Alsfeld

My mother was born and raised in a small town in north central Germany called Alsfeld.  Her father ran a sawmill there.  Some relatives, I'm not sure on which side of the family, also ran a bakery and a cartwright shop.  Alsfeld is a medieval town that dates back at least several hundred years.  Part of the old wall that once protected the town, still remains.

Mom is still alive and doing well physically, but suffers from Alzheimers.  Although she is in generally good health, her short term memory is able to comprehend a time spell of less than five minutes.  This makes conversation difficult, and many things impossible.

My oldest daughter Hailey traveled to Europe earlier this week.  There are no great connecting flights to the part of Austria that she will be visiting.  So she had to fly from Edmonton to Toronto, then on to Montreal and then on to Vienna.  From there she took a train to St. Valentin in central Austria, where Margarit's cousin Martina lives.  After a night there to rest and recuperate she caught a train to Germany.  I understand that this was for about seven hours, and included at least three transfers.  But eventually she made it to Alsfeld and is spending two nights and a couple of days exploring the area.

I have a million relatives on my Dad's side of the family, but on my Mom's side I only have one cousin, plus a bunch of distant relatives.  The timing wasn't great, and things were a little short on notice, but my cousin Roswitha, who is only a few months older than me, was able to connect with Hailey briefly in Alsfeld.  Sadly her two daughters, Melanie and Vivien, who are similar in age to Hailey, were not able to make it.

The site of the old sawmill is no longer owned by family, but many of the buildings still stand.  I understand that Hailey and Roswitha were able to visit the site and walk around a little.  I only visited this part of Germany twice.... once as an infant, and then again when I was in Grade 1.  I can barely remember that second visit, and have not been back since.  It was nice that Hailey was able to experience the background of her grandmother.  Last year she did the same with respect to the birthplace of her grandmother on Margarit's side.

After she wraps up this visit to Alsfeld, Hailey is catching a train back to Salzburg.  She will spend a couple of days there experiencing the history and exploring.  Once that is wrapped up she will return to St. Valentin.  Margarit, Annelise and Breaden will join her there and they will all be present for the wedding celebration of Martina's son David and his wife Elke.

Just listening to Hailey describe the perils of her travels is enough to convince me that I don't ever want to do it.  I've said this for years, and every time I hear of someone else's travels I'm convinced that I don't want to do it.  I'm happy to stay close to home, and don't feel any sense of loss at missing out on stuff further away.  My philosophy is... if I can't drive, I ain't going.  But all the same, I'm really impressed that Hailey had the courage to do this on her own, and I'm thrilled that she seems to be enjoying herself.  This is a phone snapshot that she sent back earlier this morning....

I'm not sure exactly what the left building is.  The central one is the church.  And the one on the right is the rathaus.  Every town in Europe has one, and this is essentially city hall.  We westerners laugh at the name and think of it as a house full of rats.  Not too far from the truth......

Another News Feature

The Beer Parlour Project was just featured in a news article over in Saskatchewan.  This one outlines our April visit to Marengo, Czar and Luseland.  The guy that wrote the article was in attendance last year when we visited the Coleville Hotel for BP26.0.  

https://westcentralonline.com/articles/marengo-luseland-and-czar-joining-beer-parlour-project-catalogue

This link is from an older article last year, in advance of that BP26.0 outing...

https://www.westcentralonline.com/articles/beer-parlour-project-rolls-into-coleville-to-capture-disappearing-tavern-culture

And this one, released in advance of our recent trip.  These guys really seem to like our project so hopefully we continue to get all this publicity.

https://www.westcentralonline.com/articles/beer-parlour-project-visiting-marengo-thursday-luseland-saturday

First Round of Golf in 2026

My neighbor Rob and I were the first two official golfers on the Nordegg Historic Course in 2026.  The golf course officially opens for the season on Saturday May 9th.  Its hard to imagine that just over a week ago we had a dump of snow here in Nordegg.  Both Rob and I purchased seasons passes for the 2026 season, and Cheryl, the course manager, allowed us to play a round a day in advance of the official opening.  There was one other twosome playing behind us, but other than that the course was really quiet.

I bought a mixed set of used clubs over the winter.  Some of them came from my other friend Rob in Vernon.  He shipped me some old clubs that he was no longer using.  This included a driver, 3 wood, fairway wood, and a few irons, and a sand wedge.  To this I added the missing irons and a putter.  I also bought a new golf bag.  This leaves my old cheap set intact, should we have any guests out at the cottage that want to play, but don't have clubs with them.

I am proud to say that I didn't lose a golf ball during our nine holes, and only broke one tee,  I also found a dozen balls, leftover by other players last season.  Rob found at least that many as well.  The highlight of the day was that I found a yellow Sponge Bob ball that I will give to my daughter Helena.  She is a huge Sponge Bob fan and this will add to her collection of memorabilia.  

The only downside to the entire afternoon was that my score was not very good.  I'm not sure that I should even mention it...?  I shot a 51, among my worst scores ever.  A score of 54 is my all time worst score on this par 32 course.  I console myself in saying that it was the first round of the year, and that I was using a set of clubs that were not only mixed, but new to me.

I don't play golf to be competitive, nor do I really care about my score.  My neighbor Rob doesn't even keep score, nor do many of the others that I play with.  I only keep my own score for the sole purpose of determining whether or not I am improving.... or getting worse.  A day on the links is always way better than most other options.....

Windy Point

I slept in a bit on the morning of Thursday May 7th, after getting word around 5:30AM that Hailey was safe and sound in Austria.  Later in the morning I had a shower, coffee and some breakfast.  It was mostly sunny, and reasonably warm, so I decided to head out with my camera for a while.  I had intended to do this on Wednesday evening, but I was too tired after splitting all the wood, and it clouded over and sprinkled a little anyway.

I headed over to Windy Point on Abraham Lake.  On the way I saw two different groups of wild horses.  There was a group of 13 blacks with two young foals, near the Trunk Road.  Further west at the Bighorn Reserve there was another small group.  I also saw several deer, a grouse and two different herds of Bighorn Sheep.

On this day Windy Point did NOT live up to it's name.  Most of the time it is extremely windy here, with white caps on the reservoir, and winds so strong you have to hold onto the door of your vehicle with both hands when getting in and out.  This time around there was barely a whisper of breeze.  The reservoir was mostly flat like glass, with only a few light ripples from time to time when the breeze picked up.  The skies were beautiful with a mix of clouds and the temperature peaked at about 18C.  There was a herd of Bighorn Sheep around and on two different occasions they wandered in to some large format photographs that I had composed.  I shot here for a couple of hours with the view camera, and it was very peaceful.  A couple of other groups of people came and went but for the most part it was just dead quiet.

The water level in the reservoir is very low at this time of year.  It will likely drop just a little further before the mountain run off starts in another month of so.  Then the dam will be closed and the water level will rise through the summer months.  By fall it will once again be full, right into the trees and right up to the highway.

Later I headed back over to the cottage and tackled a couple of chores.  I repaired the feeder that I use for the deer, and then later still applied a little watercolor to the line wash drawing that I am working on.  A very calm and relaxing day to say the least.

Back to the Cottage

I returned to Nordegg on the evening of Sunday May 3rd.  Hailey was still out at the cottage and had been working at the Miner's Cafe over the weekend.  We were both tired by evening... her from work and me from the long drive.  It takes over four hours to get from East Coulee to Nordegg.  We both crashed pretty early.  

The next day I got settled in at the cottage and tried to get after a few chores.  I managed to get my sump pump working, despite thinking I might have to replace it.  In the afternoon I put together a nice dinner for Hailey, of some grilled tenderloin and some potato skins.  We had a rather early dinner as she had to go out to a staff meeting later in the evening.

On Tuesday May 5th Hailey had to head back to the city.  She packed up her stuff and hit the road about noon.  Before she left I gave her a crash course on how to load and operate an old Leica III rangefinder camera.  She has the one that used to belong to her grandfather and wants to take it to Austria with her.  About the time she was packing up to leave, my friend Gary arrived.

Gary lives in Lake Louise and worked for many years for Parks Canada.  In his past he owned and operated a pinball arcade back in Manitoba with his father.  He is now the go-to guy in western Canada to repair and service old pinball machines, arcade games, and jukeboxes.  He has been out twice in the past to begin the restoration of my old Rockola Jukebox.  Last time he was here, he took a couple of motors and some switch gear with him.  He cleaned, lubricated and serviced them back home at his place over the winter months.  This time around we put the motors back in, cleaned and lubricated everything, did some fine tuning and adjustments and now it is ready to go.  I just have to give it a thorough leaning inside and out, and load it with some records.

Before Gary left I said my goodbyes to Hailey and she headed home.  Once we were done with the jukebox, Gary and I hung around for a while and had a couple of beers.  It was still fairly early, so he decided not to stay the night, and headed back for Lake Louise.

On Wednesday I spent the entire afternoon hauling, splitting and stacking firewood.  I got all the wood from the recently downed trees split and stacked.  This is just the stuff that I previously cut to stove lengths.  There are still more logs to be cut up.  I also split all the logs from a big spruce that came down on our guest cottage last year.  The pile behind the garage that we burned over the winter is now half way full again.  There is still a lot more wood to be cut up and split, but I got a good start on things.  By evening my old back was telling me that I had done enough and I headed in to make dinner and relax.  But I really couldn't sleep very well.  I was too anxious about Hailey travelling to Austria all by herself.

Margarit took her to the airport at about 3:00AM to catch a 6:00AM flight to Toronto.  She had a brief layover there and then caught a connecting flight to Montreal.  After another layover, she caught a flight to Vienna.  It was a little after midnight here in Mountain Time, and about 8:30 in the morning locally, when she landed in Vienna.  Then she had yet another layover before she could catch a train to St. Valentin.  This is a small town outside Linz where Margarit's cousin Martina lives.  It was about 5:30 in the morning here in Alberta when she finally arrived and only then was I able to relax and finally sleep for a couple of hours.

A Quick Trip to East Coulee - Springfest 2026

On Friday May 1st I packed up some of my stuff and hit the road for East Coulee.  Hailey stayed behind at the cottage in Nordegg as she had a couple of shifts scheduled at the Miners Cafe.  I met up with Helena and Margarit at the shop in East Coulee in the early evening.  Frank and Chris were there and we got settled around a small fire in the chiminea... roasting some hot dogs and having a few drinks.

On Saturday Margarit and Helena and I went out walking in a nearby coulee.  The snow was all gone, and although things weren't really turning green yet, the prairie crocus' were in bloom all over the place.

Later in the day we picked up tickets to the Springfest going on in town.  Margarit and I checked out a couple of bands in the afternoon, and Helena went to see a couple as well... one on her own and another with her Mom.

Last year the Springfest was a big disappointment because it was very poorly attended.  This time around they again did a really poor job of promoting it.  There was no online advertisement, no signage or promotion in Drumheller, and the line up of artists was not announced until just a couple of weeks before.  Even in East Coulee, all they had was a sandwich board sign on the side of the highway, and when we drove by, the wind had blown it over.

Frank and I ended up spending most of the afternoon sitting around in the yard at the shop.  It was clear and sunny and the temperature got up to about +23C.  In between the white wall of the shop, the light colored trailer, and the white fences, it was quite a bit hotter due to everything being so reflective and the area being so sheltered.  I got a sunburn, and we both ended up with mild heat stroke.  In the early evening, after a dinner of smokies and burgers, I ended up lying down for a while.  Frank was tired as well, and he ended up going home early.  Chris used my Springfest ticket and she and Helena and Margarit went and checked out some of the evening performers.  They said it was pretty well attended and they enjoyed themselves.

On Sunday morning we packed up all our gear and tidied every thing.  We locked up the trailer and hit the road.  After a brief stop at WHIFs restaurant for breakfast, we went for a walk out in the badlands.  Helena was happy because she found a few fossils and lots of rocks.  By this time it was mid afternoon.  We said our good byes and the girls hit the road back to Edmonton.  I set off across country to the west and headed back to the cottage in Nordegg.  Hailey and I hung out that evening and had a nice visit.

David Thompson Country Calendar 2026 - May Image

This is the image that I selected for the May page of my 2026 David Thompson Country calendar.  This is a shot of Mount Stelfox, along the David Thompson Highway, near Abraham Lake.  I like the way the clouds create a spin drift behind the mountain peak and this always fascinates me.

It was a spring day back in May of 2023 when I took this photograph.  My brother-in-law Shawn was with me out at Nordegg and we went for a drive.

Keeping Busy

On Wednesday April 29th I mostly just kept myself busy around the cottage.  I puttered around inside until about noon, waiting for it to warm up a little.  It had been mostly sunny in the morning and the temperature rose up to about +9c.  Right about the time I was planning to head outside and get to work a shower rolled in.  The rain didn't amount to much and although it was relatively heavy, it only lasted for a few minutes.  It did cool off a bit, and the clouds kinda rolled in for most of the rest of the day.

I did a run up to the dump and hauled away some of the garbage that we had accumulated.  We also had a bunch of cardboard, mostly packaging from various items that we recently purchased.  This all hit the recycling bin up at the transfer station.

Later in the afternoon I dug out the chainsaw and cut up a couple more logs.  Then I set up my splitter and set to work splitting a bunch of the stuff that I had recently cut up.  I think I did something like seven or eight wheelbarrow loads of split wood.  I finished up the woodpile beside the driveway, and then set about replenishing the one behind the garage.  That one got completely used up over the past winter and spring, so I am starting out from scratch and rebuilding that one.  There remains a lot of wood still needing to be cut and split so I shall continue with that in the coming days.

Hailey had a couple of days off work so she blasted home to Edmonton on Tuesday.  She returned to the cottage on Wednesday evening, and brought the new TV out with her.  We got that set up as we nibbled on some nachos during the evening.

First Visit of 2026 - Nordegg Historic Site

On Tuesday April 28th I decided to take a break from yard work.  It was a beautiful day, mostly sunny and by afternoon the temperature got up to about +15C.  What a change from the winter weather we had a couple of days prior.

I was able to book access to the Nordegg Historic Site.  The staff are just starting to clean up the site and preparing for their official opening in a couple of weeks.  I headed on up and wandered around with my camera for a few hours.  It was nice to see that nothing has been disturbed since last fall, and there is no new vandalism or damage.  

Most of the photography that I have done so far this year has been on Beer Parlour Project outings.  I think I've exposed almost 90 sheets of 4x5 film so far this year.  Except for about ten of some old buildings in Saskatchewan, and these few today at the mine site, all the rest were images for the Beer Parlour Project.  This time around it was a dozen sheets, over five different camera setups, and included a couple of sheets of Infrared.  It was a nice change of pace.

There is evidence of packrats up at the mine site, but I've never seen one until this visit.  You can see nests of sticks and junk in and under some of the old buildings, and their little turds are all over the place.  They have a very distinct and pungent odor.  This time around I saw one outside by some of the old vehicles.  He was too quick, and I couldn't get a photograph of him.  They are actually not true rats, as Alberta is rat free.  These are Bushy Tailed Wood Rats, more commonly known as Pack Rats.  They inhabit old buildings, mines and caves and are known for collecting junk and trinkets.

Even though there is still a fair bit of patchy snow up at the mine, in the shade, in the bush and behind the buildings, I also saw my first butterflies of the season.  These were a couple Mourning Cloaks, always the first ones to come out in the spring.  They over winter after hibernating through the cold months.

From Wikipedia...

R.B. Forbes - U.S. Department of Agriculture

Tattered Curtain

This is another sheet of Infrared film that I processed in the mixed batch, way back on March 20th.  This is a sheet of Kodak High Speed Infrared film, in 4" x 5" format.  In my not so humble opinion this was the best Infrared film ever made.  Sadly it was discontinued around the late 1990's.  This sheet is from a batch that expired in August of 2001.  I loaded the film the day before I exposed it, and stored the exposed sheet in my fridge until I finally developed it.

Development was in Kodak T-Max Developer, 1:6, for 6:45 minutes at 24C.

The infrared effect is not as obvious in this image.  That is because there is no sky, no open water and no living vegetation.  These are the things the usually show the most obvious tonal differences.  If I compare this one to a similar image, shot on typical panchromatic film, there are some subtle differences.  I may do a comparative post at some point in the future.

This one was also taken while I was ont on that day trip with my brother-in-law Shawn.  I think of him a lot these days as he is about to go in for heart surgery.  On May 7th he is scheduled to have an LVAD, an artificial heart, installed.

I shot this with my Ebony SV45TU view camera and a long 300mm lens.  I used a #25 Red Filter, with no filter factor.  This would eliminate many of the visible wavelengths and expose mostly with the infrared part of the spectrum.  I took the photograph on May 26th of 2025, at about 4:00 in the afternoon.  The exposure was for 1/30 second at F16.0.

BP 39.0 Pre-Scount - Rosedeer Hotel

A year ago Margarit and I were down in East Coulee for the Springfest Music Festival.  We met up with my friend Rob, and he dropped off a whole bunch of darkroom equipment at my shop, that I later sold for him.  At the end of the weekend, Margarit and I headed over to Wayne, to pre-scout the Rosedeer Hotel for the Beer Parlour Project.

We are well aware of the hotel, and have been there numerous times.  It is a tourist destination, and almost everyone that stops in over the summer months, is from somewhere else.  This is not really the type of clientele that we want to interact with for the Beer Parlour Project.  So, despite having it recommended to us over and over and over again by well meaning followers, we have avoided visiting.  This time around Margarit and I were just checking out the hotel.  We were considering making a return visit late in the season, when the tourists are gone, and that eventually happened last November.

I took this photograph a year ago to the day, when Margarit and I stopped by.  I was experimenting with some old Maco IR820C Aura film.  This is an infrared film that ceased to be manufactured over twenty years ago.  This particular sheet came from a batch that had an expiry date of April 2007.  I loaded the film holder in February of 2025, exposed the film in May of 2025, and developed it in March of this year.  The negative was a little thin, because I messed up the development time and only processed for 7:00 minutes, when it should have been for 8:30.  Nonetheless, the image can be salvaged.  

I rated the film at 12iso and exposed with a #25 Red Filter, and no filter factor.  This would have blocked much of the visible light spectrum, and exposed mostly with Infrared wavelengths.  I used my Ebony SV45TE view camera with a Fujinon 125mm lens.  The exposure was for 1/4 second at F20.0.

The guy in the left chair is Carlos, and that is his ATV parked out front. He was visiting with his friend in the other chair.  Carlos is a local resident and friend of the owners.  I photographed him again when we returned for our official visit in November of 2025.  That was our Beer Parlour Project outing number BP39.0.

BP31.0 - Amisk Hotel

I processed a couple of batches of color negatives in C-41 chemistry, back in late March.  I've posted some of the results here on my blog in recent weeks, but there are still more.

This one is from a Beer Parlour Project outing last summer.  We have now made three trips into west central Saskatchewan and east central Alberta.  All three times we used a short term rental house in Macklin Saskatchewan as our base.  The most recent trip was just a couple weeks ago.

On this trip, our second to the area, we visited the Amisk Hotel, on the Alberta side of the border.  I shot this photograph on a sheet of Kodak Ektar 100 film.  Unlike much of the color film that I shoot, this particular sheet was not all that outdated, only hitting it's expiry date in 2022.  This was the second of my two batches of C-41 chemistry, run on March 23rd.

This was the 31st hotel that we visited for the Beer Parlour Project.  The place was pretty quiet that night with just the owners and a couple of patrons.  Mostly we visited with Jacqui and Lee, the couple that owned the place.  It was a low key, quiet kind of outing, and much different from the hectic atmosphere of some of the places that we visit.

I shot this with my Ebony SV45TU view camera and a Nikkor 150mm lens.  No filter was used.  I took the photograph on July 20th of 2025, at about 5:00 in the evening.  The exposure was for 1/15 second at F20.0.

May Calendar Image

This is the image I selected for the May page of my 2026 Fine Art Photography calendar.  This was taken during that spring day trip with my Brother-in-law Shawn, about a year ago.  We found this old Dodge on the side of the road, and the door was unlocked, so I took this photograph.

Back to Work

By Monday April 27th... or should I say January 117th... it finally quit snowing.  It warmed up nicely and the melt was on.  By the end of the day most of the 3 inches or so of snow that we got in the days prior, was gone.  It was still pretty cool in the morning, but by afternoon it had warmed up nicely.

I dug out my chainsaw and got to work outside.  During recent stormy weather this spring, several trees came down on our property.  I set about cutting a bunch of these up for firewood.

I realized that I'm pretty out of shape, and after a couple hours of this I was getting pretty tired.  Later in the afternoon, after Hailey got home from work, I made some chicken wings, and then put a couple of steaks on the BBQ.  It was the first time that I've fired up the grill in quite a while.

Trapped Inside

The first few days of my stay out at Nordegg were spent indoors.  Hailey was out with me, as she was training for her summer job at the Miner's Cafe.  While she was at work, I spent my days indoors, trying to keep myself busy.

I got my Dad's old bucksaw.  This dates back to when I was a little kid and I remember Dad using it, as well as me using it, to cut up firewood at our cottage at Pigeon Lake.  It was laying around Dad's old shop when my brothers and I were cleaning up some stuff, and I claimed it and hung it on the wall.

I bought a second rack for firewood and set that up beside our wood stove in the main cottage.  Whenever it rains or snows our outdoor firewood piles get wet, and sometimes it is hard to get a fire going.  I like to keep quite a bit inside, so it has a chance to dry a bit before we burn it.

I also worked on one of my line wash drawings of an old hotel from the Beer Parlour Project.  This time around it was the now closed Cadillac hotel, outing number BP14.0 to Cadillac Saskatchewan in June of 2024.  I finished the sketching part and now will start to apply the wash of colors.  After that I will detail it all in with pencil and ink.

One of the girls busted my TV.  I never did quite get the full story on who was responsible and how it happened.  Maybe someday the truth will come out.  Last time I was out I hung up a TV on the wall of the guest cottage.  This time around I got it all connected to the internet so I could stream some shows.  This allowed me to watch some of the Edmonton Oilers Stanley Cup Playoff games.  I would have been even more upset if I wasn't able to watch.