Guess what we were doing?

Yesterday there was a definite feel of spring in the air.

After cleaning up in the garden, I met my friend for a walk on the beach...

This is Taylor beach in Metchosin. 

It's west of Victoria and east of where I live...

That's Victoria from where we stood.

It was a good day to collect little bits of beach glass and look at all the pretty bits of seaweed that had washed up with the spring tides...

Everything seemed to be full of fun...Clams sticking their tongues out at me...

Even the shackiest of shacks had their doors flung open to the new air...

There were heart hoof prints in the sand...

This region is home to some beautiful farms and fields.

On the road down to the beach we visited with some curious Norwegian Fjord horses...

They still have their fuzzy winter coats on.

I love how their manes grow, thick and standing straight up like that...

Imagine living in this big farmhouse on a wild and windy night by the sea!

A lot of sheep are raised in the open fields around Metchosin and right now is lambing season...

Lot's of baby noises going on all around us...

Some of these are maybe a day or two new to this world...

Look! There's some cute little black ones...

I wonder what kind of trouble they'll get up to?

This mama kept her eye on us the whole time...you can see her in just about every photo I took...

There she is again!
The eyes and ears of the flock...

So, at one point, Norene says to me
"Why do they have numbers painted on them?"
I came up with a few ideas...
keeping the right lamb with the right mom, identifying certain farms,etc
and then it came to me as I was looking at the pictures...
So, can you guess what we were doing?!

Why, counting sheep, of course!
That's what the numbers are for!

Hidden stories...

Just down the road from my house there is a 300 acre property that used to be some rich guys hunting lodge who graciously donated it to Scouts Canada. It now houses a variety of cabins, bunk houses and common kitchen buildings. There are some beautiful trails in there around the lake and quite often Griffin and I go on walk abouts for hours exploring...I have this thing where if I see an interesting bend in the road or a path leading off the beaten track, I just have to explore it. This is where I came across these amazing carvings in the woods...who are they? who carved them? My sad fantasy is the lonely old woodsman who lost his wife and child in a tragic accident and has immortalized them in wood...my happy fantasy is some farmer who used to take his afternoon break in there with a beer and some carving tools...I also love when I find old fence posts and rusty barbed wire...signs of an old farm or homestead..some exploring...maybe find an old dump in the woods with some depression era broken dishes or old glass bottles..you just never know what you're going to find on the path less traveled.