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I’ve gone winter camping with Jason several times, including our memorable dog sledding trip.  Jay was interested in canoe camping and last year when I met his fiancee, Beth, we talked about scheduling a canoe camping trip.  We scheduled 9-10 August for our trip and then anxiously watched the weather forecast fluctuate all over the place.  I was near to canceling the trip on Wednesday as the prediction for rain exceeded 70%.  I wasn’t looking forward to sitting under a rain tarp with a 5 year old for the weekend.

We called to confirm on Thursday night and the forecast had dropped to probable rain Friday night, but clearing to 20% rain during Saturday with rain likely coming in on Sunday afternoon.  We agreed to go ahead, meet early at Hoss’s General Store in Long Lake and try to get on the water at Little Tupper Lake early before winds became a problem on the shallow lake.

We had planned for company for dinner on Friday night and so began our packing early in the week.  Friday afternoon we loaded canoes and packed the car so Saturday morning we only had to add our sandwiches and food packs.  Kathryn & I arose at 5am and got Eric up a little before 6am and were on the road soon after.  We met Jason and Beth at 8:30 as planned.

We counted 28 cars in the parking lot at Little Tupper Lake and decided to return to the nearby empty Round Lake parking lot.

We dropped our canoes in the Little Tupper outlet which drains into Round Lake.  It was a pretty little stream lined with white lily pads.

Below Kathryn, Eric and Jim cruise down the outlet stream.

We found Round Lake devoid of other paddlers as we explored the eastern shore examining the potential campsites.  Several of the campsites are located at old hunting camps built by the Whitney’s.   Most sites are located back from the shore line and have P3 toilets.  We ended up staying at site #4 which was on a prominent point with several large white pine trees and copious blue berry bushes.  The only drawback to the site was lack of level tent sites.  We managed with our two tents, but more or larger tents would be a problem.

Eric, Kathryn and I went swimming while Jason and Beth basked in the sun.  Below the swimmers threaten a passing canoe.

We found a large rock that let us play King on the Mountain before we cooled enough to call an end to the swimming.

After our swim we took short nap and then a walk to scout the nearby campsites.  Beth demonstrates our voting technique:  Everyone that wants to take a hike put their hands on their hips!

As we prepared for the hike Jason noticed an interesting bug on his leg.

After our hike gathered firewood and baked biscuits using our Outback Oven.  We had afternoon tea and biscuits so we could delay dinner until later in the evening.

After our snack we swapped canoes and explored more of the lake so that Jason and Beth could test out the Wenonah Minnesota II. It was a beautiful evening for a paddle.

For dinner we had a vegetable tortellini salad and turkey chops grilled over the fire with marshmallows and s’mores for dessert.

We tried to stay up and look for meteorites, but Kathryn, Eric and I crashed about 10pm.  Beth and Jay stayed up until midnight buring wood, watching the fire and looking for meteorites.  They saw a total of 14 during their watch.

We slept great and heard loons through out the night.  In the morning we added fresh picked blueberries to our three berry muffin mix and then began our leisurely packing up to head out Sunday morning.

It was sprinkling lightly as we paddled out.  As we were loading up Ranger Coons stopped by to talk.  We told him where we stayed and talked a little bit about Round Lake.  He characterized Round Lake as without the winds of Little Tupper Lake and without the portage of Lake Lila.  I asked him about the illegal introduction of   largemouth bass into Little Tupper Lake.  He said they have spread through out the watershed and it doesn’t bode well for native trout.  I asked him about the navigability of Shingle Shanty Brook.  Ranger Coons referenced recent advice by Kenneth Hamm NYSDEC, Office of General Counsel  in the June issue of the NYS DEC Conservationist Magazine. He jokingly asked if we wanted to provide a test case.  We also talked about the portage trail connecting Round Lake to Low Lake/Hitchins Pond.  Another trip……

We stopped at Hoss’s for a milk shake on our way home and thought we had parted ways, however, we later saw Jason checking out canoes in Blue Mtn Lake.

When Adam and Matt were small (pre-teen) I took them on a couple of camping trips:

• Once on Barton Hill in back of my parent’s house where they brough everything- pillows, dinosaur books, flashlights with dead batteries and two cook kits, “because I didn’t have to wash one”.  Needless to say Kathryn and I remember carrying our stuff and a fair amount of their’s as well.
• Once in back of their parent’s house where I famously forgot the matches for the fire to toast the marshmallows.

After a successful trip to 13th Lake it was decided to take Eric and Nathan - the next generation - camping again.  We chose Spy Lake as our destination, canoing in on Sunday afternoon and  coming out on Monday. Mark, Nathan and Matt occupied one canoe and Eric paddled bow in our canoe.  For his 1st ‘extended’ paddle Eric did quite well.  Upon arrival we set up tents and the boys enjoyed a snack ’sitting’ in their chairs.

During the afternoon Matt, Nathan, Eric and I took a short hike exploring a near by stream.  Nathan packed his snack bag.

Uncle Mark took a nap.

On our return to camp the boys decided to put the snack bag to good use.

In the evening we had Mac & Cheese and hot dogs or Brats. Below Mark & Matt check on the food preparation.

While the cooking was going on Nathan & Eric worked on sawing serious wood for the fire.

Nathan and Eric eat their Mac & Cheese while the Brats are being roasted by Matt & Mark.

After dinner we enjoyed a game of war.  Below Eric stacks his deck while keeping one eye on his chocolate cookie lest Dad grab it!

Afterwards we enjoyed a spendid sunset.

Matt proved he could not only throw a bear rope over a tree, he also has an artisy side.

About 9pm the mosquitos came out in full force and we retired to our tents.  After a brief story everyone was snoozing.  During the night we got a brief shower which had Mark, Matt and I scrambling to zipper up rain flies - there was a two minute stretch where the sound of nylon zippers dominated. sleeping bag, tent, rain fly, tent, and back to sleeping bag).

Everyone slept late the next morning.  Mark made breakfast burritos and the boys had hot chocolate and oatmeal.  It was a nice trip and Eric & Nathan make great camping companions.

Last fall we cleared a small area in the far corner of our 40 acre woodlot where we had a fire pit and a few cookouts.  Demonstrating the extreme creatively that we use in naming locations it became christened “Cookout Corner” (other examples: Edge Trail, Trillium Trail, Buck Rake Pass, White Birch Field, Hanging Bucket, North Trail, etc, etc, you get the point).

Recently I tore up concrete slab from our walk way that goes no where and transported them to Cookout Corner to make a safer fire pit.  Tuesday night Eric, Kathryn and I used local transportation and took our dinner for an inaugural meal.

Our new fire pit is huge and much safer.  Below Trey checks for food scraps.

We have a home made table that I plan to move over to the area and we need to work on some semi-permanent seating.  If I get creative I will try to craft something ‘Adirondack-ish’using the chainsaw and logs.

Our garden is doing nicely this year.  I attribute it to couple of factors:

• Over the past 4 years I have focused on the garden, adding peat moss, leaves, and horse manure to the soil to loosen it up.
• This year I actually used restraint in planting peas and beans and staggered my plantings to enable harvesting over a longer season.
• We have had timely thunderstorms giving water at needed times.  This plus the abundance of horse manure compost have kept enough moisture for the plants.
• I got a some volunteer plants from last year’s crops, namely pumpkins and cucumbers, that I didn’t plant this year but were desired by the family.

Let’s take a look. Starting on the far right is a row of 10 rhubarb plants leading into a row of asparagus which has gone to seed forming big green bushes.  In the foreground are about 10 tomato plants.  On the far left you can see the edge of a volunteer pumpkin.  In the center back are carrots, beans and peas.  In the far back is what’s left of a pickup truck load of horse manure which I have been using to compost between rows as they emerge.

This is pretty much the same scene from the other side with a row of carrots,  1/2 row of yellow wax beans and 1/2 row of spinach in the foreground; a row of late peas, and the tomatoes and pumpkin in the background.

I haven’t grown carrots before because  they are so cheap to buy, but Eric wanted carrots and they are doing quite well.  You can see there is a lot of horse manure between the rows.

The tomatoes are starting to show on the plants.

This picture shows our volunteer sunflower standing at the end of what used to be a row of peas.  I planted three rows of peas in early April and we have been eating peas for about a month now.  Eric and I would eat them out of the garden and throw the empty pods to the dogs, who relished them.  The dogs made the short leap from being fed empty pods to picking pea pods themselves.  Unfortunately when they picked the pods they usually yanked the whole plant out as well.  Within a week they had destroyed the outside row of peas!  So I replanted the row and I am hoping to get some early September peas.

My pea trellis consists of hog panel fence.  It worked well for the shorter peas, but as you can see I have a row of peas that required 8′ poles.  These peas had extremely long vines and folded over the top of the trellis.

Take a quick walk with me and see some plants we have been monitoring this year.  Our pear trees look promising.  We have three trees and I plan on planting a couple more.  I gave up on apple trees because they required spraying, but the pear trees are low maintenance.

A couple years ago we had a bumper crop of concord grapes.  The grapes need to be moved because the trees around them have grown so much they are shading the grapes, but that is a project for this fall.  For now they are doing what they are supposed to - making grapes.  The concord grapes come out late (to avoid frost) and mature late (I picked our bumper crop the last weekend in October).

For my birthday this year Mom gave me a gift certificate to Miller Nurseries which I used to purchase some new grape vines - table or eating grapes this time.  They got planted out in the full sunshine and are awaiting a trellis to climb - another project.

Kathryn planted three different types of clematis next to the deck.  The tallest one scales the lattice to the top and has deep purple blossoms.

The lower clematis are along the stairway up to the deck and are showing pink and red flowers.

My bee balm has come from a variety of sources including my mom, my aunt Marie and The Garden Factory.  It is just starting to blossom and is attracting hummingbirds.