Rainy Winter

The hectic days of the pre-Christmas shopping rush are finally over.  Halifax doesn't do Boxing Day...well, at least not on the 26th...which I like.  Some rest for the wicked!  :-)  

No white Christmas for us this year.  It was rainy.  I almost regret having the snow blower serviced.  I haven't touched it yet and December is almost over!

The weather gods have been kind...so far.  It was just wet, wet, wet!  ...at least that was the impression.  But in fact, we did get some great sunny days too...but human nature dictates that only "bad" things are worthy of being memorable!  Just kidding...I haven't succumbed to the Dark Side yet. :-)

What are we going to do with all this salt?  :-)

Some more images around town.  That's the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation, where we get our booze.  It's the only game in town...except for maybe 3 or 4 other "specialty" wine shops in the city...which need the NSLC's blessing to operate anyway.

Zoom in to the letter "N".  Am I seeing things?    ºoº

...and here is where you could fill up with snacks! :-)

A Stone Village At The Bedford Waterfront

It's been a while since I visited the Bedford waterfront in Mill Cove.  Not the nice parts but the area where infilling is still going on.  The rocks come from the blasting up the hill where land development is still happening.  Are we in Bedford or are we on the moon? :-)

Somebody had fun with the rocks and created a village of stone structures!

I am guessing (as we're in Canada) that the idea was to make inuksuk like this one.

But some are more reminiscent of Angkor Wat or Ayutthaya! :-)

This is Ayutthaya (Thailand)... 

Source: Flickr.  Click to go to source.

Oh, and there was this Tim Horton's coffee cup tree too. Very creative use of garbage! :-)

Thank you to the person(s) who took time to create the stone village.  It certainly made the drab landscape more alive and interesting!

Walls Around Halifax

I like to ramble around town.  So this blog post will just be rambling along too. This time I am looking at "walls" around Halifax...i.e. any vertical plane structure perpendicular to the ground that separates space.  No story. No drama. :-)

Steps.

Apartments.

More apartments!

Cleaning or erasing?

Painting.

The last public phone...maybe!

Open from dawn to dusk.  It's soooo analogue.  I love it!  No need to get technical.  No need to bother with Daylight Savings Time!

Signs of autumn.

Ok...this one is a fire hydrant on the concrete sidewalk.  No walls.  I just like the image. :-)

Just Walking Around Quinpool

I like walking around our neighbourhood.  Quinpool (and its environs) is such an interesting place.

Athens Restaurant... I always get the lamb souvlaki there.

At the entrance of the West End Baptist Church, corner of Preston & Quinpool.

Some pics may look familiar because I have posted them on the Quinpool Road facebook page... like this lovely flower basket hanging outside the Thai Ivory Cuisine Restaurant.

The new Pizza Hut branch under the shadows of the Golden Arches! :-)

Hope the thief has a change of heart and returns the cross soon....or else there will be some pretty bad karma coming soon.  I truly believe that.  Read about the stolen cross here.

Service Canada is also coming to Quinpool soon!

On the side of the old St. Pat's high school building, this path looks less trodden upon.  The school is slated to be demolished.  Read about it here.

Lost In Victoria Park (Truro NS)

My wife read somewhere that there was a "hidden gem" in Truro's Victoria Park...waterfalls!  So, we put on our hiking shoes and off we went!  

It was verdant.

If you follow the trail...er, the paved path...past the picnic grounds, you'd see waterfalls in about 10 minutes.  

But if you're like us and got tempted by Jacob's Ladder, then you're in for a bit more exercise!

This 175-step stairway won't bring you to heaven (Genesis 28:10-12)...

...but it brought us to some trails that went around the park.

Actually, we got lost.  We didn't know where we were going and crossroads like this was anybody's guess.

Somebody was kind enough to rip off the map too.  <cough> A**hole! <cough>

Anyway, we wandered around, backtracked a few times...met a ghoul or two. he! he!

...until we found ourselves back in the mainstream.  We descended from those stairs at the back of the gazebo.

There were two wells.  The Holy Well and...

...and the Wishing Well (which was at the top of another steep flight of stairs).  I must admit I was not especially thrilled to see clumps of rocks but I did get to make a wish!  Sell the dream not the item! ;-)

I had wished we'd find the waterfalls soon.  It worked! :-)  That's the Waddell Falls.

And that's the Joe Howe Falls.  Many young people were cooling themselves there!

Ok, so they were more like water-trickles...but we were happy enough to find them!

Here's a creek-side view below a bridge.

On our way out, we caught the tail end of this Sunday's concert at the park.  So we listened to some fiddle and guitar music.  Bring your own lawn chairs!

The tree decorations were life jackets.  Publicity for National Drowning Prevention Week (July 20-26, 2014).  "Your life jacket won't work if you don't wear it."

Our hike took about 2 hours, giving us a good sweat!  If you're going, wear hiking shoes or sneakers and bring water bottles and insect repellent.   Or, you can ignore Jacob's Ladder and just go straight to the falls.  In that case, flip-flops and a bathing suit would do! 

Manila...Just A Little Bit More

From June to August is the rainy season in the Philippines.  It doesn't rain all day but rather storm clouds would quickly form and in the blink of an eye, you're in a squall.

And just as abruptly, the rain stops and all is well again.  You might even get treated to a rainbow!

A friend commented: "What else is there to do in Manila but catch up with friends and family over good food?" 

Well, there was one more thing to do....shopping!

Manila is awash with malls...and rain doesn't matter when you're inside one.

Guess which was our favourite store... :-)

We also found an ice skating rink in the mall...complete with blue lines and face-off circles. 

Quite ironic to come all the way from Canada only to skate in tropical Manila!  But my 8-year old was enthusiastically showing off her recently acquired skating skills! :-)  I was even more surprised to see some hockey practice!  Have the NHL scouts caught on to this yet? he! he!  By the way, this was where Filipino Olympic skater, Michael Christian Martinez, started skating. He was the first skater from Southeast Asia to qualify for the Olympics! 

 In super hot and humid Manila, the malls are really where people go to chill and relax.

Some more random pics....  

I guess some rules were made to be broken?

"Why would somebody name a restaurant after the Klan?" you might wonder.  In the Philippines, "KKK" is a good acronym.  It stands for "Kataas-taasan, Kagalang-galangan Katipunan ng mga Anak ng Bayan".  Now there's a mouthful, even for Filipinos!  English translation: "Supreme and Most Honorable Society of the Children of the Nation".  That was the name of the revolutionary group formed in 1892 to fight for independence against Spanish rule.  They were a band of heroes.  Nothing at all to do with the Ku Klux Klan!

Live music.  :-)  Thursday night is 70's & 80's music night at Strumm's.  

One last bit of trivia...  In the Philippines, people refer to the washroom as the "comfort room" or "CR" for short.  Don't ask me why.  Just use your imagination. :-)

Oh yes, there was one other place we could go to despite the rain... the pool!