2018 January to March Escapades

Our annual January 1st boating day was with the Youngs to Discovery Island, and we saw wolf tracks and scat – Yolanda also saw a figure moving along a cliff just before we got to the beach with the tracks, but she didn’t think it was anything to point out – maybe it was the wolf!

We discovered this January that every Sunday the local Rotary group hosts a fund-raising breakfast at the Kiwanis Tea Room at Willows Beach near our house. 2018 was their 6th year doing so! We attended almost every Sunday and watched some fabulous storms whip into the bay.

January to March 2018 was a tough go for sister Laura, whose time with her daughter AnneSophie ended and little AnneSophie now lives full time with her dad Boyd Remillard. It was an emotionally trying time, and in some ways there is no way to recover – time might not heal the pain of this difficult period.

There was wonderful brightness from early January to later February as we helped out with the Harbeck-Sandoz boys quite a bit as their granny au pair Lily from Belgium went home to convalesce from a fall in the ice. It was super to spend some time with little Luca and of course our friend Francis. Francis had a tough time thinking through his little brother sharing time with us, but we all grew new understandings from the experience.

While the Harbeck-Sandoz family were at Mt. Washington for skiing in early February, we had an almost all-expense-paid four days cross-country skiing at Fairmont Hot Springs, near the Rocky Mountains, and niece Katy Salkeld stayed at our house with Frances Reid, as she had done in October and early November 2017. There were no trail fees, as we alternated days on the golf course by our condo and on a long hilly run by the downhill skiing area – it had no fee as part of the trail was closed due to a landslide. The condo was almost free, as neighbours Tony & Susheela had time-share days that they could not use, so it was only about $40 a night for the change fees and registration. The gas to drive to the mountains and back was paid by gift-gas-cards from the Harbeck-Sandoz family. Fortunate us!

 On our way back home we stopped in Port Coquitlam for a few days and Frances came over to join us for a cross-country ski day and snow-shoe-fondu evening. The next evening we presented a Random Ravioli class with brother Rick & wife Maureen and boys Sean and Matt & Matt’s wife Kari. What a great success and a lot of fun!

We did our second Random Ravioli class at our house in later March with pals Diane Thorpe & Jim Norie – again a success and such fun!

We celebrated Bob’s 60th birthday with a few small family dinners, as Bob insisted he did not want a celebration. Bob has been celebrating in his own way for the past year, including getting trailer Gr@y, going to India, finishing our bike trip across Canada, and returning to Eastern Canada with Gr@y to see fall colours and canoe in Quebec and Ontario. In total, Bob was in trailer Gr@y for three months!

It was Chinese New Year February 17th and we were hosted by pals Cecil and Lee Sharp – Lee sent us home with two big bags of her fantastic flavour and texture homemade spinach linguine – which we enjoyed with Frances Reid on two occasions.

We hiked a bit with Frances on a few weekends, with our favourite hike outing being with the Salkelds (sister Sonia, husband Tim and children Joe, William and Katy) for Willliam’s birthday. Willam’s wish was for an outing to Avatar Grove and we also hiked in to see Lonely Doug.

Mostly in March we gardened, with Bob doing his annual pruning for the Oak Bay Garden trimmings pick-up.

One day brother-in-law Tim and nephew William arrived with their chainsaw and utility trailer and helped Bob cut down our ancient apple tree, which was no longer fruiting – the wood would be put to good use by Tim, and Bob harvested some branches for natural suet feeders.

2017 December Escapades

We had an action-packed (!) final month of the year with business and family bookkeeping, family and pal visits, decorating for Christmas, and doing painting at our commercial property. Yolanda again made gingerbread for the VDDS kid’s party – a joy for her each year.

Mid-December we hosted a sleep-over with little Francis Sandoz and one of the evenings that he was with us we hosted a dinner and evening for colleague/pal Chris Hildebrand and his boys Luca and Finley – Francis thoroughly enjoyed preparing for the visit and making Lego with the older boys.

Closer to Christmas, Yolanda and pal Stacy went up-Island one day to craft fairs and happened upon a firefighter’s fund-raiser to which Niece Alex & husband Evan had contributed baked goods – we bought lots and gave them as gifts to staff and neighbours as Christmas remembrances. Niece Alex & husband Evan hosted a lovely Christmas Day Brunch in Chemainus for us and her parents, and Yolanda was home in time to sit with her mom for Christmas dinner and evening at Oak Bay Lodge. We hosted brother Rick & family for our annual after-Christmas visit, which we look forward to each year, and New Year’s Eve dinner was with the Harbeck-Sandoz family. We ended December 31st with Frances arriving home from Lethbridge in time for a midnight toast with the Attwell gang.

2017 Halloween to the end of November Escapades

We were officially on our home-bound trip from Eastern Canada until November 16th. After leaving the Okanagan, we spent time in Port Coquitlam with brother Rick & wife Maureen and in Vancouver visiting Shanti Williamson (& Cory) and Sarah Ronald (& Bieu). Of course we did a food-bliss stop at Granville Island!

We stopped home briefly to carve pumpkins and check in and to park Gr@y, whose insurance was just about to run out and then aded off again to complete our trip via Cluxewe and Tofino. While in Cluxewe we learned about staying by the month in the off season period from October to April and so booked a cabin for April 2018 – the larger, two-bedroom so we could invite guests up.

In Tofino we visited with sister Janis and storm watched. Janis hosted her 60th belated birthday dinner with local Tofino pals – what a treat to be included. On our way back down the Island we popped in to wish nephew Fisher happy birthday.

Francis Sandoz’s fourth birthday outing was to a Raffi performance at the Royal Theatre – he really enjoyed the environment, in particular the flip-up seats and he sang along at times, which was fun for Yolanda.

At the end of November we hosted an “American Thanksgiving” for a gathering of our McDougall nieces and nephews – we feel so very fortunate to have them in our lives.

Gr@y & Blue Fall Road Trip 43-45

Monday morning Theodora was back at work and Alexandros was back at school so Nektarios and Nikolas helped us pack the trailer and bid us goodbye. We drove to Keremeos via a few lake-side birding stops.

We set up the trailer at Eagle Campground in Keremeos and the we headed west to explore the Red Bridge and the Forest Service sites on the outskirts of Cathedral Provincial Park - unfortunately the private road into the park is closed for the season. Once back in Keromeos, we headed out for an evening drive of the South Okanagan Circle Route (including Osoyoos, Oliver, Okanagsn Falls, and Penticton).

The next morning, we did laundry and at 11:00am arrived at the organic farmstead of pals Yvonne & Morris. We enjoyed great conversation and a wonderful brunch and then headed out again on a second visit to the South Okanagan Circle Route,  a bit earlier than yesterday, in order to capture photos in a new light.

Wednesday was a drive from Keremeos to Harrison Lake, but first we visited a farm stand to get squash, apples and preserves to take home.

We stopped in Manning Park to make lunch where we became a special interest of a small group of Grey Jays, but could not stay, as we had some business calls to attend to and our proposed camp stay did not have cell reception so we pushed on to Deer Lake, above Harrison Lake, but again did not have reception so we went back to near Harrison Lake to set up in a camp with WiFi for blogging.

Gr@y & Blue Fall Road Trip 40-42

The Prairie landscape sucks energy when cycling we learned in June this year. Now we know it also sucks energy when driving. With just our car, we can get over 650K on a tank; in hilly Ontario and Quebec with our canoe on the car and towing our trailer we got about 350K per tank of gas. On the Prairies, flat and windy, we consistently got about 240K per tank; back in the BC Rockies, we are getting over 420K per tank!

Friday evening, after a sunset stop at Munson Pond Park in Kelowna, we happily arrived at the beautiful home of niece Theodora and her family: husband Nektarios, 6yo Alexandros, and 3 & 3/4yo Nikolas. Saturday morning after Theodora's wonderful waffles we went up to Myra Canyon to see and walk on the rail tressels. En route, we saw a few hunting parties, including one set gutting a deer.

It was an exciting walk across many tressel sections and in one tunnel. As we exited the tunnel, it was quite windy and it began to snow, so we headed back.

After a yummy picnic lunch at home, we went out to a local turtle pond and had a laugh getting un-stuck from the muddy shore. Puzzles and stories ended a fun day. After Theodora's scone breakfast on Sunday, we were outside for a "mitten-run" to the pond and then played with Uncle Tim's Go-Cart and had fun collecting leaves. Lunch out was followed by a visit to the Kelowna Art Gallery for Yolanda, Theodora and the boys: Alexandros & Nikolas.

Bob and Nektarios went afield to seek bird photos. At the Gallery, Yolanda, Theodora and the boys painted paper plates in preparation for an over-weaving.

As the paint dried, they visited three exhibits, including an outdoor woven branch sculpture, an exhibit of tapestry works by Jane Kidd and drawings & paintings by school students. In the evening we did more drawing & puzzle making. We had such a great, busy visit with the Koulis' and look forward to returning!