Thursday, July 19/2012

I am up early and so excited. We get to have power today!!!  Woo Hoo!!  The coffee is on and I am waiting to hear movement on the other side of the garage.
Eventually Glen arrives along with his young son and the trenching begins.  I went out and took a few pics of the action (for this blog) and then Sask Power arrives to hook up the wires.  It is a glorious site to behold and I took some pics of them too.
The pole that we are hooked up to looks like a rat's nest and one of the boys from Sask Power has put in for an upgrade on  the pole as he said that the way it is now is not really acceptable.  We have four lines running across our property and he said that was not good.
One of the Sask Power guys saw all the jeeps so when the job was done, he had to take a closer look at them.  He failed to see the two sitting in the shop so had to look at them as well.
Glen's son saw the old saddle John had in the shop and asked John how much he wanted for it because he wanted to buy it.  After some thinking and great deliberation,  John finally ended up just giving it to him.  Now there was one happy little boy walking out of the shop with an old saddle in his hands.  He has some work to do on it as it needs some stirrups and lord only knows what else but he had a grin across his face like he had just found gold!!  Me, I secretly did another happy dance as I sure did not want that stinky thing in the man cave!!
With the power in and the bus up and running, we packed up the jeep and headed to the trails.  We will be heading into the Block and eventually taking a back trail that will spit us out onto the Big River Grid.  It will be a nice ride.
We met a bunch of quadders as we sat at Deer Lake for a refreshment.  The "guys" were headed out for a camping/fishing weekend.  Just a guy thing!!   They had a boat and two fishing rods and a shitload of beer!!  They looked to have enough camping gear for the year!!  A few of them were already well on their way to a "good" time.
When we first arrived at the lake. there were two loons swimming not too far from shore.  I think they did not appreciate us disturbing their day as they were very vocal.  I took the opportunity to video them and their vocalization.  It sounded awesome so I hope it comes through on the video.  The sounds you will hear are their excited sounds and not their long lonely mournful evening sounds that one hears at the end of the day.
We carried on from there and at the next refreshment stop, Dave asked us if we had seen the moose.  I had been looking for moose all along the trail as this was the area that the cow and calf usually hang around.  John and I did not see any sign but Dave and Shirley saw a moose eating at the edge of Slide Out Lake.  She was buried well into the bush and she may have had her head down when we passed her causing us to miss her altogether but Shirley managed to get a few pics of her on their way by.  There was no sign of the calf but it could have been obscured by the trees or was lying in the grasses.  The moose wasn't too concerned by the noise of the trucks as Dave said it turned its head and continued to eat.  Another Kodak moment provided by Mother Nature!!
Because both John and I like to travel Lilac Trail, We headed that way.  There is one ugly spot on this trail and John was wondering about it and actually contemplated not doing the trail.  WHAT!!  And why do we have a winch, I ask!!
Well, we got to the ugly spot and it wasn't took long before Marie was playing her favourite role a "winch wench".   As I was hooking up the winch, I noticed some whitish coloured things in a clump on the ground and thought they were a clump on mushrooms.  Not wanting to disturb them, I stepped around them and proceeded to continue with the task at hand.  It was an easy out for the winch and then Dave had to get through.  He managed to bully his way through the mud and did not have to be winched out.  When I went to leave the area, I took a closer look at the mushrooms and realized that they were not mushrooms at all.  I had stumbled across a birds nest with several whitish/brownish coloured eggs in it.  It was nested in the grass by a couple of tall poplar trees.  I have no idea what kind of eggs they were but wondered why the bird was having them so late in the season.  We all took pics then left the nest as we found it, wishing the mom bird good luck with her soon to be babies.
We continued down the trail, eventually accessing the main trail to Hooker Lake, took another side trail that spit us out at the old white truck in the field.  We took pics of "Old  Yella" beside this old truck and Dave got a few pics of the Sami beside it as well.  It just would not be right to drive past this old abandoned truck and not take any pics.
While there, I noticed that the open field around the truck was covered in bluebells and I took a few pics, hoping that the lens would capture the beauty of the field.  What an incredible wonderland for the woodland creatures.
While there, I noticed some Golden Rod just coming into bloom.  Wow, that is a sure sign of Fall!!  I always marvel at how nature has all these signals pointing towards the change of the seasons.  Golden Rod is certainly one of them and it is only the middle of July!!
The next time John and I are one the trails, I bet there is signs of some of the leaves starting to turn colour.
We stopped just before we accessed the trail that would take us to the Big River Grid.  It is here, in the dried mud that I saw the first set of wolf prints.  They were mixed in with the deer prints and I imagine that Mr. Wolf may have been tracking the deer.  Nature can be rather harsh at times and survival of the fittest is the number one rule out here in the forest.
The second set of tracks I saw and photographed, was along the trail to the grid.  Here in the mud were some of the biggest wolf prints I have seen to date.  I definitely do not want to meet up with the owner of these prints unless I was in the truck and well out of harm's way.  I bet he would be gorgeous to see though.  As you can see from the pics, his feet were as big as my hand!!  WOW!!
Eventually, we got to the grid and it was an easy few miles home.  It was a great day on the trails and I look forward to our next outing.
John started a fire and the four of us sat around for a while before it was time to think about supper.  I cut some swiss chard for Dave and Shirley for their supper thinking it would be nice to have some for our supper as well.  they soon headed home.
I had wandered over to Shirley's before we left and took a couple of packages of steak out of their freezer for our supper and as it turned out, it is a good thing I took 2 packages out as we were about to have some unexpected but wonderful company.
John checked for any messages on the computer and there was one from his cousin Edward and his wife Debbie.  They sent a message saying they were leaving Alberta and would likely be here this evening for a visit.  Now we have not seen Deb and Ed for many, many years.  We used to camp together all the time when the kids were small but somehow, life gets int the way - jobs change, circumstances change and kids grow up making it tougher and tougher for everyone to get together.   Before you know it, ten (or sixteen years) years go by.

Shirley's pic of the Moose along the trail

Oh Dear, here we are, about to have company and I have certainly had too many beer to be entertaining cousins I have not seen in years!!  Drunk as a skunk (well maybe not that bad, but bad enough!!) and guest arriving before I can even make coffee to drink!!
It is a good thing that Deb and Ed don't really care what "state" I was in and we had a wonderful visit with them.  They brought along their granddaughter Brooklyn and she so reminded me of her Mom at that age.  Eventually, John cooked supper (yes, I had enough steak) and we all headed to bed shortly after that.  Deb and Ed are headed to The Narrows for a week of camping and fishing tomorrow.  We will get to visit tomorrow morning as well,  before they head out.

Glen trenching the power line in

Getting it hooked up

Loons on Deer Lake

Dave and Shirley coming down the trail

Some other riders we met

Slideout Lake

Dave coming through the mud hole

Duck eggs

Oops!

Shirley getting the winch

Thanks Dave

An old truck we always play on

Goldenrod

Field of Bluebells

Crossing the creek

Dave coming across

Granny meets the big bad wolf

Beverage

Hogan enjoying the day

Pelicans on McRob Lake

Having a feast

Relaxing on the Beaver Lodge

Great day

The wolf is going the same way

He is a huge one!

Heading home