Departure Day

D-Day has arrived and we are sad to see our family leave for home. It has been an amazing 9 days filled with visiting, day trips, geocaching, and water fights. It will certainly be quiet around here as we slide back into our quiet routine.

Yesterday morning, the Dude and his parents went out to do 2 geocaches while we did a few things around the house and yard. We then headed out to buy corn and do our last geocache together.

In the afternoon, the Dude and his parents went out to visit friends and we sank in our chairs to rest. We had 2 hours of unwinding before dinner was started.

Our evening ended with ice cream at the DQ.

In all we had a great day and an amazing time with our son, daughter-in-law, and grandson.

Today I will start cleaning up the house and look in my sewing room. I do have a simple quilt to make and may start on that.

Until tomorrow…………………………….

A Day In the Mountains

Yesterday was another warm day but it didn’t affect us as we were higher up in the mountains looking at views and geocaching. What was to be a short trip took a good 7 hours to complete.

We headed out to the first two caches and found them after some hunting. We ended up walking a distance up the road to the find the first one. The second one, the views were breath taking.

We drove upwards and south from there to a lake called McLean’s Lake. This is part of the land that the ranch we managed for 13 years roamed. Water from the lake was monitored by the ranch to water fields next to the ranch and a certain amount had to be let go by into the creek below the ranch.

A walk down the ramp takes you to the valve that regulates the amount of water that flows out of the lake.

We continued on our way around the lake heading north and had lunch just after we left the ranch’s grazing land. A bull and cows were nearby. It was quiet and restful eating on dirt piles.

From there we headed out to another road and headed south around the base of Cornwall mountain. Next stop was at the ore sheds at Hat Creek Coal Mine. We hunted and hunted in the wrong spot as we didn’t stop where there was a road to the left. We walked a good mile up from where we parked to find the road and headed out to find the cache. It was there that we found a trackable which will move with the Dude when they head home tomorrow.

We stopped at another geocache along the way meeting others out doing the same. The rock was covered with orange growth. No pictures as we had not cell service and I left the phone in the car.

The next geocache was off the road we were on and at a provincial site. A piece of flat land and an outhouse. No cell signal and jumpy GPS signals made this a hard find. But it was found by Son who kept going back to the spot.

There were several geocoins in it.

We drove down to the highway for our last cache but didn’t find it. We headed home for dinner and the Dude went swimming at the pool with his parents.

Today is the family’s last day here and it is suppose to be a quiet day. We know we are having a corn feast. What else transpires remains to be seen.

Until tomorrow…………………………

A Day of Learning

Yesterday was warmer than expected and today will be quite warm also. We are now experiencing temperatures in the high 80F but it can still get into the 90F range. Mornings are cooler and I am getting the urge to run again.

Our day trip was wonderful. The series of land slides was around the lake and a couple were scary. As we couldn’t stop, I took some pictures on the go.

Our trip was two fold; to geocache and to explore. It was super fun doing both.

Our first stop, after lunch was at the museum to see the huge slabs of jade.

The base of this slab really caught my eye.

A variety of rocks including jade. We walked across the road to a jade shop and the Dude got to choose a rock from the kid’s bin. We left from there to go to where the salmon are migrating. It is a great run this year.

The dark in the water is the fish. Once they enter into the clear blue water, the Aboriginal people cannot net them. The brown water flowing is the Fraser River and this clear river is the Seton River.

Up on the rocks someone has painted this design.

And all around on the rocks are tents where the fish are cleaned and hung to dry.

We did geocache just beyond this area and as we found the cache, friends came along and shared the excitement of the find with us. We all signed the book.

We did drive down to the old bridge to do a second cache but the pictures didn’t turn out of the bridge. You would have thought it was a foggy day they were so bad. We also did one cache on the way home.

We had a quiet evening as we were all tired. Today we will do an afternoon trip. This morning is laundry as we seem to have mountains of it.

Until tomorrow……………………………..

 

Geocaching Again

It cooled off last night and we have the house opened up to the cool morning air. We are at 12.5C, which is cool for us.

Yesterday was a home day and the Dude went out on several geocaching hunts during the day. He did one with his parents, one with his parents and the Spousal Unit, and one with me.

Our geocache was an easy one to find. We drove up to it, parked and it was 10 feet from us. The Dude exchanged a whistle for a whistle.

We then went to see Daughter and have fun with the dogs and the cat. The cat was leery of us but the dogs were happy for the attention. After a bit of running outside, there was some lounging.

We had a young couple with 2 children come for dinner last night. There was a flurry of activity during the day smoking chicken wings, cooking jalapeno poppers, and a spaghetti sauce that was delicious.

Today we are heading out to the community to the west of us. The slides are cleared and we are planning to go over, have lunch, geocache, and go to the winery. Tonight is pizza and movie night at home. We are so enjoying our visit with our family.

I did look in my sewing room yesterday for about 1 minute.

Until the next time………………………..

A Change of Plans

Our plans yesterday were thwarted!! The road to the community was closed due to mudslides. The alternate route would take over 2 hours each way and that wasn’t happening.

They claim there was 35 km of slides caused due to the storm we had on Wednesday night. The road is open to one lane with a pilot car today.

We headed off to the city instead and did some geocaching along the way. The Dude found the first one after we searched and hunted for it. Kicked a rock and there it was.

The second one, we found the trail and let the Spousal Unit and the Dude find it in the sagebrush.

In the city, we had lunch, did a bit of touring, got some groceries and headed home. We stopped at the rest stop and geocached up on top of the rocks. The view was beautiful.

This picture doesn’t do it any justice. Once again we had to hunt and found the trail to the geocache.

Our second stop was a hard one and we had to log it as not found. We hunted and hunted and on the way home figured out the clue.

It is in this area and we will go back to find it.

Today we are at home as we have friends coming in for dinner. It is a cooking and cleaning day.

Until the next time……………………

A Busy Day

It was a great day yesterday. We headed out in the morning to see some of the country and to geocache.

We stopped in the first community and did three caches and had something to drink.

The Dude was excited to find an ammo can as we had talked about them.

The next community we visited, we had lunch and found four geocaching sites.

Our last community we did one geocaching site as the mining equipment was quite exciting.

We stopped at the mine view point on our way home.

This mine is so large, that astronauts use it as an earth location point when in space.

The equipment is mega huge.

There are lots of wild horses in the area and can be seen at times.

And someone had fun playing.

And I was the one with low blood sugar this time. But I ate and was fine.

After supper we headed out and did a 2 part geocache and after some reading, hunting, and thinking we found it. We also put swag into the geocaches we had done the day before.

Today we are heading out for a shorter trip to another community. We will stop at the winery to see their new building and do some geocaching. The family gets to choose the cache locations today.

Until the next time…………………………..

Geo-Caching

It is warm, windy, and cloudy. There is even smoke though the wind is keeping it at bay; just see it in the distance. And the icing on the cake – a severe thunderstorm watch is in effect. The second one in 5 days.

Yesterday was a quiet day for family as they are tired from traveling. Know that feeling quite well. I got dinner ready to put the meat in the smoker after lunch and did laundry.

After the pork chops were put into the smoker, the Dude and I took off to geo-cache. We had three caches in mind to find. The first one took us forever to locate. The instructions say to face the front of the building………I though the front of the building is where the viewing window is. Wrong! We found the cache though and got our sticker and a pin.

The second cache I had temporarily planned, we scrapped and moved onto the new second cache. Found it in less than 3 minutes. The third site was a major pain.

The book told us it was in the park near a very specifically marked bench. The app on my phone kept saying it was nearly a half a kilometer away. We walked the whole length of the park and back again and headed to the cache the phone kept pointing to. I did the hunt as the Dude hated the location – the cemetery. I found it. It is a private person’s cache.

We headed home as it was time to check the smoker. Dinner was smelling delicious. We then headed out to find the last geo-cache of the day. We found it!! And so did the app on the phone.

The evening was spent with three little boys and two big ones having a water fight. They went full bore for an hour. No pictures. If you stepped outside of the safe zone, you would have been soaked in a minute. Water balloons, 2 water pistols, 5 pumper water guns, and a hose with a spray nozzle was in full action.

Today we are doing a day trip to see some of the area. We will stop along the way to geo-cache, have lunch in one community, and look at the mine on our way home (if it doesn’t pour rain).

Until the next time…………………………

The First 48 Hours

The past two days have been full out fun and games.

Son, Daughter-in-Law, and Grandson arrived early afternoon on Saturday. Excitement prevailed as we hugged, and unpacked all their things.

We walked over to the pool park for exercise. The Dude played for an hour before we walked home to make dinner.

After dinner we walked back for free swim and slip and slide. Free swim was okay but slip and slide ruled in a 7 1/2 year olds eyes.

Making friends was fun but sliding was awesome.

The white is soap for better slide-ability. Three bottles of it to be exact.

Low blood sugar prevailed so skittles were a pre-breakfast snack yesterday morning.

We smoked brisket for dinner so had to be around every two hours to monitor the situation. Was tasty and we are happy with our first try.

Water fights were the entertainment of the afternoon.

Not only did they throw water balloons, they had out the the water guns and pistols.

I am sure we picked up 50 burst balloons and used a couple hundred gallons of water.

Age and sex didn’t factor in. Everyone got wet. We all laughed and hollered and enjoyed ourselves.

Skittles were the pre-dinner snack but some little guy ate potato salad, smoked brisket and corn. A perfect dinner for all the exercise we had.

Early to bed last night as the challenge has gone out to two boys to come and water fight tonight.

Life is good……………………….