The last of the fall colour, with a few leaves just about hanging in there – farewell, the leafy portion of fall!
Shrubbery leaf colour, hanging on…
Now we (I!) will wait, somewhat impatiently, for the arrival of real winter, hopefully a proper one, with decent snow and many opportunities for xc skiing and heading out on snowshoes…
Stop! (the mild winter projections!)
Unfortunately, the early forecasts and predictions are for a mild winter, but I won’t stop hoping! And I’ll be properly provisioned and prepared:
A decent IPA – one to be enjoyed post snowshoeing!
Thanks for reading, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!
We enjoyed – is enjoy the right word? – a sprinkle of snow over the recent long weekend, a reminder of what might be waiting for us as we tiptoe towards winter.
“Is this all? And anyway, isn’t this snow a bit early?!”
The actual amounts were a bit of a let down after much fuss in the forecast with dire warnings of travel disruption. In fairness, I’m sure more snow fell elsewhere and caused a bit of slipping and sliding for some…
Bow brilliance
It melted away and temperatures have since climbed back to seasonal and even somewhat above. Crisp mornings and warm afternoons, blustery breezes and big blue skies. Jackets? Not really. A sweater? Maybe for the morning, and then back to shirtsleeve afternoons. A western Canada fall!
Photographs this week were all taken along the Bow, with leaves hanging on even after the wind and snow. Brilliant autumnal days, and maybe we’ll enjoy a few more before the temperatures properly plummet!
Still leafy
Thanks for reading, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!
Goodness! The fall colours have started to show – quite far along in some places. We set off yesterday on a short prairie trip, our last blast of camping this season, and we’re looking forward to big skies and perhaps some seasonal sunshine to light up the tree colour.
Here’s one we saw earlier:
A good start!
Thanks for reading, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!
…just outside Merritt, BC. After a few rain showers, we took a short hike along the shore of Nicola Lake, following a pretty trail winding through towering ponderosa pines. These are such beautiful trees, so striking with their red trunks and long, long needles. I’ll keep it brief and let the trees and the lake do the talking below!
Texture Tall pinesYoung tree, long needlesLakeshore trail, after the rainFarewell rain, hello sunshine!We like camping here – little chance of flooding…
Thanks for reading, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!
I’ll keep this brief as we’ve only patchy wifi, but our time in Wood Buffalo was amazing, from the moment we got to Fort Smith – the NWT gateway to the park, as signposted!
What a welcome! (Photo: Mrs. PC)
Within minutes of passing a sign stating bison were in the area, we encountered several small family groupings. They are incredible to see up close (but not too close) and they are large, so very large.
Amazing!
On our drive out of the park at the end of our stay, scanning the road ahead for buffalo and bears – both seemed to pop up almost anywhere, and even though they are not small creatures, harder to spot in the shadows and undergrowth than you might think – we approached a large rock or boulder. We both commented it looked a bit like a buffalo but wasn’t quite the right shape. Slowing down and passing the “rock” we saw it was in fact a buffalo, sat down with head up, and it was absolutely huge. Huge! The head and shoulders appeared larger than the front of our truck. We rolled past, slowly and carefully, and the buffalo tracked us with the smallest right to left turn of the head. Happily, it stayed where it was, and on we travelled, astonished at the size of him, even though we’d seen several large ones on other days.
Wood Buffalo ragged pines
Amazing, and barely scratching the surface of the wonders found in Wood Buffalo. More to follow when we’ve a better connection and had time to really stop and think about it all!
Best sit and think on things…
Thanks for reading, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!
We’ve enjoyed a few more sprinklings of snow and the temperature has stayed reliably low, so there’s still a white carpet out in the woods. With luck, and if forecasts are accurate, we should have received a sizeable amount more by the time you’re reading this. Please, please, please…
At the start of the week Scout and I had the local woods pretty much to ourselves. Other than the chattering squirrels still at work, and the occasional woodpecker and numerous small brown birds I’m unable to identify, it was mostly quiet. Tracks told us of hares and rabbits, and dogs and walkers out earlier than us, but we didn’t see another person each morning. (Mrs PC remained indoors at the start of the week, under the weather and recovering from flu shots, etc. On the mend now and she’ll soon be back keeping an eye on the children…)
The air was still, with fallen snow balanced precariously on even the most delicate of branches. As morning progressed and a bright sun rose, what heat there was caused snow to tumble, miniature crystal cascades shimmering down. A tiny bird flew across the trail in front of us and into the trees on our left, almost faster than my eye could catch it. Threading through the lattice of tiny branches, wing beats dislodging snow, white puffs betraying the flight path – that was some sight!
With her half curved tail a happy question mark, Scout is most definitely a snow dog, leaping ahead or nosing into snow banks or trying to catch a snowball. I can barely keep up. If there’s a downward slope, she’ll pull hard, trying to get ahead, reach the bottom – and see if I’ll fall? Sometimes I surrender on the steeper ones, putting one foot forward and then sliding down gracefully (you weren’t there, it was graceful) as if riding an escalator, disappointing Scout as I remain upright.
“There’s a good steep slope just over the rise that’ll get him, hehehe!”
Goodness, a couple of weeks into the new winter season and Scout is yet to see me tumble. Will my luck hold? Scout isn’t a gambler, more of a gamboller, but if she could place a bet, it would be on me being flat on my face, deposited into a snow bank at some point. There is a lot of winter to come, and many more walks in the winter woods, so she’s probably right…
“I’m always right!”
The little things in an outdoor season of wonder keeping us mostly balanced – thank you, winter! Thanks for reading, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!
Last week we had the dizzy heights of coastal Maine. This week, after recent events, um, well, there’s a different dizziness and some disbelief around here. I mean, huh?! You did what now?! Hmm, wonder how that will turn out for (non-billionaire) folks over the next few years? Yikes! Oh well, if that’s what you really, really want, then good luck… (If it isn’t what you’d hoped for, I also wish you good luck as depths are plumbed…)
This works
Alrighty, on we go, and let’s look for something more uplifting!
So does this
Trees, rivers, mountains, lakes and the like always work for me, so here are a few uplifting images from the last month. Most were taken in Maine or on the (not so) Plains of Abraham when fall was in full colour.
The leaves have mostly dropped now, so let’s skip the dull bit and head straight to proper winter – you hearing my prayer, weather gods?!
Not so plain
Thanks for reading, look after yourselves, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!
By happy coincidence, thanksgiving more or less marks our anniversary for when we moved to Canada, a decision we’ve never once regretted. With each passing year, we love the place we call home more and more – we’ve so much to be thankful for here in Canada!
Live here? Sounds good!
Happy Thanksgiving if you celebrate this holiday!
Home
Keeping it short – we’re heading out to visit friends and family the next little while, with off grid and in the woods cabin time involved, so not too sure if there’ll be anything posted for a week or two or three.
Cabin time? Sounds good!
Thanks for reading and I hope you have a great (long) weekend!
…and ups again. Like this sentence, it’s been a messy sort of a week or two. The last of the snow has melted, helped by some heavy rain and a rise(!) to below seasonal temperatures. Joy. It was calm following the rain, yet that’s when we lost power, somewhat inexplicably. Maybe a happy-for-the-sun squirrel popped out and accidentally and exuberantly chewed through a power line? Grounded…
The earlier iron and steel greys – calm at least, but where is spring?
With the calmer days, we’ve had some warmer afternoons and blue skies – why, one could almost be fooled into thinking spring is here and heavy winter rains will become sporadic light rain showers. It’s been pleasant to see the greys turn blue, and spy some fresh greenery poking through. Our walks are longer and drier – more time spent outdoors.
Hold on… Spring, is that you? Maybe…
We’re mourning the passing of a campfire companion this week, a lovely guy who’s gone on to the next life far too soon. I didn’t know him very well. He was a campfire presence a few times on some of the wilderness trips we shared with youth. JT had a calm presence, and was happy to spend time quietly telling stories shot through with flashes of good humour. He’d led a tough life, particularly in his younger days, and told me he enjoyed being home the past few years, preferring it to the hustle and bustle of life away. People liked to stop and say hi to him when he was in town, and you could see he was a well liked figure here and across the bay. We’ll miss him.
Optimistic
I’ll leave it here for this week. Thanks for reading, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!
