Home on the range

Where the deer and the antelope play.

Ruth went to pick up some flowers for gardens that she has made here at the park, and along the way she saw a few pronghorn antelope. There are quite a few of them in this area here on the prairies, and it's funny how we occasionally see deer in and around the park, but the pronghorn seem to stay up on the flat parts.

We tried to book a flight to China this morning...

I was all set to write the blog post this morning when I saw a flash up on my facebook notifications....

Montreal to Shanghai, China for $683 CAD ($515 USD) return on Air Canada.

For some reason, at the time I thought it said $638 return, but it was a great deal nonetheless. Anyhow, we have those two Air Canada flight vouchers from when we got bumped on our way out to Regina at the end of April, so we thought about it for a couple of hours and then decided to book.

At some point, we want to do something epic...

Meeting a couple of guys like Mike and David makes us want to get out there and do more neat stuff. As much as some of you think that we are fairly adventurous, our activities pale in comparison when we see what other people are doing. I mean really, can you imagine what it takes to paddle a canoe across Canada? We have no ambition to do that. The same way that we have no ambition to climb Mt. Everest.

But, there are some things we'd like to do. Something epic... something that makes people say "wow" when you tell them what you did.

A moose on the loose!

Lots of fun having Mike Ranta and his dog Spitzi here at the park yesterday. And meeting photojournalist David Jackson was interesting as well. He is traveling with Mike and Spitzi and documenting their journey.

Yesterday morning, Mike was scheduled to do a talk at the long term care residence in Cabri, so Ruth and I took some time out of our busy schedule to go up and listen to him and what he has to say.

Some special visitors arrived yesterday...

Last year in May, long distance canoer Mike Ranta and his dog Spitzi arrived at the park on their 200 day journey across Canada.

He's doing the trip again in celebration of Canada's 150th birthday and we were pleased that he decided to stop in and spend some time with us again this year. And, he's got a traveling companion with him this time. Professional photojournalist David Jackson is doing the entire trip with him and documenting their journey with some fantastic photos!

May Expenses

Well, I had to go back into our 10 years of budget history to see the most we ever spent on groceries in a month. Because we certainly broke that record last month!

We remain convinced that it will even itself out over the next four months (yes, we are 1/5 of the way through our time here already!), or at least we're hoping that it will.

Alberta - Wild Rose Country

Next up in our series celebrating Canada's 150th birthday is the province of Alberta.

This province has a population of about 4.1 million people, most of them living in and around the two major cities, Calgary and Edmonton. Alberta has an oil based economy and is the largest producer of conventional crude oil, synthetic crude, natural gas and gas products in Canada. Alberta is the world’s second largest exporter of natural gas and the fourth largest producer of natural gas.

The older you get, the more difficult it is...

While that sentence applies to a lot of things, this particular time I'm talking about learning a new language.

When we were kids here in Canada, we took French in school. But it was very basic. I think we got 20 minutes per day (or something like that) in grades 1 through 8, and that increased to 40 minutes per day in high school.

It's nearly impossible to keep clean...

I've always been really good at keeping a clean car. Washed, vacuumed, and with crystal clear glass. But the little blue car has been neglected the last couple of years because it's so impossible to keep it clean living here. And it's frustrating.

I had given it a quick clean up when we parked it last September, but when we arrived here at the end of April and got it fired up, it had a nasty smell in it.

Beautiful British Columbia

That's what it says on the vehicle licence plates issued by the Canadian province of British Columbia. And it's true! British Columbia (or simply "B.C." as it's called by many Canadians) is a beautiful province.

Home to 4.7 million people, British Columbia is the 5th largest province by area, and the 3rd most populated province. Over half of the population is in the area around the city of Vancouver.

It was a blustery day!

Well, just an update about what's been going on around the park. We had a decent Canadian May long weekend. Quite a few of the seasonal campers moved their trailers in for the summer, and the weather was good for this time of year. We only had three or four day to day campers come in, but that's typical. Our park is usually fairly quiet until the water level in the lake rises.

Haven't seen our owls again. Haven't even seen remains of what they've been eating, which we usually do.

A lesson in modern farming

Our regular readers will remember last fall when we had a lesson in modern harvesting when the crop was ready to be taken off the field. At the time, we got to ride along in a high tech combine and we learned a little about farming.

Yesterday, we were invited to learn a little about what farmers are busy doing at this time of year... planting the crops. Or, simply called "seeding"...

Canada's 150th Birthday

This is a big year in Canada, with lots going on in celebration of the country's 150th birthday. So over the next few weeks leading up to the big day on July 1st, we're going to be talking a lot about Canada.

There are 10 provinces and 3 northern territories that make up Canada.

Sunday morning pancakes

Actually, they are "weekend" pancakes for us, because we only happen to be having them this morning. So while they are Sunday morning pancakes today, they could just as easily be Saturday lunch pancakes next weekend!

Ruth and I have a bit of a tradition with weekend pancakes. As well, we do weekend bacon and eggs!

Great RV and Camping Deals

As you know, we love a great deal. In fact, who doesn't love a great deal? Even people with lots of money love to get a great deal. That could even be how they got to have lots of money! After all, they say that a penny saved is a penny earned.

Most of our regular readers know that I'm pretty good at finding great deals.