What's It All About, eh?
Cape Breton evokes deep memories and strong emotions for me as well as a deep appreciation for the beauty of my adopted island. My hopes are that you too might find the photos evocative - maybe a view you've not enjoyed before, or an 'Oh I've been there', or if from away that you may be encouraged to visit this fair isle so that you might come to love and breathe Cape Breton as I do. One word about place names that I use - some are completely local usage while others are from maps of Cape Breton that I've purchased over the years. I frequently post travel and other photos that are of interest to me - and hopefully you.
On the right hand side bar find my take on Single Malt whiskey - from how to best enjoy this noble drink to reviews (in a most non-professional manner) of ones that I have tried and liked - or not. Also musings, mine and others, on life in general.
Photographs are roughly 98%+ my own and copy-righted. For the occasional photo that is borrowed, credit is given where possible - recently I have started posting unusual net photographs that seem unique. Feel free to borrow any of my photos for non-commercial use, otherwise contact me. Starting late in 2013 I have tried to be consistent in identifying my photographs using ©smck on all out of camera photos I personally captured - (I often do minor computer changes such as 'crop' or 'shadow' etc but usually nothing major), and using ©norvellhimself on all photos that I have played around with in case it might not be obvious. Lately I have dropped the ©smck and have watermarked them with the blog name.
COMMENTS are appreciated as feedback is the driving energy of blogging - And if you like this site please pass it along to a friend. Thanks!
NOTE: TO ENLARGE PHOTO, CLICK ON SAME - If using Firefox also click f11 - photos will fill the screen ...... ----------------------------------- ......TRANSLATION BUTTON AT TOP OF LEFT COLUMN!
On the right hand side bar find my take on Single Malt whiskey - from how to best enjoy this noble drink to reviews (in a most non-professional manner) of ones that I have tried and liked - or not. Also musings, mine and others, on life in general.
Photographs are roughly 98%+ my own and copy-righted. For the occasional photo that is borrowed, credit is given where possible - recently I have started posting unusual net photographs that seem unique. Feel free to borrow any of my photos for non-commercial use, otherwise contact me. Starting late in 2013 I have tried to be consistent in identifying my photographs using ©smck on all out of camera photos I personally captured - (I often do minor computer changes such as 'crop' or 'shadow' etc but usually nothing major), and using ©norvellhimself on all photos that I have played around with in case it might not be obvious. Lately I have dropped the ©smck and have watermarked them with the blog name.
COMMENTS are appreciated as feedback is the driving energy of blogging - And if you like this site please pass it along to a friend. Thanks!
NOTE: TO ENLARGE PHOTO, CLICK ON SAME - If using Firefox also click f11 - photos will fill the screen ...... ----------------------------------- ......TRANSLATION BUTTON AT TOP OF LEFT COLUMN!
Yellow Lines
I really get out-of-sorts with people that think they are above the law and park on the yellow lines in shopping centers - not just to pick up someone but just because they think they are above the law - and I thought 'yeah, they are getting a ticket' BUT no the town cop too is above the law and both mentally challenged people were just showing the rest of us that 'fuck you' we can park where we please
Laurel - native wild flowering shrub
commonly called Laurel, Mountain Laurel, Calico-bush, Spoonwood and other local names, this beautiful native wild shrub of the eastern United States botanical name is Kalmia latifolia. Its only drawback is that it can be poisonous if ingested but in my fairly long lifetime I have never heard of anyone having tried to eat it or having become sick from doing so.
Perusing My Blog I Came Across This - A post from March 2012 'Ferguson's Lake at Dusk'
© August '09 photo by smck |
Driving
back from L'Archeveque the setting sun over Ferguson's Lake was so
lovely that I had to stop and take a picture from Barren Hill Road. As
always the feeling of the fading day was ghosting over me like a
pleasing shiver down my spine - no cars, no planes, no man-mad sounds,
just the breeze that ruffled the lake and sighed through the spruce and
the tiny sound of wave-lets gently lapping on the stony beach. I
waited while the sky above darkened into early evening and while the old
memories of Christopher Ferguson and others that I had been lucky
enough to know in the Barren Hill community ran through my mind - and
how in the brief span of my later life it has reverted to a vast
background of forest and lakes with only about two inhabited homes - one
in which I know the family the other an unknown to me - the rest empty,
fading away, or gone, the great arboreal forest absorbing them back
into its bosom, with this rural community like many others only a bit
more alive by the influx of summer-from-aways like myself. It was on
Barren Hill Road that the best friend of my life was born and raised and
he and his house is gone. As much as I love rural living, this world
of the future is steadily drawing most of the rural youth to its cities
so that slowly, one by one, the small communities dwindle away or become
summer colonies and the loss is profound - even if it is not of
interest to the nation at large. I drive on back toward Grand River
appreciating the lonely street lights as I crest the hill at the highway
garage. Maybe Stewart and Sue are still up and I can stop and have tea
and chase away my colly-wobbles, talking and laughing with my old
friend's legacy, of son and daughter-in-law and grandchildren, to the
future. And it works, the great embracing feature of the rural life,
rarely discerned in the city, the embracing of your neighbor, the
looking the stranger in the eye, the easy hello, the sincere interest in
what you are doing and how you are going, even when you might be
estranged because of some imagined slight the urge to embrace breaks
forth at someone's misfortune and old wounds are healed, at least for
awhile. It is like a large and scattered family that spends threads of
communication through-out their scattering. I love it and miss it.
and now five years on, the scene is the same, the comment is the same, and my missing my old Cape Breton friends is deeper than ever
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