A pretty place to stop and relax …

… in our local Japanese garden …

… to admire the anemones …

… and pond lilies.
Happy Sunday.
A pretty place to stop and relax …

… in our local Japanese garden …

… to admire the anemones …

… and pond lilies.
Happy Sunday.
We have been experiencing a rainier, cooler than usual summer punctuated by hot days where the temperature reaches 37 or 38 (98.6-100.4 F). A rainy night makes for comfortable morning constitutionals, however.

These clouds were moving into the north after being pushed out by …

… quite strong and gusty winds from the east. Surface easterly winds are unusual here since they have to make it past a number of mountain ranges in order to arrive, but I noticed that this one seemed to have quite a lot of altitude, too, probably about 3000 metres (approx 10,000 ft).

As the day wore on – and more clouds moved back in – our resident bald eagles weren’t too concerned as they perched in their favourite lookout tree to survey their territory. Some jostling from the winds didn’t stop them from having one of their regular, affectionate chats.
Happy Saturday.
We recently had a series of showers that lasted all afternoon and night, too. In the end, we collected 10 mm (about 0.5 inch) of water which is happily going toward keeping any potential fires down, but the next morning, we saw lots of lovely clearing skies.

The carp in the fish pond didn’t seem to be much bothered, though. They continued swimming, rain or not …

… enjoying the leaves, clouds, and blue skies …

… and their attractive sky fish lives!

Happy Thursday.
Evening begins with soft, quiet light …

… that grows deeper and redder, chasing away the blue yonder of day …

… as the sun continues to disappear …

… until finally, the sky is bathed in fiery summer orange.
Happy Tuesday.
Akaroa is a charming small town located on the Banks Peninsula on the east coast of New Zealand’s South Island that was formed by two ancient shield …
Akaroa
Beautiful photos of and information about New Zealand from Linda at Wandering Canadians. Please click the link above to read about the rest of her visit to Akaroa and to see more of Linda’s posts about her and her family’s wanderings.
The Okanagan Valley is famous for its wine production.

A wide variety of grapes are grown here and in some cases, types that don’t produce particularly good wine results in Europe tend to do much better here, occasionally very much better which often leads to some interesting bottles that would be difficult to find elsewhere.

The various types are affected by humidity, proximity to the lake, dryness, and other soil, moisture and weather conditions.

Not sure what kind of grapes are growing here as they’re not labelled, but they’re near a favourite winery. They look luscious but don’t taste like table grapes at all! These are specifically wine grapes.

A bit further to the south and west of us is the Similkameen Valley, very hot and dry, which grows some excellent reds.

Although the Okanagan Valley is known for wine, this area is incredibly produce-rich and grows a very wide variety of other fruits and vegetables, including cherries, peaches, apricots, pears and apples.

No matter where you go, the life of a farmer can be incredibly tough; they’re always at the mercy of whatever the weather throws their way, but when it works it is so tasty, delicious and wonderful!
… after a rain storm …

… the sun re-entering …

… once the clouds have cleared.
Happy Saturday.



Happy Thursday.

This is taken from the Slab Camp trail out of Deer Park in the Olympic National Park. The valley you are looking directly up is the Upper Gray Wolf. …
Gray Wolf Ridge and the Upper Gray Wolf Valley
A beautiful mountain photo from Allan at Allan J Jones Photo Blog. I hope you click the link above to see more of Allan’s stunning landscape photos of his home, Washington state.
We’re nearing mid-July and the summer season is hitting its peak.

Penticton Creek is running much slower than it was a month ago …

… when it was moving along quite smartly …

… and looked much more like a river than a creek. The above picture shows one side of the bridge near the empty-point into the lake …

… and this shows the other.
There are other signs of the maturing season, too.

Panicle hydrangeas frequently start blooming in mid-summer …

… and the robin chicks are now indistinguishable from their parents.

Time relentlessly marches on whether we like it or not; there are no stop signs or do-overs …

… so it’s important to be here while we can.
Happy Monday.