Providence: While We Are On Our Great Loop Adventure We Would Like To Rent Our 1000 Islands Home

We are looking for a friend or friend of a friend to rent our home while we are on America’s Great Loop. Here is the description of our home.

Estimated time for our Great Loop:

July 7, 2024 through the end of July 2025

Our house is more than just our home, it is our sanctuary. Our home is a place where we rejuvenate ourselves. It's a place where we can relax, enjoy a cool beverage on the deck with friends and watch the boats, yachts, and big ships travel the mighty St. Lawrence River. The views of the bay and the shipping channel in the St Lawrence River are stunning!

We have a beautiful ranch style home that sits on a small hill overlooking Brown Bay. We have two bedrooms and two bathrooms that will easily accommodate four people. The laundry room is just off the master bedroom. Our kitchen is open and food preparation is easy with lots of room and light to work in. However, outdoor cooking on our grill is a real treat in its own right! Our dinner table is placed in front of sliding glass doors so we can see the river, but in the summer, we eat most of our meals outdoors. Our front deck faces the St. Lawrence River and provides a spectacular view. Our large oak tree provides comforting shade from the sun and heat. It's the perfect place for cocktails! We have wonderful neighbors in our small 18 family association on a private road. We recently paved the road to our home and also our driveway, which has parking for four vehicles. We have our own boat house on our waterfront property where you can swim, canoe, or pedalboat. There is also an association dock for swimming and a small association boat launch.

While we love living on an island and boating to our favorite restaurants for dinner in both the US and Canada, driving to anywhere is as simple as getting on Interstate 81 and crossing the Thousand Islands Bridge. There is a Price Chopper supermarket just across the bridge. We are 30 minutes from Watertown and Fort Drum. If the last-minute need should arise to get bread, milk, or other grocery items you need, the recently renovated Wellesley Island Market has reopened for business and includes gas pumps, a liquor store, and an ice cream window. They also offer breakfast items and take-out pizza, sandwiches, and subs.

Wellesley Island is just about centered in the Thousand Islands area of the St Lawrence River. While the house sits in a rural setting, the villages of Alexandria Bay and Clayton are respectively only six and seven miles away. Both villages are small river front communities with plenty of shopping and dining opportunities. Alexandria Bay, affectionately called Alex Bay by the locals, caters to the tourist scene so there are more dining, clubs, and novelty shops than in Clayton. As a result, the nightlife is a little livelier in Alex Bay. Clayton enjoys a more upscale and relaxed atmosphere. Fine dining can be found in both villages but we prefer Clayton when looking for a quiet dinner out. Fine dining can also be found on the island in the summer at the Thousand Islands Club. More casual meals can be found in the scenic Thousands Islands Park community at the Guzzle.

Canada is only a five-minute drive to the border and the city of Kingston in Ontario is about 40 minutes. The Canadian villages of Gananoque and Brockville are very much like the U.S. villages of Alex Bay and Clayton. Shopping and dining establishments are abundant in these waterfront communities as well, but with a decidedly more conservative feeling. Kingston, our personal favorite, is very much alive! Kingston is a waterfront city and is located where Lake Ontario transitions into the St. Lawrence River. Fine dining, shopping, concerts or simply enjoying the sunshine on the waterfront park lawn can all be found in this magnificent city! Kingston has a European flair about it, at least to us anyway, and draws us back time and time again to enjoy its sights, sounds, smells and its friendly people.

There are several reputable tour boat companies that run regularly scheduled tours through the Thousand Islands. Uncle Sam Boat Tours is based in Alexandria Bay and offers several trips varying in length from one to three hours including trips to Boldt Castle on Heart Island and another, much longer trip to Singer Castle on Dark Island. They also offer sunset dinner cruises on weekends. Clayton Island Tours is located at the village docks in Clayton and offers tours among the Thousand Islands. They also offer glass bottom boat tours and wine tasting tours with Coyote Moon Winery. The Canadian villages of Gananoque and Rockport also have similar boat tours. Several golf courses can also be found in the area.

The Thousand Islands Seaway Wine Trail parallels the St Lawrence River and two of the five wineries are very close. The Thousand Islands Winery is just across the river and has a wonderful selection from which to choose. Coyote Moon winery in Clayton makes a fantastic Chardonnay and boasts a wine tasting bar on the waterfront with live music on weekend evenings. Great fun! The Cape Winery, Venditti Vineyards, and Otter Creek Winery round out the rest of the wine trail.

Scuba divers will love diving in the cool waters of the St Lawrence River. There are more than 30 shipwrecks to explore in the Thousand Islands area alone! Water clarity is excellent and averages 30-50 feet thanks to the zebra mussels filtering the water for us.

We are just a few miles from Wellesley Island State Park. Here you will find a nature center with programs, a beach with facilities, a marina, and many hiking trails. There are several other state parks within a 30 minute drive as well.

Wellesley Island is also beautiful in the winter. We see lots of wildlife, including deer, turkey, and many other birds. When the bay freezes, we often have good ice skating. And you can find trails for cross-country skiing and winter hiking at the state park. We don’t often get large amounts of snowfall like other areas of the north country.

Front Walk.