Aloha! That’s me giving a shout out to one of this week’s guests, Frank! He and Dave are here after a couple-year hiatus. It’s good to have them back. At potluck last night, Dave reported returning a 21″ walleye. Thank you!
I’ve not reported on potlucks much, have I? We had venison loaf last night with a well-rounded assortment of good food. I made a key lime dessert. I’ve been in dessert mode this year. Here’s a pic of a rhubarb-blueberry upside down cake from last week:
It was a hit! The previous week I made a fresh cherry and blueberry cobbler. That baby was delicious if I do say so myself! The cherries were compliments of Wayne and Shirley. There were here celebrating their 47th wedding anniversary:) That’s a long time! Wayne added a bass and a perch to our Conservation Awards page (www.tallpinescamp.com). I love this bass angle:
The found a few reflections for me as well (thanks!):
Lovely! I liked this sky shot as well–inspirational:
There were, of course, some rains during their stay…leading to this:
There’s the slightest hint of a double there…do you see it?
They saw a loon on a nest and a merganser swimming near a funky den-ish thing:
I finally received a couple of nice bass pics from Brian and Judy! They were new to us this year and have decided to return in 2017! One for the money,
two for the show!
Last week Addie and Bennett got busy inuk-shuking during Social Hour:
I love the one on the left. It’s a big rock with two small inuk-shuks atop. I believe I saw a very cool inuk-shuk on my deck yesterday. I’ll take its picture and share in a later post (thank you, Evan).
This week’s fishing has been a bit tough. Mayflies are still here and there which doesn’t help. Duane, Jan and Will have released some decent walleye (23″ and 20″ for sure). We’re seeing some eater-sized fish in the buckets daily (all species). We figured we’d have a tough couple of days given the storm we had Monday night…holy cow. It was one of the biggest we’ve seen in our 12+ seasons. I have promised a couple of nice boys a slightly embellished version. Here goes:
It was a lovely Monday afternoon. I invited Erika of Cabin 3 to go on a blueberry-scouting hike with me. Since her hubby Doug and his nephew Austin had not returned from fishing we took Evan and Warren (ages 11 and 9) along on the journey. We took a bumpy, dusty road to the base of one of my favorite early-season blueberry spots. We parked the Envoy and embarked on our hiking adventure. Along the way, young Warren spotted actual blueberries on our path. I explained that a bear had probably been scouting there as well. We saw many wonderful pieces of my Canadian world: a garter snake, bear poop, moose poop and wolf poop to name a few.
We had hiked quite a ways and I decided we should also check a raspberry patch not much farther ahead. Indeed, both raspberries and blueberries are promising a super season, probably due to the steady rainfalls we’ve experienced this season:
When we turned to begin our descent, we were greeted by a very ominous-looking sky. It was BLACK and foreboding. It wasn’t long before thunder and lightning greeted us. We hastened our pace toward the still-not-in-sight Envoy. Suddenly the wind picked up drastically, causing the temperature to drop about 10 degrees and removing all humidity from the air. Warren suggested we jog; Erika and I increased our walking pace and kept chatting about random subjects.
We were still a good distance from the vehicle when the first raindrops found us. Warren once again suggested a jog and we agreed. As the Envoy came into sight the rain turned to sleet, pelting us painfully! I had slowed back to a rapid walk but the punishing sleet had turned to hail and I fell into a trot again. By the time we reached our chariot, hail the size of peas (and then marbles) was bouncing off all sides of the Envoy! A curtain of rain prohibited easy navigation–as, again, we were a bit off the beaten path. Slowly, steadily we worked our way back to Camp. After I delivered the sweet family back to their cabin I joined Gruper in the shed and watched as the torrential downpour pounded everything in its wake. The driveway was a big pond. We couldn’t see but a few feet in front of our faces for some time. I took these pics in between downpours and boat-pumping:
It will go down in my memory as one of the worst storms I’ve experienced up here.
I was reminded of a poem written by a young lady, Alex S., whose entire week one season was filled with powerful rains. She entitled it “Storms in Canada.” I’ll have to see if I can locate that to share.
Until next time…
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