...Blah, blah blah...
A few weeks ago I went canoeing with the Bruns family and my old friend William Shatner. It was such a calming experience floatng down the river to Mara lake. There is something really humbling about traveling by canoe. You are more or less at the mercy of the river but it is so gentle with you as it takes you along. I felt like I was connecting with Canada in a whole new way, as i am sure people have been traveling by canoe to this lake for many, many years. We headed for a beach on the far side of the lake to take refuge 
from a fast approaching storm. Here we came a cross a couple of snakes making their way through the grass. Later we headed back out onto the choppy lake and squeezed under a railway bridge and into Rosemond lake which was really glassy and still. There was all sorts of birdlife on this lake, apparently it is one of the only lakes around which is not allowed any powerboats, which makes it some what of a sanctuary.
I really love living and working here. Everyday is new and exciting. I am learning so much so quickly and mostly I am learning about things that I am really interested in. There are a lot of parallels to gardening but enough differences to keep me guessing. There is certainly a different feeling to weeding, cultivating and planting when you are producing delicious food.
We spend a lot of time harvesting and packing the veges for market and the box program they have going. This means that we are indoors in the packing shed probably about half the time. Presentation is very important and so a lot of care is taken when washing, selecting and bunching the veges. Anything that doesn’t make the grade, we get to eat! So I have been eating heaps of fresh organic veges and feeling pretty healthy for it. Even the other supplies I buy are pretty much all organic these days, it is something that I have wanted to switch too for a while but it takes a bit of extra effort (and cash). I can honestly say that I notice the difference in the flavour of the food. 
Perhaps it is just the perception of a higher taste, and the satisfaction of knowing were my food is coming from. The veges we pack are some of the juiciest and delicious I have ever seen and tasted. To read my rant on organic farming click on this picture...
What else… it is strawberry picking time now (when i wrote this about 3 months ago!). Great, that sounds wonderful doesn’t it? And it is if you like kneeling down in the mud for the first three hours of the day (and often in the rain), hunched over, searching amongst the cold wet leaves for those juicy ripe strawberries which you then place in a bucket which, when full, is snatched from your grasp to be shipped off to some lucky consumer at the market. Of course we do get to eat some of the berries that are too deformed to sell to the public. So this is for those of you who thought I was living a little too comfortably. Oh yeah and there is the mosquitos. Now I know a few weeks ago I told you about the bears and cougars which roam around these parts, but the true apex predator had not shown itself until the strawberry picking started. Lurking in the strawberry patch (and any grass above 3 inches) is a swarm of mossies waiting to suck the living blood out of you. They are relentless and somehow they keep finding their way into my cabin too. So for any of you worried I was becoming too buddhist; every night before I sleep I perform the ritual familiar to any one who is not a fan mosquitoes whining in their ears all night, and my walls are steadily becoming coated in squished mossies.
Work is actually still pretty enjoyable on the whole. After several weeks of rainy days (following a false summer of sunshine and 30 degree days when I arrived) things are starting to warm up again. Today was the first official day of summer, the summer solstice. Happy Birthday Dad!! How old are you now anyway?... We have a really good crew of workers. Since I last wrote we have lost Janet to a kitchen job but gained Laird who worked here last summer. Laird accompanied me on my resent return from a visit to Vancouver.
I decided to head back to Van for a weekend having been on the farm for over a month. I drove KEV the Brown Dodge through the mountains for nearly 6 hours. The drive was actually really picturesque in parts. The landscape here continues to amaze me with its simple beauty. I drove through mountain passes, and amongst peaks which still had snow on them. The fog hangs around on the mountain sides in little wisp-like clouds. At first glance the landscape looks pretty similar every where, with never ending conifer forests and rocky outcrops covering large hills and mountains. But subtle changes can leave you suddenly in an arid desert landscape or you might round a bend to suddenly be on the edge of a massive lake with little townships nestled all the way around (sorry no photos - I was driving). So KEV behaved pretty well on the drive. I noticed he was running a little rough when I left the farm. Not surprising seeing as it had been sitting idle for a month behind my cabin. But he chufed along the highways and up the long inclines no worries. It was when we hit the big city that things fell apart. Every time I had to slow down for traffic lights or a stop sign KEV would splutter and stall. I eventually devised a system of pressing the accelerator with an old umbrella while gearing down and breaking. This prevented the stall as well as keeping myself and any passenger entertained, as we battled through the streets of a city better negotiated on a bike than a massive brown camper van (driven by an Australian who lets face it, doesn’t care too much for road rules).
I had a great time in Van, went to a party, caught up with some friends and went to a great street festival on “The Drive” which is Comercial Drive, the Brunswick street of Vancouver. It was a fun weekend with some great people but it was good to head out of town again and hit the highway back to Mara. The drive home was not without incident however. Not five minutes after Laird took the wheel we saw some hitch-hikers and he pulled over. He pulled over rather abruptly however and we and the hitch-hikers were nearly taken out by an angry semi trailer in full brake lock! Needless to say I drove again after that.
I bought a bike while I was in town also, having left my other commuter with a friend when I left over a month ago.
I decided I needed a mountain bike to take into the hills and hopefully see a bear or something exciting that I can ride away from really fast. I could not find any second hand bikes around here however. So I found one for about $100 in Vancouver and, after a few quick repairs I had a working treddly… with a flat tire. I have been riding down to the back of the paddock lately where there is a great swimming spot on the river. The water is still pretty cold but really refreshing after a long day of work in the heat. Oh yeah it is now really hot here. It went from raining and cold just last week to sunny and 35 all this week. The swimming spot is also a great place to just sit and relax, amongst the reeds on the river bank. For some bazaar reason the mozies don’t seem to bother me there. Apparently later in the summer as the water recedes it reveals a nice sandy beach at this same spot. We have also been jumping off the bridge up the road into the river this last week. You have to be quick to swim back to the base of it, because if you miss it it is a fair battle against the current to swim back.
The is a fair bit of wild lfe roaming around the farm. This last week a deer has been hanging around and i have got pretty close to it on a number of occasions. There are pheasants here too. They suddenly flutter out of the long grass when you disturb them, scaring the bejesus out of you. There are lots of bald eagles here, it is funny how the national animal of the united states is endangered there and in abundance just over the border. They hunt the marmots who steel crops from the fields. I saw a Beaver swimming the other day, and a weazel lives under my Cabin.
They have just got a pig here on the farm too. I snapped this picture of it in the cooler.
I have been running in the mornings about twice a week. As most would know, running is not my forte and 15 mins just about kills me. However the other morning I ran all the way to the bridge and back which is 3.2 kms… is that good? I don’t even know but it sure felt good to me.
Tonight at the dinner table the family asked me about cricket. Not one of them has even seen a game of cricket. Herman was very interested to hear all the ins and outs of the rules. So I set about trying to explain the game. I also told them about Aussie rules football but that just confused matters.
After dinner me and Ari went outside to throw the baseball around to try out his new mit. You know what they say, when in Rome… but after several failed attempts to catch more than 6 balls in a row the game quickly degenerated into a round of back yard cricket! We fashioned a bat and stumps out of some ply and pine and Ari and Elena (who have turned out to absolute little brats and not worthy of the praise i previously gave them) learned how to bowl with a soft-ball. Later they found a nice soft mini soccer ball and I was able to smash a few away before it got dark. So it seems that summer evenings are much the same in Canada as they are at home.
A few weeks ago we had to move two greenhouses. I have never really been that excited about greenhouses until now. I really like the way they use them on this farm. Many of the crops we plant are transplanted. So they are raised as plugs in the propagation greenhouse, then planted directly into the field by hand. This gives the plants a head start while it is still cold and also ensures a good germination rate.
The other greenhouses are used to grow plants directly in the earth, either from transplants or direct sewing, plants that would also not be able to grow in the cooler climate, things like capsicums or tomatoes. As they get older and the weather gets warmer, some of the plants can handle being out in the open so the greenhouse can be moved to another patch of earth to start a whole new batch of crops. So today we moved the greenhouses by simply taking out the pegs that hold them down and dragging them with two tractors (I shouldn’t say we really as I just stood and watched most of the time).
Work is pretty varied at the moment, more planting and moving irrigations pipes around. We started picking peas today which, like strawberries has its sweet rewards. Sometimes I feel like a worker bee, sipping away at the sweet nectar and all the while unknowingly completing some important task for a higher cause.
Carrots and potatoes are also ready now. Digging potatoes is like an Easter egg hunt and they are so good when fresh from the ground (cooked of course). Look what the carrots get up to under the ground! Oh, I think I have been spending too much time alone…
Salmon Marashall.
A few weeks ago I went canoeing with the Bruns family and my old friend William Shatner. It was such a calming experience floatng down the river to Mara lake. There is something really humbling about traveling by canoe. You are more or less at the mercy of the river but it is so gentle with you as it takes you along. I felt like I was connecting with Canada in a whole new way, as i am sure people have been traveling by canoe to this lake for many, many years. We headed for a beach on the far side of the lake to take refuge 
from a fast approaching storm. Here we came a cross a couple of snakes making their way through the grass. Later we headed back out onto the choppy lake and squeezed under a railway bridge and into Rosemond lake which was really glassy and still. There was all sorts of birdlife on this lake, apparently it is one of the only lakes around which is not allowed any powerboats, which makes it some what of a sanctuary.I really love living and working here. Everyday is new and exciting. I am learning so much so quickly and mostly I am learning about things that I am really interested in. There are a lot of parallels to gardening but enough differences to keep me guessing. There is certainly a different feeling to weeding, cultivating and planting when you are producing delicious food.
We spend a lot of time harvesting and packing the veges for market and the box program they have going. This means that we are indoors in the packing shed probably about half the time. Presentation is very important and so a lot of care is taken when washing, selecting and bunching the veges. Anything that doesn’t make the grade, we get to eat! So I have been eating heaps of fresh organic veges and feeling pretty healthy for it. Even the other supplies I buy are pretty much all organic these days, it is something that I have wanted to switch too for a while but it takes a bit of extra effort (and cash). I can honestly say that I notice the difference in the flavour of the food. Perhaps it is just the perception of a higher taste, and the satisfaction of knowing were my food is coming from. The veges we pack are some of the juiciest and delicious I have ever seen and tasted. To read my rant on organic farming click on this picture...What else… it is strawberry picking time now (when i wrote this about 3 months ago!). Great, that sounds wonderful doesn’t it? And it is if you like kneeling down in the mud for the first three hours of the day (and often in the rain), hunched over, searching amongst the cold wet leaves for those juicy ripe strawberries which you then place in a bucket which, when full, is snatched from your grasp to be shipped off to some lucky consumer at the market. Of course we do get to eat some of the berries that are too deformed to sell to the public. So this is for those of you who thought I was living a little too comfortably. Oh yeah and there is the mosquitos. Now I know a few weeks ago I told you about the bears and cougars which roam around these parts, but the true apex predator had not shown itself until the strawberry picking started. Lurking in the strawberry patch (and any grass above 3 inches) is a swarm of mossies waiting to suck the living blood out of you. They are relentless and somehow they keep finding their way into my cabin too. So for any of you worried I was becoming too buddhist; every night before I sleep I perform the ritual familiar to any one who is not a fan mosquitoes whining in their ears all night, and my walls are steadily becoming coated in squished mossies.
Work is actually still pretty enjoyable on the whole. After several weeks of rainy days (following a false summer of sunshine and 30 degree days when I arrived) things are starting to warm up again. Today was the first official day of summer, the summer solstice. Happy Birthday Dad!! How old are you now anyway?... We have a really good crew of workers. Since I last wrote we have lost Janet to a kitchen job but gained Laird who worked here last summer. Laird accompanied me on my resent return from a visit to Vancouver.
I decided to head back to Van for a weekend having been on the farm for over a month. I drove KEV the Brown Dodge through the mountains for nearly 6 hours. The drive was actually really picturesque in parts. The landscape here continues to amaze me with its simple beauty. I drove through mountain passes, and amongst peaks which still had snow on them. The fog hangs around on the mountain sides in little wisp-like clouds. At first glance the landscape looks pretty similar every where, with never ending conifer forests and rocky outcrops covering large hills and mountains. But subtle changes can leave you suddenly in an arid desert landscape or you might round a bend to suddenly be on the edge of a massive lake with little townships nestled all the way around (sorry no photos - I was driving). So KEV behaved pretty well on the drive. I noticed he was running a little rough when I left the farm. Not surprising seeing as it had been sitting idle for a month behind my cabin. But he chufed along the highways and up the long inclines no worries. It was when we hit the big city that things fell apart. Every time I had to slow down for traffic lights or a stop sign KEV would splutter and stall. I eventually devised a system of pressing the accelerator with an old umbrella while gearing down and breaking. This prevented the stall as well as keeping myself and any passenger entertained, as we battled through the streets of a city better negotiated on a bike than a massive brown camper van (driven by an Australian who lets face it, doesn’t care too much for road rules).
I had a great time in Van, went to a party, caught up with some friends and went to a great street festival on “The Drive” which is Comercial Drive, the Brunswick street of Vancouver. It was a fun weekend with some great people but it was good to head out of town again and hit the highway back to Mara. The drive home was not without incident however. Not five minutes after Laird took the wheel we saw some hitch-hikers and he pulled over. He pulled over rather abruptly however and we and the hitch-hikers were nearly taken out by an angry semi trailer in full brake lock! Needless to say I drove again after that.
I bought a bike while I was in town also, having left my other commuter with a friend when I left over a month ago.
I decided I needed a mountain bike to take into the hills and hopefully see a bear or something exciting that I can ride away from really fast. I could not find any second hand bikes around here however. So I found one for about $100 in Vancouver and, after a few quick repairs I had a working treddly… with a flat tire. I have been riding down to the back of the paddock lately where there is a great swimming spot on the river. The water is still pretty cold but really refreshing after a long day of work in the heat. Oh yeah it is now really hot here. It went from raining and cold just last week to sunny and 35 all this week. The swimming spot is also a great place to just sit and relax, amongst the reeds on the river bank. For some bazaar reason the mozies don’t seem to bother me there. Apparently later in the summer as the water recedes it reveals a nice sandy beach at this same spot. We have also been jumping off the bridge up the road into the river this last week. You have to be quick to swim back to the base of it, because if you miss it it is a fair battle against the current to swim back.
The is a fair bit of wild lfe roaming around the farm. This last week a deer has been hanging around and i have got pretty close to it on a number of occasions. There are pheasants here too. They suddenly flutter out of the long grass when you disturb them, scaring the bejesus out of you. There are lots of bald eagles here, it is funny how the national animal of the united states is endangered there and in abundance just over the border. They hunt the marmots who steel crops from the fields. I saw a Beaver swimming the other day, and a weazel lives under my Cabin.
They have just got a pig here on the farm too. I snapped this picture of it in the cooler.I have been running in the mornings about twice a week. As most would know, running is not my forte and 15 mins just about kills me. However the other morning I ran all the way to the bridge and back which is 3.2 kms… is that good? I don’t even know but it sure felt good to me.
Tonight at the dinner table the family asked me about cricket. Not one of them has even seen a game of cricket. Herman was very interested to hear all the ins and outs of the rules. So I set about trying to explain the game. I also told them about Aussie rules football but that just confused matters.
After dinner me and Ari went outside to throw the baseball around to try out his new mit. You know what they say, when in Rome… but after several failed attempts to catch more than 6 balls in a row the game quickly degenerated into a round of back yard cricket! We fashioned a bat and stumps out of some ply and pine and Ari and Elena (who have turned out to absolute little brats and not worthy of the praise i previously gave them) learned how to bowl with a soft-ball. Later they found a nice soft mini soccer ball and I was able to smash a few away before it got dark. So it seems that summer evenings are much the same in Canada as they are at home.A few weeks ago we had to move two greenhouses. I have never really been that excited about greenhouses until now. I really like the way they use them on this farm. Many of the crops we plant are transplanted. So they are raised as plugs in the propagation greenhouse, then planted directly into the field by hand. This gives the plants a head start while it is still cold and also ensures a good germination rate.
The other greenhouses are used to grow plants directly in the earth, either from transplants or direct sewing, plants that would also not be able to grow in the cooler climate, things like capsicums or tomatoes. As they get older and the weather gets warmer, some of the plants can handle being out in the open so the greenhouse can be moved to another patch of earth to start a whole new batch of crops. So today we moved the greenhouses by simply taking out the pegs that hold them down and dragging them with two tractors (I shouldn’t say we really as I just stood and watched most of the time).Work is pretty varied at the moment, more planting and moving irrigations pipes around. We started picking peas today which, like strawberries has its sweet rewards. Sometimes I feel like a worker bee, sipping away at the sweet nectar and all the while unknowingly completing some important task for a higher cause.
Carrots and potatoes are also ready now. Digging potatoes is like an Easter egg hunt and they are so good when fresh from the ground (cooked of course). Look what the carrots get up to under the ground! Oh, I think I have been spending too much time alone…Salmon Marashall.
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