This weekend surprised us all by magically turning into summer after a whole week of cloudy, frosty mornings. My boyfriend and I packed up and headed to his grandfather's 640 acre farm to take in the autumn scenery. His grandfather has retired from farming so some of the pastures are rented to other farmers and some have been left to go wild and grow a stunning collection of bright yellow and green grasses.
I had spent the entire week on a business trip that took me all across Saskatchewan and Alberta, driving through the prairies made me want to get out of the car and run around on the fields....
Long car rides through big open sky and wheat fields have that effect on me.
Luckily the farm happened to be full of fields for me to run around in, old buildings to explore, and lots of wild life.
We arrived at the farm and the first thing I did was start catching the teeny tiny frogs that were hopping around in the grass. They were happy to jump right into our hands and hop around a bit before escaping to the ground. I named this one Patrick and I can only hope that no one stepped on him during our visit.
We left Patrick behind to go on a walk along the ridge which is covered in a grove of birch trees. Every leaf was bright yellow and we could see big flattened patches of grass that moose had recently been lying in.
The trees opened into a field that was filled with bits of cottony fluff floating around from the plants. The effect was fairy-tale like and whimsical, like a snow storm in the middle of summer. I was going to say how pretty the field was but two large pieces of fluff flew into my mouth when I started to speak. Apparently nature prefers a bit of silence..
Back at the farm we set up the trailers, there are various farm houses but they have fallen into different levels of decay. One of the best parts of visiting the farm was finding the old houses and barns on the property and peering through doors and windows to see what sorts of things had been left behind.
The most recent farm house still has newspapers on the kitchen table and a pull out couch ready for visitors. It still seems like a place that could be lived in.
The much older farm house is slowly breaking down and becoming a part of nature instead of a shelter from it.
The inside of this house has been taken over by squirrels, mice, and porcupines. Waaay in the far corner of the house was a really beautiful painting or wall paper panel with flowers on it. I was only a tiny bit tempted to get closer, but the fact that I would probably fall straight through the floor won over my curiosity.
In contrast, the one room school house has been kept in mint condition...
..complete with old wooden desks and a big wood burning furnace. A historical society holds strawberry teas at the school house..I really really really want to go to one.
Aside from the acres and acres of pasture, their family also owns 100 or so acres of land that was being used as a gravel pit. Recently the companies have finished removing the gravel and in doing so have created three beautiful lakes on the property. You can see the lakes on the aerial photographs that are in one of the trailers on the farm.
The gavel pit also has a river with some busy beavers living in it, but best of all...
...it has a grove of wild highbush cranberries. You can smell the cranberries as soon as you get in the area. They are sweeter than the regular ones and I ate quite a few right off the trees. I regret not picking a bunch of them to use for baking, but we had lots to see and only a couple of days to see it.
We caught the tail-end of the sunset by running to the top of a near-by hill.
Bye-bye sun..
Winter is coming.. long cold prairie winter. I'm so glad that we got out to the farm while the weather was nice.
I'm also glad that we came home with a big bunch of apples.. I'm thinking apple pie, apple crisp, apple bread, apple sauce....
mmmmm
I am so, sooooooooooooooo jealous!!!!
Posted by: Lesley Howard | 09/27/2010 at 08:31 AM
It looks like adventureland to me- my boys would go crazy there !
Posted by: Mylifeunderthebus | 09/28/2010 at 07:38 AM
mmmm apple crisp.
these are such lovely images, what a gorgeous place.
I have the froggiest front yard and I'm terrified about stepping on frogs. The other day, one jumped up my pant leg and hitched a ride until I shook him out!
Posted by: dani | 09/28/2010 at 06:32 PM
i love the prairies in the fall. you captured it beautifully!!!
Posted by: Delishliving | 09/28/2010 at 08:16 PM
this is just the kind of get away i dream of every fall. vivid forest, wide open fields, and derelict buildings just begging to be explored. looks like you had a magical time!
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