Visitors and Just Hanging Out

It has been a while since I put my fingers on the keyboard and tried to tap out an entry on our journal here. I used to be able to ramble on about nothing every day on here but lately the creative juices seem to have dried up and it is not so easy to get things rolling. That and the fact that since I have been trying to use this MAC so Live Writer doesn't work over here and that means I have the required two excuses I need to procrastinate.

And trying to keep up a regular schedule while just doing things around here at Dogpound North is a sure way to put our readers to sleep although it is keeping us entertained. We have ripped some fence out, done a little riding around the place, not to mention getting a bunch of medical things out of the way, and tomorrow we have a hoe coming to do a little demolition work and remove the last old buildings around the place. Who knows I might even get some pictures of that for our next entry.

But things heated up over the last week and we had some notable visitors that got us out and about and doing some things that generated some interesting photos. Back in our fulltime RV'ing days we met a lot of folks and we have managed to coax some of them to stop in either here or at Dogpound South for a visit as they travel by. This was the second time the Kendall's have been going by and been drawn into our yard. Last time they were here we did what for us is our the usual things, a trip to Banff and Lake Louise, and a tour of our favourite spot the Yaha Tinda, and by special request a tour of the Tyrell Museum out Drumheller way. This time we thought we should see some different sights and added Peyto Lake into the tour. The shot below was taken on our tour the other day and the blue is certainly a different colour at this time of year than it was a couple of years ago in the fall.

 The picture above was taken in September and it is obvious that over the summer the glacial mill has a bigger effect on the colour, different but still beautiful.

The fellow below was there to greet us as we started our hike up the access road to the viewpoint. The usual trail was buried in 3-4 feet of snow so we wandered up the road that the buses take to get up to the overlook.

 Day 2 of the Kendall's visit we just took it easy and drug them out the Harold Creek road and onto the Forestry Trunk road for a little tour of our back country. Along the way we ran into three bands of wild horses and the one below was the prettiest so although we got lots of pics this was the one that made it into the journal. The palomino off to the right hand side is the herd sire and you could see his influence in the yearlings and the one foal that was travelling with them. He was a good looking horse and here's hoping he contributes to the gene pool in our west country for a long, long time.

 The picture below was taken at Mountain Aire Lodge where we stopped to stretch our legs and enjoy a little refreshment.

One of the thing Deb always asks when she heads our direction is for us to line up a few moose to sit for photo's along the way and although we didn't get any on the trip to Banff or out around the Forestry Trunk Road we had a great showing from our local Dogpound North resident herd. I know Rod and Deb saw at least three different ones while we were wandering the country side there were six individuals out and about that I saw at different times. But heading out swimming every morning at 5:30AM is pretty conducive to seeing some wildlife.

These last two were hanging out within a few hundred feet of our place and made sure they got into the photo array.

As well as the Kendalls we had a visit from Lacey and Becky's half sister from Ontario, Jolene. She had come out specially to meet her sisters and was heading back to Ontario early this morning and I volunteered to drive her to the airport, so she stayed with us here last night. The girls had a great week and we really enjoyed getting a little time to get to know her. That is Jolene in the background watching Lacey and her two new found nieces playing with Grandma's toy stash.

But all good things must come to an end and this morning after Jolene was safely on the plane back east it was time to say our "see ya laters" to the Kendalls as they have salmon to catch up along the Kenai river in Alaska. We are already looking forward to their next visit here and hope to get them down into the desert at Dogpound South for a visit in the interim.