Art in the Park and Silver Lake

 It was the return (after a covid hiatus) of Art in the Park to Port Dover, and Jim, at the Woodhouse Gallery, had asked if any of his artists would be interested in demonstrating during the weekend.

I was set up at the front of the gallery, working on my Long Point Fall piece and in front of my Tree Spirit.

In the tent outside, Neil was doing a water colour painting of the Port Dover pier.

There was lots of traffic, questions and interest. I hooked for a couple of hours with a break in the middle to do some shopping myself in the park.

One of my purchases was a Dogs Nest t-shirt.

Dogs Nest, possibly named after the hotel sign that depicted a dog and puppies, is just up the road from me. It used to have a sign, "Dogs Nest, est 1851" but it was stolen so often that the MTO decided not to replace it. The local community is fundraising to erect a heavy, un-stealable, sign where Mill Rd crosses Hwy 6, just east of Port Dover.

Thunderstorms were in the forecast for Sunday but they occurred overnight and, although grey, it was again in full swing the next day when Rick and I drove by on our way for a walk at Silver Lake.

I am having difficulty finding a place to buy bulk, native, wildflower seeds (without having to spend $1000.00 - St Williams Nursery!) so now carry a plastic bag with me when going for a walk. This garden by the market will be a source for seeds in about a month.

We were out for a leisurely walk, rather than our usual energetic one, and both had our cameras with us.

There has been an effort made to eradicate the Phragmites that had invaded Silver Lake and were choking out the native species of reeds. This has resulted in far more open water and more water foul. Mallards of course

and I think this is a Redhead but I'm not sure.

A Kingfisher actually sat for long enough for us to get pictures

even showed us his crest before a loud croak and swooping off to fish.

So many Great Blue Herons....

.....

......

Some of them

were pretty adamant

that there were too many

and there were some noisy altercations regarding fishing rights. (Photo by Rick)

Standing quietly, scanning the water, marshes and reed beds we would see movement that we wouldn't have noticed had we been striding by. Hard to see him through the reeds

but he flew to another spot and with the photo uploaded to the computer we could tell he was a Green Heron.

And another one.

"Ooh whats that one, in front of the Canada Geese"

Lots of clicking of shutters until we realized that it was just a Cormorant.

What do you mean just!

But standing there we found another

Green Heron.

While on the topic of birds..... I decided to put the dots on the front window to prevent the birds from the feeder flying in to it. I bought the tape roll in March and kept it in the garage so wondered if that was why it was difficult to get the dots to stick on. They kept coming off with the tape as I peeled that off.

I called their customer service and left a message, not really expecting that I would get a response, but I was pleasantly surprised. The woman who called me back said that the glue and the technique I was using should work and wondered if it was the temperature changes in the garage. Bottom line ... she offered to send me another roll, free of charge.

They show up as black dots in the photo taken from inside but you don't really notice them. That one window took me 2 hours so I will wait for the new roll to do the other 2.

Anyone want some garlic? I dug up one clump, growing wild on the bank, and now I have to figure out how to preserve it.

Rick's birds

 Rick has a much better camera than I do but has found it difficult to get it focused fast enough to capture birds. He spent a couple of his walks trying to improve this.

Chickadees are pretty fast so it can be difficult to get the bird in focus, rather than the branches, before it flits off.

Cedar Waxwings. Backlit so I had to lighten it up on the computer. I am assuming the right hand one is a fledgling.

In flight, even more difficult.

Then, sitting at The Edge, he was able to practice on a passing Eagle. I loaded the pics up on to my computer, lightened and added contrast. My computer wasn't happy with the process as the files were "raw", whatever that means??

I cropped, lightened and added contrast.

He also sent the raw files to his friend Steve who, with a much more sophisticated computer program, produced this.

 

The pine tree, down the bank, at the edge of the lake, is home to lots of birds and occasionally a hawk will sit on the top.

First time I have seen a Turkey Vulture there.

 I am still finding that I don't have as much energy as I would like and, as I am moving towards vegetarianism, Nicola suggested that I might not be getting enough protein. So this week I went to see a dietician. Well, the news is, its tough to get enough protein on a plant based diet. I am supposed to get 61gms per day. I have been nowhere near that.

I went to Bulk Barn to find some protein sources to add to my usual soy products, eggs, nuts, cheese and legumes. The pasta, in the picture, is the most protein rich with 36gm in a 100gm serving. But I was only able to eat half of that at a meal.

The dietician also pointed out that it is not just protein that I need to watch but also the omega 3s, amino acids and iron that meat and fish provide. However I don't plan on giving up seafood altogether and I already take an iron supplement. Its a work in process.

2022 Chaos Race

 Rick and I , on Spellbound, entered the Chaos race for a second year. Last year, because of light winds, we only had to go around three course markers but this year, with steady winds forecast it was a four mark course. 

We start, slowest boat first, one at a time, at ED2 and can sail the other 3 marks in any order, finishing again at ED2. We chose to head for the Nanticoke mark first. This large green buoy marks the channel that takes the Lakers in to the pier at Nanicoke to load and unload for Stelco. As we approached, I was on the helm, and a Laker was coming into the channel. I felt like we were playing chicken with this fast moving giant but we made it around the buoy well before he came into the passage.

We were using the Navitronics App on Rick's phone and it performed very well. Last year we had no idea where the buoys were. This year we knew exactly when and where to start looking for them.

Sailing diagonally across the bay to the Turkey Point buoy we again crossed paths with a working boat.

This time it was the Donna F. going back to Dover after a morning of fishing.

At Turkey Point we started to see other boats that had chosen different routes around the buoys. Redhead with her easter egg coloured spinnaker.

I think this is Shaibu but it might be Bluebird, both are Nonsuch's.

From Turkey Point we sailed along the north coast of Long Point

to the buoy marking Bluff's Bar sand spit.

Diagonally back to ED2 (Port Dover) and the course took us straight through this anchored Laker so we had to dodge around its bow.

Approaching ED2 we could see Grey Escape, moving much faster than us (he was close hauled, we were running) and he passed the mark ahead of us. About 9 hours out on the water on a beautiful day for sailing.  It turned out, when all the stats were crunched, that we came in 2nd in the JAM fleet, beaten only by Grey Escape. In hind sight we decided that we might have had a better chance of winning if we had started on the diagonal to Bluffs Bar. We came in 3rd last year and were happy with how well we sailed Spellbound, "to her PHRF" according to Rick. Each time we learn a little more about the strategy for this strange race.

I will end with some grandchildren pictures:

The Edmonton contingent swimming, in Kelowna. Photo by Aimee.

River. Photo by Aimee. They just sent me a video of her standing up, walking will happen shortly.

Cigi sporting her Blue Jays fan togs. Photo by Chris.