A Great Day!

This morning was cloudy but not much wind. I decided to walk down to the river which entails crossing four lanes of Prince of Wales Drive. Luckily it wasn't bad since it's Saturday. When I arrived there this kayaker was making his way along the Rideau River.


I thought I might see some muskrat or some other critter but none were to be found. On the way back I did notice that these wild strawberry flowers were out.

This afternoon I suggested that we should get out and do something so we went to one of the trails just on the outskirts of Ottawa called Stony Swamp. Stony Swamp is a large area and has several trails so we took Jack Pine Trail. Neither one of us had been on this trail before. The first thing that greeted us was this little red squirrel.

There were lots of little red squirrels around today. Bird feeders have been erected along the trail and people come along with their bags of food and fill them up so the squirrels, chipmunks and birds eat very well and consequently aren't really afraid of people, just a little wary. Next we came upon this chipmunk, again one of many.

Here's Gordon laden with his camera equipment on the trail

Another part of the trail.

Since the trail goes through swamp there are a lot of boardwalks around. We saw a couple of geese sitting on nests from the boardwalk. In one case the male was guarding the female and we got to see a goose fight when a couple of geese tried to come into their territory.

We also saw a few bluejay.

And this what we think is an Eastern Garter Snake.

It was a beautiful day for a walk and we were happy to see so many little critters and birds around. We also saw quite a few chickadee. The jack pines were beautiful too and the path was quite level with not a lot of rocks or encumbrances. Just the type of place I like to walk.

We left there and stopped to fuel up. It was 1.30/liter and it cost nearly $148.00 to fill the tank. After that we stopped at the library to see if they had any trail maps. They didn't but found them on line for us. We can also go back when the City offices are open on Monday and pay our $2.00 and pick one up.

From there we drove to our old neighbourhood and took a photo of our house. This is where we lived for 11 years up until August 2004.

From there we stopped at my sister's house and picked up the mail and talked to John and Margie for a while.

It was a nice day, good to get out and do something!