Monday, October 10, 2016

Happy Thanksgiving!


It was a beautiful drive to Matawatchen with Alex, Penny, Ryan and Rob. The fall colours on the winding roads were stunning. Crimson, orange, gold and canary. The sky a steely gray and then clouds lifting to blue.

Thanksgiving dinner with Lois and Mark, Brenda and Bill, Gord and Linda, James and Spencer. The meal was wonderful, but better still, sharing time with people we love around the feast, a big bonfire, some fireworks, a starry country sky. 

I'd never seen a peanut plant's flowers until Lois showed us the ones in her garden. The few plants were harvested, and we could see the peanut shells covered in dirt. I didn't know we could grow them in our short northern season. 

On the drive home we stopped at Pieters to pick up apples and cider. It's been over twenty years we've been stopping by the orchard, and we've seen it pass from Pieter to the Madambas's, and now to someone new. The family has sold their farm to someone else, and this was the last fall they were working there together before turning it over to new hands. 
We also stopped at a fruit and veg stand, and I picked up some salted black peanuts grown in Ontario. And lots of fall squash - turban, spaghetti, acorn.

The salmon were running in the Ganaraska River. They were very plentiful this year, I can't recall seeing so many people by the fish ladder in Port Hope. The crowd was taking photos and clapping when a fish was successful and made it to the next level. There were also salmon that weren't so successful... I watched as one fish slid back down three levels, tired from its journey, the carcasses of other salmon bobbing nearby. Sad to see, but hopefully mink and fischer and osprey will enjoy their own Thanksgiving feast after the crowds have gone.




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