Walmart Wetlands

Nicola Lake roadside view

Refreshing fragrances waft from the lakeside and brushes alongside Nicola Lake through the screened windows on our bus. 

It's early morning and we are enjoying a breakfast to prepare us for the trek to Kamloops to visit family. 

View from Big White window

Frank's grandson and his mother have purchased a house and he is now preparing a magnificent back yard garden. The first thing we inhale when we step out onto the back porch is the dynamic fragrance of lilacs. Our visit with them is filled with lively chatter and full meals. They are a pleasure to be with.

We arrive mid-day in Salmon Arm and experience a most disturbing event. We sit outside our bus at the Walmart parking lot and our conversation is interrupted by the sound of barking squawks emanating from the bushes at the edge of the wetlands. My research into the sounds doesn’t clearly identify its source. It sounds a great deal like a Black-crowned Night-Heron.

Coyote ~ courtesy of  Clive Byson

I put the binoculars to my eyes and begin scanning the horizon. A Coyote stares back at me. He releases his gaze and directs his attention to the ground in front of him. Within a few seconds, he captures a gray mouse in his teeth and devours it. I watch him trot across the grass back into the protection of the bushes. I’m impressed because it’s the closest I’ve ever been to a Canis latrans.

Coyote at Walmart

I set my field glasses down and see near us an adorable quail strutting along the fence line. She disappears cloaked in her famous camouflage into a small cluster of beige bushes. 

Grouse ~ Clive Byson

Earlier that day, we walked along the Salmon Arm docks to observe the calm glide of grebes and the dynamic plunge of an osprey as it grabs food from the lake and sits on a wharf post, feasting on his find.

Nature is the ultimate reward between house and pet sits.

Hope For The Hopeful

Spike, our pretend cat

We phone one of Frank’s relatives just outside of Hope. She answers with a friendly tone and we are welcome to stay with her overnight. It is our great pleasure to connect with friends and family and to meet new people on our 2016 adventure across three provinces.

Big White is as ready as she’ll ever be to haul Frank and me and our Ural motorcycle on a trailer behind her. She’s a powerful beast and doesn’t mind the mountain terrain. 

Big White hauls the Ural

After Hope, we stop in Yale. Their new rest area is complete with large displays of the history of the little town with a big gold-rush past. We take our time with our picnic lunch and chat with other folks on their own journey.

Clean up service

We settle in at Skuppa Rest Area in Skihist Provincial Park for a late dinner. We have the privilege of meeting a wonderful lady who used to be a dump truck driver and helped build the Dempster Highway. She reminds us that it is also referred to as Yukon Highway 5 and Northwest Territories Highway 8. The next morning, Frank cleans the area a bit. It’s a happy service we both enjoy.

Later that afternoon, we arrive at Spences Bridge, a small community north along Highway #1. We take several photographs of the St. Michael and All Angels church with the intention of having Frank prepare a sketch of it. We’ll display it for you when it’s complete. 

St. Michaels and All Saints church

If you like trains, behind you and in front of you and the clickity clack and squeal of metal on metal combined with the sound of a rushing river, then the Cal Woods Recreation Reserve campsite is the one for you. We prepare a meal over an open fire, explore the area on foot and capture memorials of good folks gone on to the next realm.

Panning for gold ~ Fraser River

Frank prepares dinner

Archie Adams memorial

Cal Woods memorial

Beautiful yellow daisies call out to me to take their photograph. All daisies remind me of my mother. Frank and I stand in silence for a while admiring the view and the magnificence of nature.

We pull into Kamloops and make our way to a suburban neighbourhood. We settle in for a few days. Life is good. 

Yellow daisies roadside

It Was The Best Of Times

Vancouver Island View

Today is a happy day and a sad day. As house sitters and pet sitters, we are glad to be with two dogs, two parrots and one cat in a luxurious home on a forty-acre parcel on Vancouver Island.

We started this gig mid-November 2015 and are now leaving April 14, 2016. It was a pleasure to sit the homeowner's pets and very nice of them to provide a private bedroom with an ensuite bath.

We agreed from the onset with the owners that we would feed the dogs at 5:00 a.m. as is their habit, along with the cat who knows when feeding time is also, and of course, the two parrots who chatter as Frank prepares their food and water. We often joked with each other about our living at a veterinary clinic.

Tipper the Ragdoll

Walking the Jack Russells

African Grey parrot

 When we first arrived, Misty, one of the Jack Russell dogs, struggled to get up from her bed and wobbled tentatively to the door. Ah, she didn’t make it and pooped on the rug. We worried a bit about her hip and asked the owners, by email, if we should contact the local pet doctor. They calmed us famously with comforting words that the little dog did suffer from hip issues and to only watch her condition. We will miss Misty and her companion Shorty.

Dogs housed in pens at night

Just yesterday, one of the parrots, Rose, fell from her perch and broke her beak. She bled a bit and very soon it coagulated. For the rest of the day, and again this morning, she tucks her head under her wing and sleeps. We took the owner’s advice to offer her small pieces of banana and fruit juice. She accepted both, cautiously, but went back to resting.

Beautiful Rose

That leaves me to say that I will miss Tipper, the beautiful Ragdoll breed cat, the most. He is so loveable and cuddly. What a pleasure it was to have his bump his head on my arm to encourage me to pet him. We brushed him regularly, but, alas, his long hair tends to live a life of its own.

Tipper in the sun

Life is a journey (thanks Marc). Life is good.