Showing posts with label Hatley Castle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hatley Castle. Show all posts

Friday, December 03, 2010

More Hatley Castle in November #4




A few more photos from Hatley Castle in November Autumn Colors.  These are a few photos from the Italian Garden.  This is just the 'bones' of this garden at this time.  It is a riot of color in Spring and Summer. Nice bones, though!

Yesterday I finally got out to the garden.  I raked leaves off the paths in the front garden and put them onto the beds as mulch for the winter.  There are still leaves on the liquid amber tree that will be again covering the paths.  I raked the leaves and apples off the back grass.  Also took a bag of the apples over to the deer pasture.  Pat has been seeing a one year old buck in the mornings.  I have not seen it yet, but I did see a doe sashaying down the street early one morning.  It left the deer pasture and crossed the street and carried on up the short block to the park on the other side of our house.  The deer have 2 streets to cross to get from park to park area.  We shouldn't have too many accidents, I hope.  These deer never bother my plants.  I guess they have better food in the parks. My back yard is difficult for them to access, also.
I still have 32 tulips on the deck that need planting.  I have a bag of potting soil left over from the orange tree transplants.  I think I might set up one of my old plastic pots on the deck for some of the tulips and for basil plants when it warms up in the spring.  I have learned how to make pesto and we like it! 

My site counter stopped working properly a few days ago.  But, tonight, it is working again.  It is showing a lower number of hits, but I understand these meters are not always accurate. Actually the hits don't matter much to me, as this blog is primarily for my own interests. I will blog, and facebook to promote our Megashot, but I refuse to twitter.  Enough is enough.  :-)

On Megashot we now have videos to promote the photos in the contests and on our facebook page.  The videos are on YouTube and I have started an archival community on Megashot to record all the videos produced by Cyrus for Megashot.  The last ones are looking really good.  They have music synched to the display of photos and text.  You can view them on youtube or on Megashot in the Movies on Megashot Community          Click the hot link and go to each discussion thread to see them.  Also on the front page of the community there is a playlist. You can click on the playlist and see the categories of the videos and watch them from the play list.  On youtube you should be able to see them full screen.  See the list in the side bar for more megashot. net videos on this hot link.

The last photo, is the top of the water heater we just had replaced.  The pipe where the hot water leaves the tank was totally corroded and rusted.  The plumber, Vern was amazed that we even had any hot water pressure left at all.  The pressure was normal as far as we could tell.  We are very lucky that Pat caught this before we had a great flood.  We now have a 60 gal. tank too, which should let the 4 of us go through the shower without running out of hot water.

I made more squash soup today and have frozen 2 jars and have another in the fridge.  I gave Tara a jar of pickled peppers and pickled beets.  I made the mustard bean pickles, but they did not turn out as well as they should have.  The taste is good, but the beans should have been cooked more.  They are a bit tough.  I suppose I could microwave them in the jar. This would not hurt the consistency of the mustard sauce.

Life is really very good on the wet west coast.

Monday, November 29, 2010

Hatley Castle in early November




More of the spectacular color out at Hatley Castle earlier this November.
There is still a bit of snow and it is coolish.  I finally have a day rescheduled for my visit to Royal Jubilee.  This is running into the time when we do our annual celebration with Dan and Irene, but its the busy season. 
We now have movies of some of the winners of the megashot.net photos on our Facebook connection.  The next ones will be the Contests photos of the day for each level of the Landscapes Contest and the Black and White contest.  We will have one of all the contest winners of the year, too.  Have a look at my journal on my megashot page to see these marvelous creations.
Yesterday, I cleaned up the light garden a bit and watered all.  I have two phalenopsis in bloom and several African violets.  The little orange trees that I transplanted a few days ago seem to all be surviving. 

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

More Hatley Castle in November




More photos of the Japanese garden at Hatley Castle from the beginning of November.

Grace and Jim have left for home today.  She left me 30 Queen of the Night tulips that I planted out along the garage.  The dark colors should look good against the white of the garage.  I was to Cannor and bought 30 more tulips that I will be putting along the driveway.... pastel colors.  I also have 7 good sized plastic  pots and saucers.  I have 7 little orange trees that I have grown from pits, in a flower pot.  I will be transplanting them into these new pots and keeping them in the house.  The last time I did this, I left the orange trees out on the deck and they froze, of course.  These pots don't look great, but I really do plan to see these trees produce oranges.
We were out to the Fireside cafe with the Scots on Monday night and tonite to the Dunlop House with Jim and Sheila.  Was all nice. 
We have had a few days of high winds and quite cool weather, with rain.. typical November weather. 

Friday, November 12, 2010

More Hatley Castle in November




I took a few photos of the pagoda in the Japanese garden at Hatley Castle.  and the bench. 
The juncos and other birds are hanging out at the feeder.  I refilled the humming bird feeder today, too.
I gathered a few more apples and made about 4 cups of applesauce.  I added a bit of ginger root, cinamon, and sugar.  Its delicious. 

Thursday, November 04, 2010

Hatley Castle and garden dressed for Autumn

The bridge in the Japanese Garden at Hatley Castle
Hatley Castle that is now Royal Roads University, dressed in Autumn colors.

One of the peacocks in the garden.  Motion blur on the feathers. 
More Autumn colors in the Japanese Garden
A window in the outside wall that looks out over the Japanese garden. 
On Sunday, we took a deli salad out to the lower parking lot of Hatley Castle.  It was a fine, sunny day with some occasional cloud cover.  I caught the Autumn colors just about right!  This is a very picturesque place.  They want us to go through the gift shop and pay an entrance fee to the gardens, now.  There are locks everywhere and high fences.  On the great lawn at the water side of the castle the geese roam freely.  Its a terrible mess.  I guess the fences keep them out of the gardens. 
After getting home from this fine afternoon we got news that an old buddy had passed away... age 65... just a young fellow yet.  He had not been having any health problems.  It was a shock to all.  We feel fortunate to have had some visiting time with him and his wife a couple of days previous.  It was a massive heart attack and he did not suffer.  RIP Don... you will be sorely missed.
Our Premier Campbell has resigned.  The polls are showing a huge decline in the popularity of the Liberal Party and in Campbell in particular.  He has been in office for 3 terms, and has implemented many changes that have not been well received over the years.  Not the least of which was the recent HST tax grab.  A former Premier had launched a rally and was getting signatures on the protest to have this tax law scrapped.  It seems to be a long process.  The Liberals changing horses in mid stream should not save them, this time.

Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Royal Roads


Shooting across Esquimalt Lagoon at the back of Royal Roads university (originally was Hatley Castle)

Saturday, January 13, 2007

Japanese Garden, Hatley Park


Part of the new Royal Roads University grounds is the Japanese Gardens in Hatley Park. The park is part of what once was the estate of James Dunsmuir. The castle was designed by Samuel McLure - a well known architect in Victoria, in the early 1900s. More here