We have an apple press!

Hey friends!  Exciting times at Willow Retreat: our new apple press has arrived!  It took Paul some time to assemble, due to the parts not being that well machined … but after a bit of filing and skimming, he made it fit together.  The finished article is quite impressive.

Our second Avalon Gathering!

Hi everyone, well, what a weekend. The 2nd Annual Avalon Gathering took place from Friday, August 23 to Sunday, August 25 and was a blast. The theme was Pirates and Gypsies, and people took it to heart!  Paul and I also renewed our wedding vows, with a real pagan handfasting ceremony, officiated by our friends Joe and Demmarest Parish of Feywood Grove.

Uisge Ban Falls

After the SSC navigation class wrapped, we decided to take the group and check out nearby Uisge Ban Falls. Gaelic for "white water", and pronounced "Ish-ka-ban", the falls are reached via a well maintained trail and are quite beautiful. The trail is very easy and can be walked by anyone, in fact we passed several families with children and seniors, most of whom were wearing shorts and flipflops.  We felt a little overdressed in our hiking gear!

A bird in the hand

Sometimes nature leaves surprising gifts. Birds around here have a habit of flying into our windows; some make it, some don't.

A tour around the garden

As we have had a rare sunny day, I thought you folks might like to see some pictures of the garden in bloom. It's been so wet and cool, I think some of the plants thought we were having an English summer!  The rhododendrons in particular are full of blossoms like I've never seen them before.  Yet, some plants seem not to have done so well with the cool temperatures, rain and late frosts that have characterized this June so far: the buddleia is stone dead, and there is a lot of dead wood on the grapevines.  One entire limb of the apple tree appears to be dead as well.  I guess it's pruning time!

Bird Report

It's May, and Spring is fully underway in the Middle River Valley. I'm pleased to report that we have cardinals back at the feeder, although I haven't managed to get a decent photo of one yet. They look like very young birds, they started out quite brown, like sparrows, but with a reddish tinge to their head feathers. Gradually, day after day, they've been getting redder and redder. They share the feeder fairly well with the chickadees and juncos, but sometimes they get a bit aggressive when they feel crowded.

Finally Spring

Huzzah! I'm delighted to be able to report that Spring has finally deigned to show its face in the Cape Breton Highlands. Currently it is teeming with rain, our road is open and almost snow-free, and the snowdrops and crocuses are blooming! We're also playing host to a flock of slate-grey juncos, who have decided to make the Retreat their home. The chickadees, who have kept us company all through the winter, seem to tolerate the juncos well, and they've been sharing the bird feeder. The robins have returned, but they stand off from the smaller birds, preferring to keep to the lawn and the wetlands. The woodpecker has been very busy as well, with his staccato rat-tat-tat echoing through the early morning garden. The brooks and streams are full to capacity with spring meltwater, and it's so good to see the snow finally receding.

Disenchanted April

O, to be in England now that April's there, wrote Robert Browning in Home-thoughts, from Abroad.  Well, I'm not in England, and although the calendar says April, if you look out of my window you'd be forgiven for thinking it was January.  I wrote a blog entry entitled "First Snow" back on December 1, and little did I know I'd still be posting snow pictures on April 9!

Happy Easter!

Hey everyone, and a Happy Easter to you all.  Or Passover, or Ostara, or whatever you celebrate.  Spring is on the way!  🙂

Happy Spring! Or … not.

OK so, the spring equinox arrived a couple of days ago.  Spring is supposed to be on its way, right?  Wrong!  See, this is Atlantic Canada, and last night, we were visited by the worst snowstorm so far this winter season. In excess of 40 cms fell in certain places (for example, the Cape Breton Highlands!), helped along by winds of 100 kph or more.  The wind was scary – it howled all night long and you could hear the snow blasting against the side of the house. I hardly slept a wink.  And when I woke up, this is what I found: