I celebrate spring with the first mowing of the lawn. It’s a task I really enjoy. Today was that day. The grass is still a little patchy in places with various areas a little longer than others. Just the same it all got a mow. I enjoyed my time in the warm sunshine and absolutely loved the smell of fresh cut grass.
Kettle Valley Railroad
We definitely live in a most beautiful part of the world!. I went for a bike ride on the Kettle Valley Rail line to the historic Othello Tunnels this afternoon. The quintette tunnels were part of the Kettle Valley Railroad and were constructed around 1914. The trail I took starts from the little town of Hope (about a half hour drive from our place) and travels up the abandoned rail grade through the west coast rain forest. It is an easy ride, about a five kilometre trek to the tunnels. The scenery is breathtaking with glimpses of the Coquihalla River roaring through the canyon far below. As expected, the tunnels were still closed for the winter season (open in May) due to ice and rock falls inside. On reaching the gated tunnels I did the return route, then drove around and biked in from the other end of the trail. The picture below was taken at the east end of the tunnels through the gates. Even though I couldn’t go into the tunnels, the trip was well worth the effort. I’ll be back in May when they open and I’ll take some video the next time.
Fenced!
When we began the construction of the Hazelnut Inn one of the first tasks was to pull up the fence that was along the edge of our yard. It was replaced with a giant concrete firewall that now separates the two properties. We’ll be making it pretty at a later stage. The sturdy welded steel fence was carefully stored until this week when we repurposed it along the front of the Hazelnut Inn property. The landscaping will be soon be seamless across the fronts of both yards and now the fence continues for more than a hundred feet across both properties. The good news is that we could remove the temporary orange construction fence and it made a big difference. It won’t be long until we begin the sculpted plasterwork on the retaining walls. Paint will follow soon after and our vision will come to life through the summer months. Stay tuned…
