Thanksgiving – 8 October 2023

 

Woody Woodpecker

Thanksgiving for Bev’s Canadian family is very much a family day.  A nephew and his family had arrived the previous day from Montreal for the celebration as well as a nephew from

Toronto. It was a house was full of adults and children. 

 

Eating, drinking, and catching up with each other was the main activity of the day with 6 young children filled with of the excitement of the occasion and being together.  Fortuitously it was fine for much of the day and after some lunch we headed out to a place called Mer Bleue which is a peat bog that was part of an ancient river course of the Ottawa river after the last ice-age.  It is an example of the tundra according to the information posted at the bog. 

The family
 With a large number of children darting off in all directions it was never going to be a fast walk so we meandered through the bog which was mostly on a board walk.  It was lovely and there were some nice autumn colours but as mentioned earlier, not as intense this year as it sometimes can be. 

 

Autumn colours

The children had fun running through the woody areas and the adults enjoyed the fresh air.  Their adventurous spirit even inspired one of the adults to make a dash through the woods expecting to take a short cut and end up ahead of the group, but disappointingly for him, the idea backfired, and he came to a dead end. Not quite the impression intended!

 

The meal was a Canadian and New Zealand celebratory meal which included lamb (NZ lamb of course) which was delicious, and the quality was better than we would typically get in NZ. The vegetables were roast potatoes, roast pumpkin, peas, roasted tomatoes and gravy.  Dessert was a pumpkin cheesecake (delicious) and a pumpkin pie which was enjoyed by many but was too rich and sweet for me. 


 

We had a some very nice wine, an Italian Brunello, a Pinot Noir from Sancerre, and an Ice Cider (from NZ).  There was also some XO Cognac (which was superb) and a high-quality Calvados (also very nice).  I only had a little of each so managed to go to bed feeling well although it was again very late. 

 

It was wonderful to experience another country’s cultural event with the locals. 

 



 

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