Outpost ~ A bear, a bird and a loaf of bread

His name is Slick. We hadn't planned on naming him, didn't think he'd come around after we took away his “honey pots” but we were wrong. His first return visit woke us up in the middle of the night. We just assumed that is was the raccoons causing the racket but when we poked our heads up from the warmth of our bed it was none other than our resident bear right outside our window. Several plastic garbage cans, empty and cleaned must still retain some aroma that gets Slick's nose working. Even though he didn't get anything out of the cans during his midnight foray that didn't discourage him from having another go at it in the morning.

                                                           Who's watching who?

  The winter rains haven't set in yet..... maybe this is just a dress rehearsal.

Stormy days can be very productive. It's been almost 2 weeks now that the fruit for my fruitcake has been marinating in a liberal amount of very good dark rum and I think it's time to bake.

I know there are those of you out there who think that soaking fruit for a fruitcake of all things is just a total waste of good booze but I....we...love a good Christmas cake. I have never used one for a doorstop or re-gifted it to someone I really don't care for although I have had my share of cakes that could fall into one of those categories. A good cake should have a high alcohol content, it's acts as a natural preservative...really. In fact I have in the cooler at the moment one slab of cake from last year which is now aged and so moist I'm sure it will make the perfect Christmas pudding once heated and served with a generous topping of my drambuie caramel sauce. We will have to wait till Christmas and as they say , “the prove is in the pudding”.

I bake almost all of our bread and am always trying something different. This wholewheat loaf is full of oats and ground flax,should make a good sandwich or toast.

                            ....Somewhere, over the rainbow, skies are blue.......

The heron is back. Last year only one showed up for a week or so before 5 others arrived. Maybe this one is the scout. I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of the gang.

Till next week,

Heather & Mike

Outpost ~ Ever Changing

The weather we can experience morning to dusk can be as different as night and day.

Waking up to see the towering trees swaying against a sky that could be the colour of granite or a hue of robin's egg blue, tells me it must be windy. Depending on the arc of sway I can tell you if there are whitecaps or swells out by Solide Island or just swirls and ripples in our bay.

Quite often a windy morning will turn into something else. If we're lucky it will blow away the clouds and allow us a bit of sunshine. No longer do the rays reach the back deck, the sun being lower than the 300' hill and 100' trees so it's down to the heli pad I go. I read that 15 minutes of basking in the sun provides the daily dose of Vitamin D and for me a much preferred method, besides you never know what you will see just sitting down there.

Not being so lucky, the winds will bring rain. I've never given much thought to “rain” other than it's wet and I don't really care for it....yes I know I live in BC and for the time being have chosen to be in an area classified as a “rain forest” but those are the facts.

Precipitation in Haida Gwaii averages 168cm or 66 inches on the west coast ( that's me ) and that is certainly alot of wet days. I've taken to embracing the rain, from inside ofcourse, and found that there are countless ways to describe exactly how much it is raining. A spattering of raindrops can quickly turn into a cloudburst which will unleash a deluge. Sheets of rain marching across the bay one ofter another making me think this must be what a monsoon looks like. Running out of steam before I can capture it's force, the torrent has turned into a drizzle leaving behind a mist that drifts lazily through the conifers making the whole scene appear serene with not a hint that a storm has just passed by.

Some nights dusk can make up for a day that has offered nothing but grey.

Fall is in the air and that can only mean one thing...Fruitcake! It's been about a week now that the fruit has been soaking in a generous amount of rum...... plumping up.

Our woodpile is growing piece by piece, wagonload by wagonload. We've been fortunate that the trees we have been working on have been relatively close by but that is coming to an end. On our walks through the woods Mike is looking up for dead trees while I have something else on my mind......a Christmas tree. Considering what happened last year I've decided to start looking now for the perfect one.

Look what's coming out of the oven these days. We are still waiting for the barge to bring the part for the furnace so we are having a lot of fires using the wood we have just cut, which is wet and green. A new chore after dinner each night now is to load up the oven. With just the heat from the pilot light it drys out enough to burn.

And the bear came back. Searching for that honey pot, which for him was a pail of used oil, he found himself out of luck. After his first visit we made quick work of removing the temptation. Nice to see a bear up close in the wild but we'd rather not have him making a habit of showing up at the kitchen door.

Today is October 20^th and that means we've been here for 2 months. I'm still puttering around putting things the way I want. Guess I better get a move on or before I know it, it will be time to put everything back.

Till next week,

Heather & Mike

Outpost ~ Suprise Surprise

Another Thanksgiving has come and gone. You may recall from my posts last year that the best place to eat around here is “Heather's Oceanside All Night Diner” and that's where we went again this year. As always the view was fabulous, the service attentive, no waiting in line and reasonable prices.

The fare is simple comfort food, reminiscent of what I grew up on at our family restaurant. I think my eyes were bigger than my appetite and the pumpkin pie will have to wait till later.

Being a holiday for which we give “thanks” , we couldn't ignore our four-legged friends especially Sally......surprise surprise who turns out to be more of a.... Sam.

She (he) was relaxing at the back door and laying in such a position that for the first time we realized that she was a he. Who knew.

 

Did you happen to see an article this week forecasting that BC has a good chance of experiencing the coldest winter in 20 years?

Yippee...how do I type that in sarcasm? On the bright side maybe we won't have a lot of rain. The chainsawing, splitting and hauling of wood has become almost a daily activity, as we try to stockpile a good winter supply.

The hub of wildlife activity seems to concentrate in the area outside our kitchen door, wonder why? The other day I was putting clothes away in our bedroom when a noise grabbed my attention and surprise surprise look who I saw.

He stayed around for quite some time sticking his long snout into everything. I'd tap on the window to catch his attention but couldn't compete with all the smells he was experiencing which held his curiosity. He finally found what he was looking for. Heavy duty tough white plastic containers which hold the used oil from the deep fryer was the object of desire. He must have been here earlier as the lid of one was gone, chewed off as far as I could tell from my viewing point. Once found he didn't waste any time in getting a good grip of the handle and sauntering off into the woods. I haven't gone looking for the container yet but I will, just to see how far he travelled till he stopped to indulge in his prize.

Once again... just outside the kitchen door. Have no idea what he is after. Cute they may be but they get into everything, inside and out. Last year I had an ongoing battle with one in particular who kept finding ways into the basement. I've learned, the hard way, just how clever and determined they can be so this year I'm ahead of the game making sure anything that they could possibly open is stowed in totes and bins and even empty freezers....yet I still run into them down in the basement every now and again.

Surprise, surprise....the geese that only fly over head have started to show up every afternoon for a little snack before heading off to the other bay where they seem to stay.

The last bite.

Till next week,

Heather & Mike

Outpost - A Full Week

Wind, high water and waves.....that's how our week started.

Blasts of wind skimming across the water's surface gathered up droplets creating an effect that always makes me think of blowing snow.

As the day wore on the winds increased and small waves were dancing in the bay.

The other side of the coin or should I say, other side of the dock. Same day, same time as the previous picture yet so calm. This is one of the highest tides we will see all year at 16.7 ft or 5.1 m.

With rain coming through on and off it's a day to spend some time in the kitchen.

I'm still working through cases of peppers, a box of cabbage, several bags of zucchini, and a flat of tomatoes. Dozens of meals.....cabbage rolls, stuffed peppers and spaghetti sauce now all sit in the freezer, in the quick dinner section.

After stuffing 50 half pepper shells and cooking them it was pretty clear what we were having for dinner tonight.

The skies have cleared but the winds continue to blow, the air misty with the lightest of rains giving us a day of rainbows.

We've become quite use to seeing the deer wherever we go and toss out the occasional apple peelings or carrot but this one, whom we call Sally, has become quite a regular sight at the back door.

Being self reliant and going with the flow are character traits that will serve you well when choosing to do what we do. It had only been a week after everyone left that our boiler/furnace decided to stop working. These things happen the same way as soon as your warranty expires so does the appliance. Running through the routine check this and check that list, Mike came to the conclusion that we needed some new parts. No problems there, they are ordered right away but getting them here is not as easy. We let Ken know that it's not of an urgency to warrant a plane, so we await the barge.

This is where “going with the flow” type attitude comes in handy. So we don't have any hot water, at least we have water. Heating water for dishes and for taking a nice long “bucket” shower isn't the end of the world. Heat is something else we don't have at the moment but just think if this had happened in January! We do have a fireplace and Mike and I had planned on having more fires this year, just not so early in the season. A temperature of 64 degrees through the day is fine but evenings tend to get a bit chilly and that is when the fireplace comes to the rescue. However there is also a cost to this and that would be wood. Not wanting to deplete the pile left by the summer crew, we have been scouring the forest for any fallen trees,either by man or nature, which we could utilize. Every nice day ( translation - no rain) is spent chainsawing, chopping, splitting, carrying, wheeling, tossing and stacking . Tell you the truth I enjoy it all.

Washed up on the far end of the beach is a hefty old cedar tree which would make for great kindling, so Mike armed with the chainsaw made quick work of cutting away all he could. The chunks, although light now had to be carried down the beach, each step shifting under the loose pebbles than manoeuvring over an outcrop of jagged rocks to the ramp where we load them into the wagon which is pulled up the steep boardwalk where we than unload the wagon to begin the process of splitting the wood into thin slabs,like shingles, so we can than slice them to make kindling. That part of the job complete the wagon is reloaded, pulled up to the steps at the back deck where we once again unload the wagon. This time the kindling just goes into boxes which I carry into the foul weather gear drying room inside the lodge, all other wood is tossed into the basement where it is stacked. This whole scenario will be carried out 3 more times to bring back all the wood that one tree will provide.

Sally who has begun to follow us around when we are out working, found all of this just a bit exhausting.

Till next week,

Heather & Mike