Well That's a Wrap

and we are off on another adventure. We came scampering home from the American SW about 43 months ago, we were running from a virus and here we are almost four years later and it still hasn’t caught either of us. We crossed the border after a run north that was almost surreal, the only vehicles on the road from Salt Lake City north were packing Canadian license plates and I hope all those folks fared as well over the intervening years as we did. Life brought us some ups and downs but all in all it was OK. We had a pretty good summer at Dogpound North this year and concluded that we should do what we could to extend it. After scrambling around the past week or two getting ourselves and the rig ready we were packed and ready to roll late this morning. We wandered down to Milk River and are holed up in the local campground here for the night and will cross the Medicine Line first thing tomorrow morning. It seems that we are not the only folks running for a land south of Winter as this spot is chuck full of RV's. The weather is great today and predicted to be good for the next few days so that should give us the option of meandering southward in a more relaxed fashion than our usually pell mell race for someplace below the Frost Line. We left home today with water onboard not antifreeze so that is a good sign. It is just a 4 or 5 hour leisurely drive from DPN to here, so we are breaking in Brenda slowly. Tomorrow I expect we will cross early, and then make tracks across Montana, looking for a nice spot to pull over for the night. Not exactly sure where we will be tomorrow, and the day after that is a long, long, long way in the future for an RV adventure so time will tell where we end up and if I get my fingers in gear maybe I will share it with you folks.

Since this blog was really active the whole world has migrated from these written epistles to video logs and I can’t convince Brenda that she should be packing a camera and narrating every part of our adventure so you folks will just have to settle for this old fashioned form of journaling.

Resuming our Regular Broadcast

Down the Road from Dogpound

We are missing our four legged family members but I thought I might update you a little on the other things that are happening around Dogpound North. My Mom is bearing down on three months of self-isolation in her home, she is 90 and that puts her amongst the high risk folks although for the most part she is healthier than most 50 year olds. I talk with her most days and her grandchildren keep pretty close tabs on her as well so she is not running short on supplies. Matt, my son, runs a bi-monthly trip to Costco to reprovision all of us with the necessities that that business usually provides to us. We used to buy most of our meat from them but recently we have been trying out a local ranching operation, Long Run Ranch,  and their meat is every bit as good as Costco's, no more expensive, and I would rather keep the money in the neighbourhood if that is possible. Costco like most big operations gets most of its beef from Cargill south of Calgary, but this is even closer to home.

Our home province of Alberta has fared fairly well throughout this pandemic. Our stockpile of masks, ventilators and all the other paraphenalia that we are hearing other jurisdictions are running low on are adequate, in fact so much so that we are sending stuff to other provinces that are not so fortunate. Folks have been self-isolating and at this moment in time we are in the midst of phased re-opening of the economy. Small businesses like hair dressers and the such as well as restaurants are re-opening although with some restrictions on crowds. I don't imagine the airlines or travel business are seeing much traffic and it is hard to imagine that they will anytime soon. People are getting pretty handy at "Zoom" and other meeting software so I actually think there will be a shift in how people work, less travel, less office time, and if the reports are correct, more productivity.

Our schools up here are closed and have no plans to re-open until the fall, so kids are being home schooled with the assistance of their regular teachers online and of course their parents where they are able. Even my band teaching son is running his classes online.

So although normal is different now that in the past, we are seeing more and more people masked up when they are out and about, but after seeing that some countries where masking was a common occurence are coming through this wave with less severe economic impacts maybe, just maybe, we are figuring out that if you wear a mask you probably need measurably less severe restrictions to deal with the corona virus fall out.

But enough of that, I am getting out and about most days of the week and enjoying the spring migration as the birds go through here on their way to the northern parts of Canada where they typically nest. We are seeing many more varieties than is typical, but that is the opinion of a decidely unknowledgeable birder so I am just enjoying shooting them......with my camera. For folks who don't want to be inundated with pictures of birds or my Facebook fans, who have already been subjected to these photos, this is a good time to sign off.

Mallard Drake and yes he is really that colour.

A cute little Chickadee

Yellow-headed blackbird

A pair of Ring-necked ducks

Great Horned Owlets, we're watching you human

American Kestrel

A goose family out for a swim.

Cowbird

Great Grey Owl

Green-winged Teal

Rufous Hummingbird stopped by for a portrait

Rose-breasted Grosbeak

For the moment my favourite duck, the clowns of the pond, a Ruddy Duck

Baltimore Oriole

Mallard Drakes in Flight

Gone to DPS

Yep, it is November and we have flown the coop and left winter behind at Dogpound North. Last week I loaded Blue and Wink and pointed the truck south. We had found a weather window that gave us a good shot at getting down to Dogpound South (DPS) without hitting to much weather along the way. Late season trips to the south place mean your travel plans need to be flexible and as we slid across Montana we started hearing reports of an incoming storm in Southern Idaho, mostly high winds but some snow and that led us to change our first overnight stop from Dillon, Montana to down near Idaho Fall, Idaho. And to ensure that we beat the winds out of Idaho we made an early (2:30AM early) departure from Idaho Falls and headed for Utah. The early start got us out of Idaho and into Utah so that we were through the Salt Lake City rat race before most of those folks got out of bed. As we rolled south across Utah the roads were good, at least until we hit the junction of I-15 and I-70, at that point they went downhill in a hurry. Although the temps were up around 45F we came over a hill in the middle of a pack of transport trucks to find a State Trooper jumping up and down in the middle of the highway. Sure wish he had gone a mile or so farther north as that might have given us a chance of getting slowed down a little before we hit the packed snow and ice covered highway ahead. Now anyone who has driven the ice roads in the Arctic knows how much fun it is to be on solid ice when the temperature gets above freezing. Hard enough to stand up let alone skid our big LQ down the highway while trying to get down to a more reasonable speed as well as not cause any issues for the surrounding transport trucks. Eventually the truckers and I managed to slip our way between the ditches, which were full of four wheelers, and get our speed down to a still too fast 15-20 mph. The ice and snow only lasted for about 3 miles, but they were an exciting three miles.

We called it a day once we wound our way down the Virgin River gorge and through Mesquite towards Logandale. Logandale and the Clark County Fairgrounds have a great spot to stop with horses. Brand new box stalls, pens, and even a place to plug in the LQ for the night. Even with all the excitement we were all settled in by mid-day and probably could have made DPS if we had been so inclined, but the horses had two long days in the trailer and it was better to let them get out and move around a little and get an early start the next day.

Day three we were up and on the road again early and through Las Vegas before rush hour and well into Arizona when the sun rose. One stop for fuel and it was all downhill in the Valley of the Sun. We were at DPS around noon and got unloaded and stretch our legs, all 18 of them. I never mentioned the dogs but they are great travelers and slept most of the way down.

Things here at DPS are pretty well setup so it was just a matter of hanging a water bucket on the rack and turning the tap and we are ready to go.

Thursday, Brenda was up early back in Canada and onto an airplane headed down to join us here at DPS. We gathered her up and stopped to pick up a few supplies on the way back out of the city. The last few days have been spent getting settled in here and restocking the larder.

We've spent the last few days getting settled in and trying to get Brenda not to do to much. When it comes to the former we have been relatively successful, but the latter has not been that great a success. She has raked and swept and cleaned both inside and out, so DPS is looking pretty nice.

And back at Dogpound North it is looking like "we are glad we beat it."

Just in the Nick of Time

I was reminded this morning that I still have a blog out there in the ethernet and that Brenda checks it daily to see if it has been changed. The last time I updated this journal it was the summer solstice and here it is about to be fall so I guess it is time. We have had an eventful summer, not much riding, but a lot of other things going on.

Beginning back where I left off oh so many months ago, we had a couple of our favourite visitors for a weekend at the end of June.

Alle and Grandpa

Lounging by the poolside

Alle Kitten

The girls telling Grandma a bedtime story?

 Then it was off to Crimson Lake in July for Ella's 6th Birthday party, 6 where has the time gone, it seems like this was just yesterday.

Now she is a grown up little lady. Her birthday celebration was a beach party and the kids and I had a great time swimming at the lake and then eating her ice cream cake.

The next weekend was a celebration of Cheryl Brydens birthday her girls and our girls all came for a campout at Dogpound North. We ate well and stay up late around the campfire telling stories.

 And of course it wouldn't be July in Alberta without a little snow on the ground. Well really I guess if was hail, but frozen water is frozen water.

 But it does make for dramatic skies and some great photo opportunities

We finished up July with a visit from Mark and Jolene on their annual western swing. Always great to see Jolene and sure was nice to meet Mark this year. We did manage to spirit them away for a little drive in the mountains also.

The Bow River in the Stoney Indian Reservation near Morley

That takes us into early August and then we were off on an adventure in Upper Canada or Ontario as the natives call it. We were going down to Brenda's nephews wedding and decided to include a few other stops along the way.

Niagara Falls looking across the American Falls to the Horseshoe Falls in the background

The locks on the Rideau Canal between our Hotel and the Parliament buildings

Our digs in Ottawa on the left

Ashley, Madeline, Adam and Lukus, well the top of his head anyway.

Granny Doak, Donna and Danny Doak, Adams Dad

Mr. and Mrs. Doak and their kids, Madeline and Lukus

Aunty Brenda and Adam

The Doak clan, L to R Danny, Lukus, Ashley, Granny, Adam, Madeline

 After the wedding we headed off to meet some RV friends who have settled down in Smith Falls. Gordon and Sandra are also Facebook friends who capture some pretty nice photographs. Gordon, in his former life, was a graphic designer and is quite the Photoshop expert. I asked him to do his magic on this photo I stole off their page. To my eyes it appears that he did a great job on Brenda and Sandra but has managed to add a few wrinkles and a lot of gray hair on himself and I. So for those who don't really know us all that well, be advised that we both look much younger in person.

Those who have been to DPS before know that there used to be a patio roof running all along this side. It was blown off in a windstorm this summer and now currently resides in our neighbours yard about 300 yards away.

Once we got back to Dogpound North from our Ontario swing I headed south the Dogpound South to review the damage with our insurance folks and some contractors and initiated the process to get it repaired. That took about 10 days then it was time to come home for a couple of more birthdays. Our granddaughter Everly turned 1 and her brother Kashton turned 4 so they had a little soiree for their friends and family at Becky and Ved's place.

1 year cute

Kashton in the centre supervising his Dad's pinata installation

 While we have been fluttering back and forth across the continent Bob has managed to get all the hay put up here at Dogpound North and a portion of it sold. Seeing as how I didn't have any part of that I thought I had better get working on some other things around here. 30 some odd years ago when my Dad bought this place we needed to replace the fence along the road on the west side and lo and behold it is time to do it again. I spent a couple of days removing wire and with Matt's help got all the old posts hauled away. Another neighbour of ours is pounding posts and stringing new wire so soon it will be a nice shiny new fence instead of a tumbled down eyesore.

And the construction at DPS has begun so Brenda headed south to supervise that process. She has a much better sense of colour than I do, or so she says, so I agreed that she was the right person for that job. The patio roof is back up and from my daily report the painting is completed today. Now just to repair the door and the wall damage inside from an botched burglary and she should be able to come home. That could take another couple of weeks though so if you are in the Phoenix area give her a shout.

The dogs and I are looking after ourselves up here at DPN and although the cooking is not up to our usual fare we will probably survive. I have managed to get out a couple of days and take some photographs of both landscapes and some night scenes so will include a sampling of those shots to end this long, looooong update.

Some Northern Light dancing over Dogpound North

Looking back at the LaFarge plant at Exshaw

The Milky way from our deck at DPN

Mt. Kidd looking across Wedge Pond

The Kananaskis River running past Canoe Meadows

And finally a shot of Venus rising on the eastern boundary of DPN