Last year 2024, just before pulling out my jetski for the final time as fall was slowly saying hello, my wife and I headed up to Lake Simcoe for some fun on the water. To be clear, i’m the water baby, having lived in Jamaica for about 12 years, the tropics tend to fuse to me.
Luckily, the water was still pretty warm and just beautiful. Lake Simcoe is a hidden gem, with the most beautiful sandbars and many sandy bottoms along the cottage coastal. We had been here a few times as it is only about 45 minutes from Whitby, for a quick reset. Many times the large sandbar spreading across ‘Holmes Point Beach’ for a couple kilometres, has many boaters of all shapes and sizes, anchored off its waterlines and many are walking around in the waist deep water, having a great old time. Sometimes, there is even a homemade raft floating around being guided by a couple partiers, with mega speakers shouting out all kinds of music. Our first time, after we had joined in the fun with our jetski, I expressed my love for the area to a couple boaters, remarking how beautiful it was, to which they replied; ‘Shhhhhhhh’! Yes Sir, the hidden gem.
So moving forward, on the day in focus, as the season was slowly winding down, my wife and I were enjoying a beautiful day on the water, zipping across this large beautiful lake, feeling the warm breeze on our faces, with my wife’s hair blowing in the wind. Not mine, how do you say, it cant blow if its not there! We were having a nice cruze along the shore line, going quite slowly, so as to clearly take in the gorgeous views of all of the different cottages. At this point we were only about 100 metres from shore. We decided that it was about time to start heading back to the Marina from which we had launched from and I slowly turned the jetski around, although I still cant get my wife to agree on the ‘slowly’ part. This jetski is a Seadoo GTI SE170 with 3 seats, with the rear seat being more comfortable than the middle seat as it has nice handlebars for her and foot rests. My side of the story is that although I had asked my wife nicely not to lean way over on the corners, she did and what do you know, over we went. The key to the jetski was attached to my life jacket but broke off so the key was still in the ignition, so off the jetski continued to go, although very slowly, out further into the lake. Of course I checked quickly and my wife was fine and so was I. Next, my good prescription sunglasses were gone and our mobile phones and portable boat radio along with our flares and flare gun, were all in the jetski. The good thing was the water was a bit more than waist deep as we were close to shore and quite warm, but no one in sight. One of the cottages had huge boulders along their shoreline and yes, it happened. With some slight wind and the jetski hitting a small wave, it turned slowly and started heading in land, with me hoping that it wouldnt hit the rocks. One lady who had been laying on her dock that we didnt see, jumped in the water and walked out and asked if she could help but, there were no boats in the area to head out to our jet ski to try and rescue it. We used her phone to call Durham Regional Police but the Dispatcher advised that there was no Marine Unit in the area due to the late afternoon time.
After about 20 minutes, our jetski was close enough that I could attempt a rescue, which I did as it was going in circles and all was well.
To this day, my wife still blames me for the sharp cornering on the jetski which she says, caused the jetski to overturn. My version of this story differs slightly, but she is probably right and since I have a lot of experience listening to her when I am driving and she is giving me instructions, I should have listened to her.
However, we all have a right to protest so this will be locked in our vault with the other protests and we will live happily ever after.
On a serious note, we were not hurt, we were close to shore, water was warm and there were no sharks in the water that day, maybe just a couple minnows.