April 8th, 2007: Another in a series of bright, sunny days with little wind, but cold. Today was a bit warmer, so maybe we are getting back into a warm spell.
 Some people think the warm spell we had got rid of a lot of water, and that breakup won’t be so painful; others say there is just as much snow in the bush and it is loaded with water, and that flooding is inevitable. Not that we have to worry about it here, but there are some roads around that could be flooded for awhile.
Jeff Bernhard was out at the dam recently, and said the water is flowing over the dam at a great rate. He says the creek running into the lake is running, too. Surprising, considering we haven’t had any thawing weather for quite awhile. We do have almost twelve hours of sunshine a day, and even when the temperature is low, the sun keeps licking away at the snow wherever there is something dark to attract it.
There sure hasn’t been much happening here this week. There is some extra traffic this weekend but not what one would expect. We don’t see much of our neighbours now that the Beach Café is closed; with the yards so muddy nobody is anxious to have coffee at their place.
There are side benefits to putting a house on the market. Every time our realtor has an open house here, Doreen cracks the whip for a week before hand, getting everything spiffy and spotless. We are having one next Saturday morning, so I am not looking forward to next week. At least it’s not so long since the last one, so there aren’t too many layers of dirt to get rid of. If I take long enough with the duster and vacuum cleaner, Doreen will get all the hard work done.
We got into the car the other day and there were four deer in the driveway. Doreen got out to talk to them and they kept edging closer to her, so she took a few pictures of them. They recognise her as the one that spills bird seed on the ground, banana peels and such, so see her as a soft touch. They came up to within five or six feet of her.
We are starting to get the itch! Our motor home has been parked in Jenny’s yard in Kelvington. It hasn’t been started all winter, nor has the charger been plugged in, so we went down yesterday to see if it would start. I had to walk over three foot snowbanks to get to it, but the snowbanks were hard. It started easily and I let it run for about half an hour.
The snow has melted close to the motor home, but there is a big snowbank behind it, and it is going to be awhile before the lane is passable. Realistically, we won’t be going anywhere with it for at least a month but it would be nice to have it close so Doreen can start stocking it up.
I walked down to the marina today; the creek was frozen over at the bridge, but I could hear it running strongly upstream. Sure enough, it was open and running about a hundred yards south of the bridge. The ice by the bridge had collapsed, indicating the water was much higher at one time, likely about the time of the fishing derby, and had drained away partially.
The marina looks about as high as I have seen it – once it starts to thaw in earnest, if it can’t get away fast enough at the north end, the peninsula could be flooded.
There were a few geese lounging around on exposed grass on the peninsula, and a few more flying around overhead, all of them honking away, but the most noticeable sound is the cawing of the crows.
There were no vehicles at the park cabins by the beach so I assume they are empty. I did see a couple of cars, and heard some voices, at the log cabins at the top of the hill. I wonder how much of an effect the lack of amenities such as the café and gas bar had on tourism this weekend?
Doreen’s uncle, Fred Perry, was wounded at the Battle of Vimy Ridge in the First World War. There was to be a vigil tonight and we were told the names of all who attended the battle, and pictures where they had been submitted, would be projected on the Vimy Memorial in Ottawa. Fred’s picture was supposed to be projected at 11:30 EST which should mean 10:30 our time. We went online but were unable to see anything happening.
Lucille in Saskatoon was able to see the names being flashed – she has high-speed – but no picture. Big disappointment!
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