June 2024
Yew Lake
brings me back for another year.
Vancouver Heritage House Tour
I have wanted to got the Heritage House Tour for a few years, but it
closed during the COVID period and this is the first time it came
back in the regular format. I believe it runs on the first
weekend of June and tickets are only available for a narrow window
between being offered and sold out. We actually missed that
window, but I found they had some tickets in reserve and was able to
buy 6 tickets.
You can't actually take photos on the tour (they don't even want to
see cameras or cell phones out) because these are peoples private
homes. That said, you are welcome to take photos if you are
standing on the sidewalk outside the house. My Mom came over
from Victoria and my Aunt and Uncle happened to be in town so we
made an afternoon of it. Nara had just that morning flown in
from Ottawa so she was home recovering from her trip.
Desert Plant Society Show
We have a small plant box on our fireplace and Claira wants to add
some cacti. In the spring, every weekend at VanDusen they have
a different plant society show. The desert plant show is one
of my favorites so we decided to drop in and see what excellence in
potted plants looks like.
The show had a "kids zone, do it
yourself planting zone" where kids mix up their own desert soil from
the provided ingredents, fill a pot and then transplant up to three
different cactus into you pot. All free (the show is by
donation). Claira made a nice pot and found a few plants she
wanted to buy from the members sales tables.
Family Dinner With Lobster!
Claira went
to Nationals for Science Fair and she somehow negotiated that if she
went to nationals we would pay for lobster for dinner at a Chinese
restaurant. Helen's aunt Jennie also happened to be in town
for two weeks so had a larger family dinner (large enough to justify
buying a Lobster). The kids don't normally make a big deal of
the lobsters but the serving staff asked if they wanted to hold them
so we got a little show.
Dinner
was the night before Jenny went back to Hong Kong so the kids were
all sentimental.
Yew Lake at Cypress Provincial Park
I have a soft spot for Yew Lake at Cypress Provincial Park.
There is generally a lot of parking and it isn't that far from It
has wide selection of alpine plants, but it doesn't involve a long
drive like Manning Park or Whister does. It's quite sensitive
to weather - year to year it can be ahead of behind by weeks.
I got an "in lieu" day at work so I decided to drive up and walk
around.
It wasn't actually raining when I started walking, but it was
overcast with fog. Overcast is actually good for photographing
plants and fog does wonders for trees.
The plants were a generally pretty early in their bloom cycles -
first flowers coming out. The trails up here are really well
roped off so thankfully there are often good plants growing right
next to the edge of trail.
As an example of seasons - there is a small patch of old growth
trees near Yew Lake. I saw an orchid growing up through the
rich soil - it's a few days from the flowers coming out. On
the other hand, the heather near the lake where already out and
attracting pollinators.
What has surprised me in previous years has been the insect life up
here - butterflies and dragonflies. I didn't see either of
those today, but I did see both kinds of local humming birds and a
Hermit Thrush singing to an audience. Yew lake is a really
short walk, but still worth the time to get outside.
Tags: Cypress Provincial Park(12), Vancouver(3), house(3), fog(2), cactus(1), tree(1)
People: Claira(7), Nara(4), Helen(3), Janet(3), Jennie(2), David(1)
From: John Harvey Photo > Blogs for 2024 to 2005 > June 2024
Last Modified Monday, July 29th, 2024 at 21:29:18 Edit
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