Winter in September

The weather this September has been very cold, with temperatures far below average.  We have had snow several times before the end of summer, both here in the city and up our our cottage in Nordegg.  

The past couple of weekends I went out to Nordegg by myself.  It snowed out there, but I'm told there was just as much back in the city.  I worked on a bunch of small projects around the cottage.

I have all the rough in ready for the electric furnace that we will be getting installed.  Our friends Court and Sandra gave us an antique Singer sewing machine and I took that out and set it up.  I also worked on installation of some aluminum posts that will be the supports for our railings.  

This past week here at the shop I've been working on some walnut sleeves that will slip over theses posts to finish them.  Then panels of clear tempered laminate glass will be clamped in between the posts.

I also cut some pine longs that I will peel and use for handrails on our stairs.  I took out a couple more chairs and some dishes.  I cut in a cold air return to the basement, and installed some bathroom accessories.

My weekends just consisted of all sorts of small jobs like these and it was very peaceful and quiet.

I put some oats out behind the cottage to keep the deer coming around.  I am not a hunter and have no intention of doing anything other than watching and enjoying these guys.  There is no hunting allowed in our subdivision so these guys feel pretty safe coming around.  The Whiskeyjacks were also around off and on.  At one point a Pine Marten cut through the yard.  I saw wild horses almost every time a drove to and from the cottage.

This weekend I stayed home.  I played hockey on Saturday morning and the Renegades lost a close one to Pentastar... by a score of 6-5.  Then on Saturday afternoon I went to the football game and brought my friend Court along.  It was bitterly cold with a light breeze out of the north.  The Eskimos played one of the worst games I've ever seen and got thumped by Winnipeg 30-3.  We bailed out and left after there third quarter, heading over to a local pub to warm up.

Sure hope the weather turns around and we get a little of that "First Nations Summer".  The forecast for the next week or more is for continued cold and some snow out in the mountains.  Maybe after that we'll get a mild, dry fall...??  As much as I enjoy winter, I'm not quite ready for its arrival at this early point in the season.  

I've attached a few photographs from the past couple of weekends out at Nordegg.  

Quote

Read this quote in a small community newspaper... not sure who to credit it with but it made me chuckle...

Lottery - a tax on people that are not good at math....

Winter Arrives Early... again...!

Last year I was witness to a big dump of wet snow, out in Nordegg, on the last day of summer.  This year winter arrived two weeks earlier than that.  There was a little snow out at Nordegg, but not a lot.  There was actually just as much, or perhaps even a little more, here in the city.  It started around September 11th, and has been cool and overcast ever since.

I was a little concerned about the new cottage as the temperatures unexpectedly dropped significantly.  Last time we were out at the cottage I didn't leave any heat on.  We had a small gas leak on one of our fittings so I turned off the gas.  And, with the weather so mild at the time, I didn't bother to leave on any electric heat.  This sudden onset of winter weather brought tempertures down in the -3 to -5 range overnight.  I was pretty certain that it wouldn't freeze in the cottage that easily and quickly but made a point of heading out on the weekend of September 15 and 16.  Initially my friend Rob was going to come out with me and we were going to finish up a few electrical things and then spend a couple of days hiking and making photographs.  But his travel plans changed due to work issues and he wasn't able to make it.  I had some extra time booked off from work so I went out by myself.  I left the city on Friday afternoon shortly after lunch, and returned home on Monday evening.

It was chilly in the cottage when I arrived on Friday but nowhere near freezing.  I turned the gas back on and fired up the room heaters.  At the same time I built a nice fire in the wood stove.  Within an hour or two the wood stove had the place really warm, and I turned the room heaters off.  For the rest of the weekend I kept the cottage warm and toasty with just the wood stove.  In fact it was too warm, with the temperature upstairs rising to around 80F.  I had to open the windows to cool things off a bit.

On Saturday our mechanical contractor came out and repaired the minor gas leak for me.  He also brought out the electric furnace that I have decided to install.  This will supplement the other heat sources and prevent the plumbing from freezing during really cold weather.  

I spent the weekend working on a few other odds and ends.  I roughed in an electrical line to the new furnace, and another that I am adding to provide an upstairs switch for the hot water heater.  I also cut in some floor openings for registers for the new furnace.  And I put up a proper shelf and installed the recorder and router for the security camera system.

The rest of the weekend was pretty low key and relaxing.  I just took it easy and relaxed in the cottage.  No one else was around our part of the subdivision except my neighbor Rob and his wife.  It was wonderfully quiet and relaxing.  Lots of deer were hanging around and I watched them outside my window.  Now that our kitchen range is functional, we no longer have to do our cooking outside on the BBQ and campstove.  So instead of the usual steak and baked potatoes that we have made all summer, I was able to have home made pizza and a pasta dish... cooked indoors.

On Monday I had the plumbing/gas inspector out to do the final inspection of our installation.  Later in the day the electrical inspector was also out to review the power installation.  Everything is approved with just a few remaining things to address later when we are ready.  The power supply to the furnace and the hookup of the sink in the kitchen, once cabinets get installed, are the only remaining issues.  But everything to date is now approved.

I left the baseboard heater in the basement, and one of the room heaters on when I left.  I'm sure this will be adequate to keep frost out of the building for the next little while.  Later when the forced air electric furnace is installed, that will provide heat to the kitchen, the bathroom and the waterpump.  I plan on turning it on at a low setting during the coldest months of the winter, so that we can leave the water system on through the winter.

Native Site

After leaving Esther, Chris, Connie, Rueben and I headed over to a nearby site.  I had been told about this place a couple of years ago and never had a previous opportunity to check it out.  There is a hillside covered with dozens of piles of stones.  Rumor has it that they are native graves.  We aren't sure if that really is the case or if they are just cairns of some kind.  They are obviously man made, and obviously very old.  Further research is in order to find out more about this fascinating place.  Photos don't really do it justice....

Politically Correct

The weather this past couple of weeks has been somewhat unsettled.  It feels a lot more like fall and winter, than the end of summer.  Last weekend we had some snow.  There has been a heavy frost every night.  Daytime high temperatures have only made it up into single digits.  The normal high for this time of year is 16, and the normal low around 3.  We haven't had conditions anywhere near that... The forecast is calling for a few more days of cool weather and some rain possibly turning to wet snow.  After that, the long range forecast sounds better.  I'm really hoping we get a nice Indian Summer and a long mild fall.  I suppose it is not politically correct to say that.  In this day and age of apologies and reconciliation and attempting to not step on any toes I suppose we can't say Indian Summer.  But I like the term, and use it without any ill will or discriminatory connotation.  Besides... it sounds a lot better than "Aboriginal Summer"  or "First Nations Summer"....  Sheesh...!!

Forgotten Prairie Reunion 2

A couple of weeks ago, after checking out the abandoned Military Base at Alsask, Chris and Connie and Rueben and I also made a stop in Esther, Alberta.  Part of the documentary film project was shot here back in the spring of 2017.  We managed to connect briefly with Bill Dalton, who was featured in the film.  He was busy with the harvest getting underway and we only had a chance to visit for a few minutes.  But, we gave him a DVD copy of the film so that he could see it.  We also wandered around the old grain elevator for a bit and reminisced about the project, and how much better the weather was this time around....

A Trip to Youngstown

On the weekend of September 8th the girls and I headed down to Youngstown, in southeastern Alberta.  We actually stayed in our trailer, which remains parked at the shop in East Coulee.  On Saturday we drove further east to Youngstown.  Our friend Tanja was getting married.  Tanja is a member of my photo group, the Monochrome Guild and over the years has also become friends with Margarit.  Tanja moved away from Edmonton about a year ago to take a teaching job in Hanna.  She lived in Youngstown and made the commute to Hanna every day.  Her new husband Paul is from North Dakota and she will be moving down there after the wedding.

Tanja had a digital photographer hired to shoot her wedding but I also took some shots for her.  I was shooting black and white film with my Hasselblad and will be giving her the negatives so that she can print them herself.  After the photos, and the ceremony in one of the local churches, there was a dinner and dance at a nearby Community Hall.

My three girls were pretty excited about going to a wedding as this was the first one that they had ever been invited to.  Most of our friends and relatives are old, like me, and are already married.  The younger ones are not yet of marrying age... although some of the cousins are now getting close.  The girls were looking forward to the opportunity to get all dressed up...!  Helena decided that she wanted to wear a tuxedo... and we found a small used one at a local thrift store.  The older two got all dolled up in dresses, shoes and makeup.  It was kind of fun to see them so excited.

After the reception we headed back to East Coulee and spent a second night in our trailer.  Then the next day we made the trek back home to the city.  We tried to hit a couple of antique stores on the way home, as we are now looking to decorate the interior of our cottage but unfortunately they were all closed on Sunday.

Long Weekend in Nordegg

The girls and I all headed out to Nordegg for the Labor Day Long Weekend.  We left the city on Friday evening, right after work.  Our travel plans were delayed as there was a big traffic jam on Highway 2 heading south out of the city.  It turns out that an RV exploded and caught on fire and traffic was backed up for miles.  It took us almost 1-1/2 hours to get from our house in the city, to the Nisku overpass just beyond the city limits.  After that it was clear sailing, but this delay meant we didn't arrive in Nordegg until well after dark... at about 11:00PM.

It rained heavily overnight and the next day it was pretty muddy.  This was the first time that I saw the new vinyl plank flooring that had been previously installed in the cottage.  The girls saw it the weekend prior while I was away in Saskatchewan.  We moved our fridge from its temporary location in the garage, into our kitchen.  I set up a heavy duty shelving unit in the garage to store a bunch of small stuff in a more organized manner.  I also built a temporary kitchen counter using a half sheet of 3/4" plywood.  The other half I installed as a temporary lunch counter in our bay window.  These will eventually be replaced when I have the permanent cabinets, cupboards and counter tops finished.

Rob from Action Security Cameras came out on Saturday and installed our camera system for us.  This involves a bunch of programming and set up that is beyond the understanding of an old dinosaur like me.  

Then on Sunday, Scott of Shunda Creek Contracting stopped by and used his skid steer to lift our kitchen range into the cottage.  It is a modern gas range made to look like an antique.  It is the one item that we really splurged on so far.  The specs claim that it weighs over 400 Lbs so the equipment was in order to get it into place.  Later on Sunday afternoon my brother Greg and his wife Barb came out for a visit.  This was their first time out at our place.  We had dinner together that evening and they stayed overnight.  Greg even helped me to lift the kitchen range off of it's pallet and slide it into place.  I got the gas line hooked up and we were finally able to cook inside...!

On holiday Monday we went out for a ride on the ATV's.  We hit some of the trails and stopped down along the creek.  There was an American Dipper bobbing around the falls.  By afternoon we started packing up and getting ready to go home.  Greg and Barb set out on their way and the girls and I left a couple hours later.  I saw the wild horses along the road on the way home... the first time I have seen them in a while.

Abandoned Military Base

After leaving Kindersley on the morning of August 26th... our visit with Jack still fresh in our minds... Chris, Connie, Rueben and I made a stop at Alsask.  This town on the Alberta-Saskatchewan border was once a Cold War era military base.  It was part of the Pine Tree Line, an early warning system that was intended to detect an invasion from the former Soviet Union, coming over the Arctic.  The base was once home to thousands of military personnel.   It now sits largely unused and abandoned.  Some of the barracks are privately owned and have been converted into residences.  The recreation center, with it's swimming pool, has been taken over by the town of Alsask, and is used by the residents.  There are a few detached houses that are still occupied... mostly used as rental accommodations for tourists and hunters.

Just down the road in the townsite there are still many occupied homes.  We checked out the abandoned hotel and school, but this is not a ghost town and is still home to a number of residents.  Originally there was a main railway line through town.  That line is still used, but it now terminates a short distance to the west in Oyen, and does not continue beyond there as it once did. 

I thought the place was pretty cool and worth some further exploration.  Unfortunately on this day we did not have time to hang around as we all needed to be back home that evening.  Another one to add to the "To-Do" list...

Winter Hockey Underway

The kids went back to school at the beginning of the week and with that came the start of the winter beer league hockey season.  My Renegades played our first game of the regular season last night at Coronation Arena against the Cannibals.  We skated to an easy 11-5 victory... hopefully the sign of good things to come...

Lots of Visitors

The girls and I were out at Nordegg for the long weekend.  Rob from Action Security Cameras came out for a day trip on Saturday, and installed our security cameras for us.  I had the CAT5 wires roughed in from way back when we did the electrical, and put up the boxes.  I bought the cameras months ago and had them in storage.  Now I purchased the recorder and router and had Rob come out and hook everything up for me.  We mounted and aimed the cameras properly and got everything all set up.  With these in place I no longer need to us my game camera as a makeshift security camera on the driveway.  So I moved the game camera back into the woods behind the cottage.  We often see deer hanging around back here.

The girls and I were watching a couple of White Tail does on Monday during the day, but other than that we didn't see any wildlife back there.  When I pulled the memory card from the game camera and checked it, I found that there was a lot more activity back there than I thought.  In addition to the does, we also had a visit from a cow elk and her calf, and several White Tail bucks in full velvet.  Mostly they were around early in the morning, just before and after dawn.