Week beginning 20th
March 2011
Ok, it’s back down to earth this week, we have recovered
from the New York trip and Chelle and the kids have returned to school and I’m
back into domestic bliss. We are all trying to come to terms with the fact that
the next big holiday isn’t until July.
Anyway, Spring arrived and then very promptly left again! Wednesday morning brought a another dump of
snow up to 20cm. It’s funny, neighbours have been telling us that you can
usually expect one more good fall during March, but this one seems to have
caught people by surprise. The Eastern side of the GTA (Greater Toronto Area)
was in chaos, Michelle said there were cars in ditches all over the place and
some on ramps onto the freeways were closed because they were too slippery.
This fall lasted all day and was almost as much as we had when a snowday was
called in Feb and the school’s closed. This time some schools closed and some
didn’t. Ryan was unhappy because the public school next door to theirs called a
snowday.
The temps have stayed around or below zero, so the snow
hasn’t melted away yet.
Saturday, thinking that it might be cold enough to get one
more skate in on the pond, we headed down to the Burlington Lake Front, but
unfortunately it’s been drained and is in the process of being returned to a
water park and reflective pool. So we spent an hour playing in what was left of
the snow.
Sunday, we contacted Ken and Francesca another exchange
couple who live only 15 minutes from us, and we all headed out to Mountsberg
Conservation area to visit a Maple Syrup festival. These things are big over
here. Basically it’s a tour of a working Maple syrup farm, in this case a
traditional farm not a commercial one. It was basically a self guided tour
through the farm witnessing the process of tapping the trees, gathering the
syrup and then boiling it to gain the final product. Of course there is the compulsory
tasting of Maple Syrup and pancakes at the end of it. For the kids there was a
large barn to play in and hay rides through the forest. Also because it is a
conservation area there are a number of animal exhibits including a Birds of Prey
Recovery Centre, which had amongst others, a couple of magnificent Bald Eagles
and some Snowy Owls.
In one of the paddocks was a herd of bison. A fact I wasn’t
aware of. Bison are related to goats and sheep and not to buffalo and cows, so
a bison is just an overgrown dumb sheep.
Not much more I can add, the next couple of weeks are going
to be fairly quiet, just restricting ourselves close to home, so I probably won’t
bore you all unless something good comes up.
This weekend we are settling into living a normal lifestyle as the children have
friends coming over or going to a party.... Michelle will be doing a little bit
of school work, we will be entertaining on Saturday night and generally just
taking it easy... (again)
Take care.
The Nightingales
