The actual hike

That's Mary
We hiked up Kusawa ridge on this warm day. The air slightly smoky, from far away forest fires.

As often, quite an adventure to get to 5000 feet. But there we are.
That's where we love it most.


melting water, submerging the wildflowers.


Roseroot

Tonight I will post some of all the flowers we have seen on my wildflower blog.
Sorry for this, way, too short post, and the pictures don't really show it either.
We did see sooooo much, so much beauty. You know how it is.

American Emerald

Yet another flyer.
This the Cordulia shurtlefii.
Who was so kind to sit on Mary's hand, where the photo clearly shows her green eyes.
Yes she is a female, see her slender body(top photo), abdomen(the tail as i see it). At the tip, note the 2 appendages, the also tell me she is a female and! that she is most definitely an
American Emerald

'flying'

First things first.
Alexander my son is still practicing his flying skills too.
As i don't pay as much attention anymore. Luckily other people do.
click on this link to see him.

Alex

I myself 'flew' up the mountain. (as in a long sweaty hike) and took a picture standing on the top. Basically the same view as i had in my last 'header' but now being there.

Then... this bird that just came out of the nest and can't quite fly yet.
I was hiking with Mary (i"ll do a next post about it)
so this information is all hers;
This is a Savannah Sparrow. It is a fledgling, see short tail and yellow stripe under it's beak.


And this one i recognized, as we saw it at basically at the same place and time last year.
American Golden Plover. And he/she did fly all the way from the States to nest here. A long-distant migrant. Today it flew just to keep us away from the nest.

recollection

A tiny pool in the forest, where the cotton-grass grows.
I would love to sit here with you, bringing back childhood memories, that have turned cotton-candy.

That was not was not what i was going to say. And neither about my ability to recall the names of all the flowers, which is not very good.

Seeing my favorite orchid this morning,

i was wondering; how does a tiny flower like that, gone and what's left underground, frozen for the most part of the year. How does it come back basically the same as last year? How does it remember; where to put it's purple spots, its tackiness attracting me, does it stick out its tongue at me?
Its memory perfect unlike mine.

That made me think of the whole cycle in nature. Its not one winter it remembers. In Holland i saw a luscious yellow border along a canal. Nobody planted it there. apparently it all came up because the dirt was disturbed or pulled out from the canal bottom. Next year other plants will take over. But there where the seeds, having waited for many years for being exposed

Her we have the fire weed that is first to come up after a fire, willows then poplar
many years later it is a spruce forest. and i am no biologist, but the old forest might turn into a bog.
Where... the orchid remembers to grow.

Thinking this all (nothing wrong with my brain conjuring up things)
I figured i need a picture of fireweed

The fire weed patch (in a recently burned area) full of bees and butterflies

I have been wishing (nothing wrong with my ability to fantasize) for a picture like that. Don't ask me its exact name. It is a Blue.
(thank goodness for people having named it, and recorded it, so i can find out (again:)

Independence Day

rubies, sapphires and pearls
the water emerald
impatient to find the words
let me fall into
the bed of pink roses
Instead i dive into
the crystal clear
i swim hard to ignore the cold
squatting on the shore
my arms around my knees
skin tingling


all i wish to do is plunge
and be total stillness
to receive it all
gemstones everywhere every single day

the furrows of the day

Today my friend Sylvie is here.
We are having all these different experiences,
that don't really relate.
All connected as they made up one whole day,
I will write down here some of those furrows that we followed a bit.
Not in any order, but as they flow on the page.

drawers full of unread hours
written on pages of fire
catching flames at inconvenient moments
dispersing smoke with love fragrance

(a translation of one of Willem's poems.)

(As we are doing art, while painting the next poem comes up.)

Spring flood of emotions
french woman
moving her frost heaved heart
towards love
becoming the goddess
she is meant to be
lines in her face
the furrows of an aapa mire

In the morning.
Going for a walk; first the road, then through the swamp. As we missed the early hours of the day, it's already hot and the mosquitoes are out.
Leaving the beautiful swamp flowers for what they are, we quickly move towards a ridge. Not that that gives as any relieve.

(Sylvie, getting hungry, is cooking a meal, telling me to tell you, that she is very much enjoying the view from the kitchen window)

Back in the woods, my goal today, is really not to far, a group of rocks, where i have only been once. Overcome by the heat we almost give up. We point to a spot, higher, that seems like a clearing; "That is how far we go."
Once we reach it; we see the rock face!
Only a little more climbing, we can do it.
And it is worth it! The view, the mountains in the south with their patches of snow, the incredible sky, with picture perfect clouds. The valley below, with a blue green lake. Sitting on the big boulders.


On the way back, light thunder. We happy with a sprinkle, turn, on the spur of the moment, into a neighbors yard. The fence is open, meaning he is home.
And so he is, we catch him on 'an inconvenient moment':) as he is just leaving for Montreal. Leaving his house in progress to the swallow.
They in French and i in English, we do have a very pleasant conversation.
And I learn that the rock we have been sitting on, is
Annie Ned Granite Batholith
A thin strip of geological land coming from the coast.
Not only do i live in an ancient lake (close to shore mind you)
I also live on an even older island, maybe 100km wide, right in the middle.

Wild Strawberries

mmmmmmmmm... i picked two cups. One for winter (in the freezer now) and one for dessert and i ate some, like the ones i took a photo of. Their size half an inch or 1.5 cm.
I don't want you to think now...
Some even think one is crazy to pick anything that small,
I know i am crazy, but there is more wild strawberry pickers out there, yes?

I will also post them on my Yukon Wild Berries blog.

Yet another blog i have, which really i have to work on some more. I have more pictures on file, of the different stages of the plants, that i want to add.

Anyway, i picked for over an hour. Which says two things; That it does take a long time to pick any amount. And it does say; really i am not much of a picker, i know people who pick for hours loving it.

And it is not that the bugs chased me away. Today they were much better behaved, maybe you scared them Christopher, thanks.
Also thanks for the birds and Dragonflies, who were around me.
I even did some gardening today, that is watering and weeding in the vegetable patch.

No photo, but worth mentioning,
A Sulphur is on the wing. I saw it first two days ago, a beautiful, rather big, bright yellow, butterfly.
Lifting my spirit.