The Great Dickens Christmas Fair

I've been to the Dickens Fair in San Francisco a couple of times long ago, but this was the first time I'd really dressed up. I spent the week previous sewing like mad, and was making adjustments the day we drove down. I went with friends John & Pia and Mary & Doug. Maybe some day more of the Siren Crew will come along, but the Christmas season is so busy for most of them.


Here's the outerwear

There's a lot to see, and one day wasn't nearly enough. Just looking in the shops can take half a day. Our favorite shop was Dark Garden, which makes custom corsets. They have two windows with live models that changed every half hour or so. We think the model in the red corset must have had some ribs removed - real bodies just don't compress like that! You can't see it in a still shot, but she was struggling for every breath. John definitely appreciated her heaving bosom.



Early in the day, one could see Ebeneezer Scrooge foreclosing on shops everywhere, and Jacob Marley's ghost clattering down a street. Chimney sweeps wander about in sooty groups, looking for work or trouble. Most of them moved so quickly that I couldn't get any good photos.

Now that real absinthe is legal in the US, the Fair has the Bohemian bar. We tried a nice absinthe from St. George's distillery in Oregon. Of course, I was too much in the moment, and forgot to take some pictures.

We only caught a few shows, which is why two days at the Fair would be good. Fezziwig's Dance Hall is the place for dancing, of course. They vary performances with ballroom dancing for everyone. Mad Sal's is the place to see the Can-Can girls and other bawdy acts. We caught part of Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show at the Advenurers' Club. We also visited the steampunks at the Explorers' Club, where Jules Verne and H.G. Wells reign supreme. They had a Giant Squid Feeding and a slide lecture of their Journey to the Center of the Earth. We were also fortunate to have gotten into the Naughty French Postcards show, which is extremely popular.


An inventor at the Explorers' Club

After the Fair, we went to Gulliver's for dinner. I didn't think theme restaurants like this were still around, but it is. The decor is Colonial Era, and the walls are covered with many nice book illustrations and paintings illustrating Johnathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels. The era is a little early for our garb, but was close enough for dining in costume. It is Meat Heaven at Gulliver's; they specialize in prime rib. even with the "petite" order, I got enough red meat to last me a few days. The nice waitress obliges us by taking a group picture in front of Mr. Swift's portrait.



Now Pia and I need to come up with some less respectable garb for when John wishes to eschew his gentlemanly persona and go in sailor garb. Hopefully much bawdiness will ensue.

While looking for a few filler images of the Fair (sadly I didn't find what I wanted), I found a blog called The Grateful Hedonist that has a lot more "flavor" photos than we took.

December Bloom Day

Before last week's heavy frost, we had quite a few nice flowers continuing to bloom. Sadly, the princess flower and nasturtiums shrivel when they see a refrigerator. The pineapple sage and hydrangeas are also looking badly frost-burned, and the remaining lavenders decided to give it rest. Other plants still look fine, but their flowers suffered from the frost followed by a storm. The snapdragons (which have been blooming throughout the year) and most of the roses are in the crummy-looking flower category. Only one lone rosebud still looked nice; it probably missed the frost.


Others, like the primulas, are in their wintery element.


As I was wrapping up today's garden photo shoot, a Steller's jay flew into the rhododendron by the back door. I "chucked" to him, and he came up close. A handful of peanuts were his reward for being so bold.

I've completed a year of mostly close-up photos of my garden flowers. I'm a bit embarrassed that very few areas actually look "nice". I'm a hodge-podge gardener, and very rarely plan a space. Next year I'll take on these embarrassing whole-garden photos, and perhaps motivate myself to improve my garden for public consumption.

November Bloom Day, with Cat & Bee Cameos

Helpful kitten: Isabel in a bed of alyssum

This weekend saw our first frosty mornings of the winter. Most flowers are winding down in the garden, but a few are just beginning their season. The "Christmas" rhody and ipheon have their first few flowers, and the Shirley poppies are forming buds. A couple of weeks ago I saw a single paperwhite cluster, but no more have followed yet. I was rather surprised to note how many of the fuchsias still has blossoms.



The bees are still enjoying the abelias, thyme-leafed fuchsias, heather and some long-blooming lavenders. The hives are doing well, especially the three with homemade queens. Here's hoping I've thwarted a bad mite infestation this year.



The old apple tree is loaded, and I need to harvest some fruit for drying and juicing. It's difficult to thin the fruit early in the season, but a lot of it is looking pretty robust this year.



It's been a long time since I've tried growing broccoli and cabbage in the veggie garden. There was room this year, and I thought I'd see if the soil had improved enough to support such hungry plants. Today I saw small flowerets in the broccoli; hopefully they'll get bigger before beginning to open. It looks like I need to put out some Sluggo (iron phosphate) around the cabbages to get the greedy gastropods. I'd thought the summer squash was done, but noticed a few small specimens that might be harvestable. There may be a pot of borscht in my near future: the beets are getting big.



Now that we've had some rain, I need to replace some less than wonderful plants. Perhaps I'll refresh a bed or two before spring. I've pulled out a couple of ancient sprawling lavenders, and need to put some new ones in their places. I've decided I don't love my vitex bush, and plan to put in a Japanese maple in its place. The white callas tend to get frost-bitten, and look crummy all year round. I think some hydrangeas and/or azaleas will be good replacements. Maybe I'll put a cluster of the callas in the "jungle" to see how they do back there. I don't see that are getting its much-needed rennovation for many years to come, so why not let it have some callas?

Alabama Coastal BirdFest

A week and a half ago, Pia, Holly and I flew to Alabama for the BirdFest. We'd been lured there by my Facebook friend Fran, who appears to be the head organizer. The area around Mobile sees large numbers of migratory birds come through on their way to and from their winter homes in South America. The birds aren't in their breeding finery in autumn, but I didn't mind the challenge of identifying birds in their wintry plumage.

On the day of our arrival, the weather was warm and humid. Mosquitoes would gather whenever we stood still. We wondered if we'd have any blood left in our veins after the weekend. As one birder had posted in a birding group, "the mosquitoes enjoyed a blood cocktail with a DEET chaser". However, the weather broke with a storm that evening, and the rest of our stay was relatively skeeter-free.


On that first evening, we attended a BirdFest social at the Five Rivers Delta resource Center. Fran spotted us as we approached, and gave us a warm welcome. It seems she had told a number of people about us. It seemed that everywhere we turned, someone would greet us with "are you the ladies who came all the way from California?". I'm not used to feeling so comfortable amid a crowd of strangers; everyone was lovely.


The next morning, Friday, we arose at O-dark thirty so we could make it to our first birding tour. In the morning we went to Weeks Bay for a boat ride up the Fish and Magnolia Rivers. It was a lot colder than I had expected it would be, and had left my vest & jacket in our room. But I tapped into my Scottish heritage (and life on Humboldt Bay), and found it wasn't so bad. It was a challenge to birdwatch with a canopy overhead and other birders in the way at times. But nice to see the area from the river, rather than from land. The weather had scared off a lot of birds, but we still saw some hardy specimens. My favorites were the fish crows, because of my fondness for the corbies. Brown pelicans, great blue herons, great egrets, mockingbirds and blue jays were in abundance, as they were throughout the weekend. It was a treat to see yellow-shafted flickers (aka yellowhammers) rather than our usual red-shafted variety.


After the boat tour, our guide took us to a pitcher plant bog. The featured phyto-carnivore is called white-topped pitcher plant, and is quite pretty. We also saw several autumn wildflowers like goldenrod, narrow-leaf sunflowers and lantana. The lantana is extremely popular with butterflies, and throughout the weekend we could cont on seeing lots of monarchs, gulf fritillaries and admirals enjoying the nectar. We also met several golden-silk spiders, also called banana spiders because of their shape and color. They are orb weavers, but look very different from our Humboldtian pumpkin spiders. There weren't many birds there, but we did see a Carolina wren and a blue grosbeak (just not very blue right now).


In the afternoon we took another boat tour, this time up Blakely River. The sky had cleared somewhat, but the wind was colder. I was glad to have picked up my warm clothes on the way. Of the new birds, we saw a (not-so-)purple gallinule, a blue-winged teal, a juvenile bald eagle, other raptors and a couple of soaring flocks of white pelicans. As we were leaving the boat at the end of the tour, one of the guides said that she found a great rat snake sitting on someone's bag. we hustled back to see it. It was lovely, but cold & shy, so the guide covered it up for the evening.

There was a banquet this evening, and we thought that it was being held at the Five Rivers Center. So we didn't feel too hurried after the tour. But when we got to the building, it contained only a few stragglers from an earlier event, and they sure didn't look like birders. Reviewing our info sheet, we found that the banquet was at the senior center in Fairhope, about 20 minutes drive away. As I drove, Holly called information to find out where the senior center was. Thank goodness for cell phones and 411! Upon arrival we found that we had plenty of time before the feasting began. A nice calming glass of wine was in order. We had a wonderful chat with a couple of the people from the Chamber of Commerce who were tending the bar. Then we checked out the silent auction items and chatted with Fran.

While standing in line for the buffet, the couple in front of us turned to us, and the wife asked "you're not from around here, are you?". We 'fessed up, and asked how she could tell. The lack of big hair and natural coloring were her clues, though that really didn't seem to be much to separate us from most people there. Anyway, we had another nice chat until we escorted our laden plates to table. Later, while waiting in the dessert line, the husband handed me his email address, offering to send us some good birding info. I looked at the addy, and had to ask if he knew our friend Kristin. She had told us about a birding friend in Mobile named Chazz, and here he was! Chazz told us that he was leading a trip on Sunday, and we arranged it so we could attend and then send BirdFest some more money later.

The next day we were on our own. First we went into Fairhope for the Bird Expo, and had more lovely conversations with people at the booths. We picked up some bird souvenirs, watched the raptor demo and looked at snakes. On a side street we found some nifty sculptures by local artist Bruce Larsen. We got some sandwiches and beer, then drove south to Fort Morgan.


The drive seemed long, especially the horrible stretch between Foley and Gulf Shores. Nothing but shopping malls and stop lights. After coming onto the sand spit, things improved, thought there are a lot of enormous vacation homes along the beach. We suspected that most got rebuilt bigger (and better?) after Hurricanes Ivan and Katrina, because they all looked new. In one area, we stopped to watch a raptor: I think it was a broad-winged hawk. Then a merlin flew by, then another and another.


We arrived rather late at Fort Morgan, and the bird banding station was shutting down for the day. One nice fellow came over to us and showed us the yellow-bellied sapsucker that he was about to release. Then he gave us some pointers, and went back to his job. Wandering through the woods, we heard and caught glimpses of several elusive little birds. Our luck had been better near where we parked the car. We saw our first eastern phoebe, blue-gray gnatcatcher and gray catbird. We even had a great blue heron fly into the trees nearby, and he stayed around for a while. Later reports informed us that all kinds of birds had been seen and/or banded earlier in the day, including a kettle of hawks that soared in the thermals overhead.


We then explored Fort Morgan, which guarded Mobile Bay during the American Civil War and up to WWII. It's mostly empty now, but there are lots of nifty rooms and alcoves to explore. We thought about walking to the beach from there, but the wind was howling and the sun was getting low.


We had dinner back in Fairhope, at a place that claimed to have steamed seafood, but most of what we saw on the menu was deep fried. I didn't feel like ordering steamed clams at $1 a pop, so I had some mediocre gumbo. No wonder the place was so dismal on a Saturday night. The best thing about the place was the crawdad sculpture on the sidewalk.

On Sunday we were back in tour mode, gathering before dawn at Five Rivers for our date with Chazz. Our goal was the Blakely mud ponds, a Superfund site where nasty caustic mud & water from an old Alcoa plant is being remediated. The birds really like the secondary and tertiary ponds, where the pH has been lowered to more tolerable limits. Nonetheless, we were warned to not fall in the water unless we fancied a chemical burn. The site resembled the Arcata Marsh, though with more excavators and redder mud. Yes, that southern clay is red red red.



Our highlight was a black-bellied whistling duck mama with 15 fledging ducklings. Chazz said that's the first evidence that these whistling ducks breed on Mobile Bay (if not Alabama). Those ducklings were still to young to fly, so couldn't have come from somewhere else. In a thicket of trees we found all kinds of little songbirds. Unfortunately they move fast, so identifying or even seeing them was often difficult. I was pleased to recognize a ruby-crowned kinglet and got better at spotting my new friend the blue-gray gnatcatcher. In the reeds we saw a sora, which is a modest little marsh bird. This poor fellow had a broken wing dragging in the water. They don't fly much, so for now he was OK. However, our Sibley Guide says they don't winter on Mobile Bay.

Chazz offered to take us to another site that afternoon, so after the group tour we followed him through Mobile to get some lunch, then to his house to eat it. We settled into patio chairs to watch the birds, and Martha ("Mrs. Chazz") kindly brought us some hot chai to fend off the cold wind. After watching the cardinals, blue jays, chickadees and chickens for a while, we saddled back up and went to Muddy Creek.

There wasn't much creek, but there certainly was mud. Fortunately there is a boardwalk winding through the swamp. We continued to see many now-familiar birds like the phoebe and catbird. I caught enough of a look to know I was seeing a pileated woopecker before he took off again. Although they also live in the woods in Humboldt, I've never seen one before. I also saw a white-eyed vireo, which is aptly named for his strikingly pale eye. There were more golden-silk spiders and butterflies.


In the evening we went to McSharry's a pub in Fairhope. Fran's husband Tom plays fiddle in a wonderful Celtic band called Mithril, and usually plays in a session at McSharry's on Sunday night. Fran joins in with the bodhran. The waitress Barbie was wonderful, and I don't think it was simply due to the announcement of her engagement to the owner Ronan. She made sure we got the last piece of bread pudding to share. It's topped with a Jameson whiskey sauce which made it even more wonderful. Fran and Tom come over to visit a few times during a break, and we had a grand time. Sadly, the music was over all too soon, and it was time to go home.


On Monday we were on our own again. We finally had a warm and un-windy day. Our goal was Dauphin Island, but first we made a detour to see an alligator and then to Battleship Park. There's a boardwalk along a creek in Spanish Fort which a birding couple had told us about. The morning was cool, but we got to see one alligator sunning himself. At Battleship Park we didn't tour the USS Alabama, but were scanning the mudflats for more wading birds. There's a handy elevated platform, and we got to see our usual great blue herons and great egrets. But then there were white ibises, a tri-colored heron and a little blue heron. Sadly, no roseate spoonbills, which had been seen there a day or two before.


At the Airport Marsh on Dauphin Island we hoped to see a reddish egret, but were out of luck. We consoled ourselves by watching hermit crabs scoot about through the mud, and even what looked to be a hermit crab orgy. Maybe they were fighting, but I like to think that they were procreating. Earlier Pia had put a shell in her pocket, thinking that it was empty. When she went to pull it out to check, she found that the resident hermit crab had grabbed onto a sizeable bit of fabric. It took a fair bit of patient work to get him to let go.

At Shellmound Park we saw more yellow-bellied sapsuckers and lots of elusive little sputzies. While we sat watching the birds in a clearing of sorts, a woman showed us a yellow-billed cuckoo. Unlike all the nervous little birds, the cuckoo sat quiet and still for the longest time. Not easy to spot, but once you do, you get a good long look.

Our last spot on Dauphin Island was the Audubon refuge. The trail leads through a long-leaf pine forest to dunes and the beach. It seemed odd, then very naturally Gulf coast to see small palms and magnolias in the midst of a pine forest. The beach sand here is very white - all quartz sand, I believe. It's so very different from our gray sand & pebble beaches. I'd never thought much about the color of seawater in the Gulf, but hadn't expected the color of weak coffee. But it makes sense when I thought of all the water coming through the bayous and marshes, laden with all kinds of organic matter. It was warm, too, unlike our numbingly cold green water.


Near sunset we rejoined the car and set off to Gulfport, whence we were to fly out in the morning. Our return was fairly uneventful, thank goodness. Now we need to figure out where we're going for our next birding trip.

Bloom Day October 13, 2009

This month's Bloom Day is a little early, because I'm heading for Alabama tomorrow. What was expected to be a big storm came in, but I was able to dart out and get some photos before it got very wet. So far the storm has been disappointing, giving only 1 of the promised 4 inches.

For the most part, the flowers are winding down. The abelias are going strong and several lavenders are still blooming, which is good for the bees. A couple of the mophead hydrangeas turn interesting, muted colors as they age, keeping them from being deadheaded for a while.


The "King" apples are nearly done, and I got a lot of nice, healthy fruit. I just haven't had time to juice the fallen apples, so they'll probably wind up in the compost. The "Pippins" (or whatever they are) are nearly ripe, and it looks like I'll get some good apples for drying.


In the veggie garden, I'm still harvesting "butterstick" summer squash. I'm also getting kale, lettuce and snow peas. The broccoli and cabbage plants are getting bigger; we'll see if I get anything edible from them. In the past, the soil just hasn't been rich enough to grow them well.

2009 Medieval Festival of Courage

Over the last few years, a local Medieval festival has developed. Although still small, it is growing and acquiring more merchants, performers and living history demonstrators. The Siren Crew (aka Morgan's Compagnie) likes it because the drive is easy. Unfortunately it means that the evenings are quiet because many people go home at dark rather than play after hours. I won't mention that the first night got so cold that I drove home at 1 AM so I could sleep warmly. I got a scolding from John & Pia and Thorne for not slipping into one of their beds :)


Those of us who stayed over made the rounds and invited other participants to join us in camp. We had two pleasant evenings of conversation and song. Liam, a merchant of quills, ink pots and temporary Irish marriages, regaled us with many stories he had written and recited in verse. On Sunday, John did right by three of his harem girls, and got hitched in one of Liam's weddings. Sadly, Kristin could not be there, but there's hope that some day John will make an honest woman out of her.


One living historian was Sven Lugar, who has studied Norse culture. Sven set up three traditional tents, including a Sammi hunting tent that resembles a tipi. (Coincidentally, there was a fellow set up behind Sven who had gotten his continents and eras confused. He had a North American tipi and wore buckskin trapper's garb.) Sven also displayed a handmade stringed instrument (can't recall the name), viking arms and a loom for weaving belts and straps. He also taught several of us to sand cast pewter.


Tony, John and Colin's gang of LARPers (live-action role play) set up an eric for swordplay. Much of the time it was home to boffer battles, where the LARPers would pit themselves against a horde of wee "goblins" (sorry, no photos). Boffers are toy weapons made of PVC pipe and foam, and wrapped with duct tape. The boffer merchant saw land office business. The big kids, like Tony, John, Thorne and Colin played with live steel. Tony has a small scar above his eyebrow from one such battle a couple of years ago.

At the tavern, Tony, John and Thorne drummed up business by singing any drinking song they could remember. In camp, we would occasionally start a game of koob or hunkerhauser, either among ourselves or with some visitors. We also had some woodworking demos, and continually told people not to touch the weaponry.


There were also jousts by professional touring jousters, but I kept missing the show. One knight was soundly knocked off his horse twice. He wasn't walking too steadily afterward, but apparently recovered enough for the next day's show.

Bloom Day September 15, 2009

Although the garden isn't in its full glory, there are new flowers blooming even now. I really do need some better garden planning so I can show them to advantage.


The China aster above is the only survivor of the seeds I planted this spring. I need to be more aggressive in eradicating gastropods, especially those huge nasty brown slugs. Where's that garter snake that I found in the compost last month?


Although I've been planting "Thai Silk" seeds for a few years, this is the first time that I've noticed them blooming. Planting them in a container that I see every day helps.


Although it's not too lush yet, this "Mutabilis" rose shows how it got its name. The flower buds are orangeish, then change with age to a deep pink. I had fallen in love with it at Fickle Hill Old Rose Nursery in May, but they didn't have any ready for sale. My friend Holly got one for me from her mother, who seems to have the knack for sticking a cutting in soil and getting it to root. My Mutabilis surprised and pleased me when I went out a week or two ago, and found several blossoms.

Many of the heaths and heathers are beginning to bloom. Along with the thyme-leafed fuchsia, abelia and French lavender, these offer some late season forage for the bees.


The naked lady amaryllis have had a brief reign, signaling the start of school. I think that I need to divide mine, because they just aren't blooming as wildly as in years past. The hostas are already done, and need another application of Sluggo to keep the gastropods from devouring them completely. I call hostas "snail candy".

Many flowers are fading, and I need to finish deadheading them. There was one fresh gladiolus remaining. The English lavenders are mostly done, though the bees know how to find a little more nectar from them. This week I plan to replace a couple of old rangy plants with fresh new ones. I also plan to try my hand at propagating some from slips.


The "King" apples are ripening, and I picked a basketful this weekend. Some have a condition called "watercore", but ought to be fine for juicing. Maybe it's time for applesauce, too.


It's termite flying season, and that means it's also pumpkin spider season. These orb weavers are around all spring and summer, but don't get big until about now, when the insect harvest is good. Unfortunately they are also dining on some of my honeybees, but I can't get too stingy with my helpful garden occupants. The webs of the pumpkin spiders grow as they do, and I have to walk through the garden with one hand in front of my face. Fortunately they seem to train well, and stop building across a certain space after having a web or two removed.

We had the first significant rain for the season on Sunday. A heavy mizzle last week didn't count. Maybe things will start greening up again soon, and I won't have to water so often.

White Tea

The last beautiful cup of white tea that was sent to me by Hsin-Hsin. Thank you!

Bloom Day: August 15, 2009

Overall, the garden is looking a little ratty after my 9 day absence in Montréal. So many things to deadhead. But the other flowers don't know that, and are blooming nicely.



The fuchsias, hydrangeas and roses are still going strong. I really like the fringed hydrangea shown above. Unfortunately I don't know it's name; I may have gotten it as a cutting.

The "Garnet" callas are going great guns. I'm glad that they are hearty plants. While house-sitting, my friend Jyl saw a tiny treefrog sitting in a calla cup. Sadly, there was no nearby camera. I need to stake out the calla patch in hopes of seeing one.



The lavenders are past their prime, but the honeybees and wild bees are still loving them. The bees are also working the abelia, crocosmia and gladiolus. Unfortunately, my "Starburst Panache" sunflowers are pollenless. They're pretty, but next time I'll get pollen-licious sunflowers.



I'm trying to resist pulling out all the Crocosmias. They're rather invasive but pretty, especially when poking up behind or through some other plant. I'll continue to yank up the big clumps, just to keep them from taking over the world.

The blueberries are all done. I need to plant more, and get a wider span of ripening times. The "King" apples are starting to fall, and tomatoes are getting plump. So far I've harvested about 9 pounds of potatoes from a few volunteer patches I keep in the garden. More potato tops are dying back, so I need to look again.

Honey Extracting

I finally got to harvest some honey yesterday. Two hives have gotten rather tall. The top box (#6), full of honey, is awkward and dangerous to lift. Svetlana had enough ripened honey to harvest, and I took a total of 9 frames from two of the boxes. I would have taken the tenth, but the comb was built out so far that only 9 would fit in one box.

Ekaterina has many full frames, but not enough of it was ripened & capped. Unripe honey has too much moisture and will ferment, so I'll have to wait a little longer. Besides, I need to assess how much honey all the hives have so that I can decide how much to leave for the girls' winter pantry.



Joy also had some too-tall hives, so we convened for a small extraction party. Some of us have recently bought a plastic two-frame extractor, and this was its maiden voyage. Joy's husband Steve and visiting niece Jane, plus Julia and Sheri joined in the fun. Julia and Steve were already in Joy's bee yard robbing the hives when I arrived, and the rest of us started in on my box right away. That meant I didn't get to go out and document the hot and sweaty stage of the harvest.



The extractor worked well enough for a small harvest, though we weren't able to get it spinning as fast as a four-frame or larger extractor; the balance wasn't good enough. But the remaining honey goes back to the bees, so I didn't mind too much.

It was good sticky fun, with much licking of fingers and saucy jests. Comparisons were made between the two honeys. Jane seemed determined to lick up every drop off the ground tarp. Joy thoughtfully provided snacks and beverages. All too soon we were done and cleaned up. Joy and I each got about 2 gallons of liquid gold.

The Gite du Marigot

We stayed at a B&B in Laval called the Gite du Marigot. Laval is the island just north of Montréal. Since our last stay, Laval has had three Métro stations open, which made transportation much easier. This time we walked a few minutes to the Station Cartier, rather than cross the river to Station Henri-Bourassa.



The Gite is a comfortable lodging graciously run by Chantal, who used us to improve her English and helped us with our French. One morning, there was a Parisian couple at breakfast. They and Chantal told us how challenging it can be for Québecois and the French to understand each other, rather like Americans and Englishmen.

There is a riverside park across the street, and every other evening there was a patanque league playing. Patanque is similar to the Italian bocce, though the main difference seems to be that patanque uses steel balls, and bocce uses clay. One evening, Karin and I nibbled on sandwiches and tried to figure out the subtleties of the game. I think a visit to Wikipedia is needed to complete our understanding.

About 10 minutes' walk away is a nice French restaurant. We went to dinner during Kate's visit, for an early celebration of Karin's birthday. The food was delicious, and the staff very accommodating despite the fact that their English was only slightly better than our French.

The Latin Quarter of Montréal

On Sunday the whole "family" went to Montréal's Latin Quarter to stroll a bit and have lunch. On Saturday Kate had come over from Toronto to see us, but had to return that afternoon. Kalen and Alyx returned to the Gite as soon as Kate drove away, so Karin and I were alone to better explore.

This neighborhood took its name from the Parisian Latin Quarter because of its artsy feel. It suffered a bit of a slump when one university relocated, but recovered when UQAM moved in. Square Saint-Louis lies at the heart of this neighborhood full of beautiful Québec-style older homes, and Rue Saint-Denis hosts many shops and cafes. We didn't have any adventures, but took lots of photos of houses and things that caught our artistic attention.

Chanoyu in Montréal

While planning activities for Montréal, I discovered that the Montreal Association of Chado Urasenke Tankokai offered demonstrations of Japanese Tea ceremony at the Botanical Gardens' Japanese Tea Garden. I determined to go, and made a day of it. First I visited for a couple of hours with my friend Owen, whom I had met on a previous trip. As the time for Tea neared, he escorted me to the Botanical Gardens, and then we said our farewells.

I had known there would be a small charge to attend the Tea ceremony, but hadn't expected to pay $16 just to get into the Botanical Gardens. My internet info site had indicated $11, which still seemed high for what they had. Even so, I forged ahead, determined to find some harmony in a bowl of tea.

From Chanoyu in Montréal

I arrived early to sign up for the demonstration and participation, as had been recommended. Two members of the Chado school were getting into kimono, but they graciously gave me my ticket and allowed me to chat a little with them. Then I perused the bonsai garden, which was very nice, though the examples weren't terribly varied in form. I can only hope that one day my own little bonsais will look so good.

The Tea Garden, or rather the related Tea house, is also a small museum for things Tea related. They had a wonderful lacquer exhibit - showing the progress of a bowl from wood core to finished product, and examples of different decoration techniques. There were also photos & explanations of lacquer resin gathering & processing. I hadn't known that the lacquer tree is in the same genus as poison oak and poison ivy. The lacquer collectors must develop a resistance to the irritating sap.

In another room they had some gorgeous examples of lacquerware made by members of the Japan Urushi Art and Craft Association (Nihon Shikko Kyokai). Most of the pieces were beautifully carved and simply lacquered rather than highly adorned with color or inlay. I refrained from taking photos of the displays, but now wish I had.

When Tea time came, we guests seated ourselves on folding chairs where we could look into the Tea room. There were 8 tatami mats set up to make a larger than usual Tea room, to accommodate visitors to the Tea demonstration. Usually there are 4 1/2 mats. The tokonoma, or alcove, had a scroll with "ichi go ichi e" brushed on it. This means "one time, one meeting", and reminds us that each time in the Tea room is unique. In the tokonoma there was also a vase holding a clematis vine.



The demonstration came first. One person worked behind the scenes at the mizuya, and was probably busy preparing sweets and bowls of tea for the visitors. One student explained the procedure while the host and two guests demonstrated furo usucha, one of the methods for preparing tea. The utensils were kept on a stand, which I haven't seen used at our own Tea practice. They were definitely students, and I caught a few mistakes, like using the wrong leading foot when walking across the room, placing the fan backwards, etc. The host was a bit hasty and thus not very graceful, but she did well enough.

After the demonstration, the students served sweets and bowls of tea to those of us who had paid a little extra for the experience. There were about 18 of us who came into the Tea room, and we had barely room to bow. Tea was prepared behind the scenes and brought out to us one by one. The sweets were yokan, a jellied bean paste, served on wide strips of paper serviettes (kaishi) folded simply into a V or winglike shape. Serendipitously, I had brought my clematis kaishi, which matched the flowers in the tokonoma. The tea was a bit thinner than we make at home, but was nice and smooth.

I think I was the only one familiar with Tea, and got to coach a couple of people near me who asked. A few people were very enthusiastic, and might pursue Chado. The host was pleasantly surprised when I thanked her for tea in Tea-speak. The students had so many other people asking questions after Tea was done. I didn't stick around to talk, but wandered out into the Tea garden.



I made an error in the garden by walking past a rock in the path. It was just past a small fence which marked another section of the garden. Someone else had been in that section, and I couldn't rightly remember the significance of a rope-bound rock until after I transgressed. Essentially, it's a "stay out" sign. So much for my gold star.