Life Is A Gamble

First, you see it. A lit cigarette hangs from a man’s mouth. He removes it with one hand and stuffs a few fries into this opening with the other. Next, you smell it. The unique aroma of tobacco. Then, you taste it. A thick cloud of expelled smoke from deep inside this stranger’s lungs swirls, almost purposefully, into your nostrils and lingers in the back of your throat. You cough it away as best you can. It’s futile. It lingers.

Stoney Nakoda Resort & Casino

Stoney Nakoda Resort & Casino sits comfortably on the Stoney reserve at the convenient intersection of Highway 16 East and 40 South; a long road through Kananaskis Country. We’ve chosen to settle here in our RV for the night with permission from the front desk clerk. We consider having our evening meal at the lounge but are told by security that it is a smoking-permitted café. 

First, you see it. Paper hand towels crumpled and strewn around the garbage can near the sinks. Next, you smell it. Contents left in the toilet bowl. You flush. It’s futile. It lingers. Afterwards, you approach the woman at the front reception and inform her that the ladies’ room is in need of attention. You smile.

Life is a gamble. Play the hand you are dealt.

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.

Look, A Woodpecker!

Hairy Woodpecker - male

While on a walk along a nearby trail, we hear the familiar hammering sound by a woodpecker securing food. Tap, tap, tap.

They’re very elusive and flutter from one location to another tapping and extracting grubs with their extremely long, flexible tongues. I’ve learnt through researching the Hairy Woodpecker, a common bird throughout North America, that their creative tapping starts off gently, which helps them detect the exact location of the food. In contrast, when tapping to declare their territory, they cling to a dry limb and tap rapidly, building up to a loud drumming and then fading away.

I was thrilled to have one sit for a moment on a tree branch. I put the binoculars to my eyes and memorised the male's red patch at the base of his crown, his light underparts, and white back with black wings and white spots. His scraggly black tail had white outer feathers. All of a sudden, he let out a loud, sharp peek! And then another. He flew off.

We didn’t spot the female but know that she looks similar but doesn’t sport the red patch.

Hairy Woodpecker - female

Nature opens our hearts. 

Photos courtesy of Joachin Ruhstein

Deer Oh Deer

Black-tailed fawn

Our current house and pet sitting location on Vancouver Island provides us with views of the endearing and enchanting Black-tailed Deer. In the early morning hours, a mother and her three offspring travel gently through the trees to access the pond built by the property owners. My attempts to take photos from the great outdoors is interrupted by the slight squeak made by the sliding doors. Frank wants to admire them too. They trot briskly into the bushes. Prey are famous for being skittish.

As I type this post, the gentle troop saunter across the lawn and nibble at the new shoots. Frank takes a photo through the window. It is our privilege to observe their beautiful coats, flickering noses and ears, and quiet attention to signs of danger. The deer are not aware that the birdseed set out for the local ducks is not meant for them and supplement their grazing by taking in the new food.

Young deer from the window

With urban development and the introduction of farmlands and non-native plants, shrubs and trees, deer habits are changing along with their habitat. On the Island, it is not unusual to see a herd of deer grazing alongside a herd of cows, both sharing the same field.

Courtesy of the Internet

During the day, the deer camouflage themselves among the trees. At dusk, they travel the same path back, past the pond, into the other edge of this property and beyond. Their presence seems magical.


Fawn photo courtesy of: http://wingtips.org/

TIPPER THE TRIPPER

Tipper

Tipper, the cat we are sitting these days, spends most of his day on the couch. He sleeps on a puffy bed on top of a cozy blanket surrounded by the heat emanating from the wood-burning fireplace located less than six feet away from his perch.

I sit at the other end of the leather sofa to read and watch television and when I’m off to do other things outdoors or in the house, Tipper saunters over from his cushion to lay casually on my designated spot. And when I am on the couch and wrapped in a luxurious blanket, he comes up to purr and sleep.

Tipper in Susan's spot

Frank sits comfortably on the large leather chair across from the big-screen television – a location of no interest to the cat for some reason.

Tipper’s day begins at 5:30 a.m. when he follows the prompt of the two dogs who bark to be let outside to relieve themselves. He is very persistent. His sits on his haunches at our bedroom door and waits for Frank to get out of bed. He will push it open if it is not latched properly. He makes an attempt to get into the room to hop up on the bed. 

Tipper accomplishes his goal

I prefer not to have the handsome fella in that room and scooch him gently back into the hallway. Although, one time he managed to curl up at the foot of our bed. 

Tipper pitterpatters after Frank who prepares his morning specialized gastro-intestinal meal first. He jumps up on his feeding shelf in the mud room and peers around the corner waiting for Frank to deliver his breakfast. Afterward, Tipper hops back onto his couch pad and begins his morning cleaning ritual. In the meantime, the dogs are barking to be let in and fed, and the birds are beginning to chirp for their morning meal.

Tipper is a tripping hazard. He has a habit of flopping down on his side to get attention and affection. For example, when either Frank or I get up in the middle of the night to stoke the fire, Tipper will hear someone approaching and sometimes gets off his couch to lay on the floor to greet you. Tipper is a tripper. 

Pet Me!

During the day, Tipper makes it known that he wants to be let outdoors, pet, brushed, fed again and to be left alone. We are starting to understand his various meow tones. He sleeps with the two-sided brush we brought along to use on him and is very passionate about being groomed. Another of his favourite spots is the four-tier viewing platform set next to a large unobstructed window. It allows him to view the great outdoors.

Tipper on top

Tipper is of the Ragdoll variety and, in our humble opinion, one of the most beautiful and cooperative cat breeds.