Cedar Plank Salmon

Have you ever had salmon bbq'd on a cedar plank? It's awesome. Very tender and moist and flavorful. This is how you do it:
Soak a cedar plank (any old cedar - can be fence board) overnight. Put a rock or can on top to keep it underwater. Then preheat the bbq to high and heat the board for 2 or 3 minutes. Keep a spray bottle handy in case it catches fire! Then sprinkle with coarse salt and add the salmon filet which has been brushed with olive oil, lemon juice, and topped with onion and coarsely ground pepper. You can also add dill and we added onion green.
Turn the heat down low when you add the salmon, close the lid and the recipe says to cook for 10 minutes but it took ours more like 20. The salmon should be flaky. Check it , and keep that spray bottle handy.
Then enjoy. You'll love it.

Don't you just expect a little gnome to come out of this mushroom? It was about 4 inches high and quite thick. Saw it in Kananaskis.

Our green trim , eavestroughs and soffits need to be replaced because of hail damage and they don't have the same color. So which color should we choose? Another dark green? Black? Dark brown? Any votes?

Happy 10th Anniversary!

Happy Anniversary, Jon and Magan!

Sorry you're sick today. Get well soon and celebrate.

Magic Mal

Mal likes playing with fire when we camp. Here he is stoically setting his arm aflame.

After some practice he was able to put his hand in the flame with a smile. I suppose the next step is fire-breathing!

I settle for more common forms of entertainment like hiking!

The highlight of this camping trip was seeing the Pileated woodpecker and beaver below.

Woody Woodpecker

We were walking on a road in the campsite when three huge Pileated Woodpeckers swooped over our heads in a flash of red, white and black and landed in the trees right ahead of us. They stayed around long enough for me to take some pictures and then took off again.

According to my Bird Book it was the Pileated Woodpecker that inspired the old cartoon Woody Woodpecker. You can see him at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeldv48RGv8 . It has a maniacal call that can stop a hiker in its tracks. (We never heard it.) It is up to 48 cm long while other woodpeckers are more the size of a robin - 18-24 cm.
Apparently they aren't seen very often because they require extensive areas in which to forage. They need about 40 ha of mature forest to settle. I feel blessed that we saw them so close up.

After they flew off we continued on our walk and came to the river. Suddenly a bird flew high overhead and then 2 more. Far in the distance across the river I saw one bird on a treetop. I took a picture so I could zoom in and see what kind of bird it was. After zooming in I saw 2 more. Sure enough, it was our 3 woodpeckers. Can you see all three?
This picture was taken with 18x zoom and then cropped to make it closer still. They were a long ways away.

The tale of the beaver tail

We were on a hike when we met some people who'd just seen a beaver on the path. He had chopped down a tree and was dragging it along. They said he was as big as a bear cub, so we hurried down the path to see if we could find him, but he was gone.

We tried several paths to the river and finally got a glimpse of him, but he was too close to the bank to get a good shot, so after waiting awhile Mal finally threw branches in the water to encourage him to move away from the bank.

He swam further into the river, and then with a loud slap of his tail was gone.

Marsh Walk

A hawk wasn't very happy about being disturbed. He kept his eye on me and then began screeching at me for a long time.

You can see his mouth open as he screeches. This picture isn't the best quality, but I loved the pose!

I saw a Solitary Sandpiper for the first time. (Solitary is the name of the variety- there may have been more than one.)

I disturbed two foxes from their den in the field. I had only seen one at a distance before. Now I'd like to find their den!

A collage of hail damage. Click to enlarge. The trees are really showing their damage now. The trunk of our Schubert chokecherry is very badly scarred, and the top right is our little Maple Tree. It had 3 branches torn right off. Bottom right shows that the climatis on the right was protected and is blooming, but on the left it took a blow and is struggling. Our Blue Spruce had almost all of its tips ripped off and it is beginning to turn brown. We hope it survives.

Bottom left is my grand flower bed. This really feels like the summer that wasn't.

However, our rhubarb is coming back after being totally sheered off, and I may yet get some sunflower blooms if the frost holds off!

Tim and Kalli's Wedding

The weather was perfect for the outside wedding, everyone looked great, the bride's dress was stunning, and the ceremony went off well.

The musician.

The tent was decorated beautifully for the reception. Everything looked classy, and the food was incredible. All in all, a great wedding!