charm in a laundry line!) Of course if you're a birder you don't need to be told that the overabundant flies make for a high number of birds, which is very interesting. I always have a feeder in the winter & we see dozens of varieties! There are also tons of rodents living off the bugs, but all of them who come near get slain by our cats. (I must confess the birds die too sometimes) Yes, the cats! They love having a forest humming with life. They'll explore, climb and hunt for hours. But eventually they want to come inside to eat & rest, and that's the big reason we are unable to just shut the house up when we're not there. So we're sort of looking for a zookeeper or a pet nanny, ha! As well as keeping the house safe & sound, you must let the cats in & out, set out their meals, deal with their litter, brush them, play with them, and tolerate them waking you up at 4a.m. randomly (This is how cats are!). There are 3. For their safety we will have no "high risk guests" coming with you: no large dog, toddler, you know what I mean. These cats are beloved & are each really awesome! They will be the best part of your experience! We have given up on finding a tenant, with the mill closing & real estate in the area getting shakey. But if we could find a guest who'd be willing to cover the cost of property taxes, electricity, cable & internet, firewood... then at least the place wouldn't be costing us money! My dream would be to find someone like a retiree, correspondence student, author, or painter, who won't be bothered by the lack of employment opportunities in the area; have this person be handy and responsible & a cat lover; and have the person contribute a couple hundred a month for the expenses If we found someone permanent, we would be happy to avoid this search again, but if you would like our house for just a couple months, that would be nice too actually- at least then we could get away for awhile.