The Greenwater Report for July 9, 2001

Greenwater Provincial Park - Monday, July 9, 2001 - by: Gerald Crawford

an oven

July 8th, 2001: Hot, sunny and windy again today, that makes four days in a row. We were in Saskatoon Thursday, when the temperature went up to a record high (wouldn't you know it? Nice and cool here by the Lake, I'll bet!) On our car thermometer, it hit 39°; the radio reported only 37.7°, and that was 99°F! We didn't realize how hot it was until we got to Saskatoon and got out of the car. Like an oven! However, it wasn't far from air-conditioned car to air-conditioned store. The last time we experienced heat like that was in 1998 when we were in Washington and Idaho in our motor home, which was not air-conditioned. Every day hit at least 90°F, and lots of them went over 100°F.

 

 

Crops
look
thin

Crops look thin and short between Tisdale and Saskatoon, and are heading out. Sloughs are almost all dry; the few that are not are full of waterfowl. The Saskatoon area broke records for drought again at the end of June. But it's not just west of us we were in Kelvington yesterday and noticed that more and more sloughs are drying up, and the crops don't look too promising. We were at Folsted's, over toward Archerwill, today; they have a large grassy area in front of their houses and the only green things were the odd dandelions. The grass actually crunched when we stepped on it.

 

 

Hudson
Bay

On the other hand, we went to Hudson Bay on Wednesday and crops generally looked good, but then we have had almost four inches of rain since the snow melted. One slough that usually holds quite a bit of water, about half way between here and the north edge of the Park, was almost dry, though. The beavers usually have it dammed, and something must have broached the dam. Otters?

 

 

lots of
beach

As for Greenwater Lake, I believe it is about as low as it got in the early '90s, though not all directly due to low precipitation. As I understand it, Sask. Water decreed that the level be brought down last fall so that this spring's runoff wouldn't cause flooding downstream. Of course, there was no runoff to bring the lake back up to normal. One thing about it, though there's lots of beach!

 

 

Family
Farmers.com

We were invited to Folstad's today for a barbecue, their thank-you to contributing columnists. They run Family Farmers.com, an internet magazine, and I have been contributing the Greenwater Report and Parkland Photography Club News since they started. It was a good time, with great food and interesting conversations. There always seemed to be some shade somewhere so we didn't bake in the sun. There were several other contributing columnists there, too, that I was happy to meet. Reading the columns is always more meaningful if one knows the author. Hearty thanks to Ken and Joanne, and Karla. By the way their Web address is: www.familyfarmers.com.

 

 

Vivian
Broberg

Vivian Broberg was there, too, and we had a nice visit. She and her late husband, Glen, owned Fisherman's Cove from 1969 until the mid-'70s and they continued to live here at Greenwater until a few years ago. Vivian now lives at Barrierford in the summer and Kelowna in the winter, and we hardly ever see her.

 

 

Moose
Capital

Hudson Bay is a fine-looking town. We drove around just looking it over, and found its famous moose sculpture at one of the southern entrances to the town. Hudson Bay bills itself as the Moose Capital of Saskatchewan, so Peter Palko, Troy Guderyan and our neighbor, Bill Gudjonson, built a life-sized sculpture of a moose. It is set on a pedestal among some large rocks; if you get down real low with your camera, you can just about get rid of the houses in the background, and the moose looks huge!

 

 

personal
watercraft

I walked down to our dock last night just after sunset. A bunch of those personal watercraft were buzzing around and that plus a large power boat or two made quite a racket. Then a girl came along in a canoe, making hardly a sound. Peace amidst chaos!
   
  Gerald B. Crawford
Box 100, Chelan, SK S0E 0N0 (306) 278-3423 Check out my Webpage: http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/crawg