Shadybrook opened at 5 pm on Friday after being closed for 10 days because of the storm. The trees were all cleared from the front of our site. There are still a lot of trees in the forest behind us and beside us that are down or partially down and need tending to. Many people walked by and noted that our site looked like it was one of the hardest hit. We still can't believe that Phoebe seems unscathed. We are going to bring her home next weekend for a thorough cleaning and look at her roof. On a positive note, with all the fallen trees we now have some new fire wood and lots of starter kindling. Saturday morning we were up and ready to celebrate Canada's 150th. First stop, the Seba Beach Seniors Centre for the free pancake breakfast. It was fabulous. A sea of red and white enjoying pancakes and ham. The Seba Beach Farmer's Market is always busy and today the highlight (other than the perogies, fresh cheese buns and rainier cherries) was free Canada 150 birthday cake. We grabbed the dogs and headed west to take in the Entwistle parade. The streets of Entwistle were packed with kids (and adults) with their hats or plastic bags out to collect candy. There was a lot of candy and freezies thrown! Kids would run between moving vehicles and horses to gather the sugary treasures. Happy to say no one died in the collection of candy, though we did hold our breath when one kid ran out on the street between horses to get a candy. Small town parades have their own unique excitement. Back to Seba Beach, a thunderstorm rolled in but that didn't stop us from standing in line for our free hotdog (and bottled water). When it rains at Seba it means it—big rain drops and lots of them. But we were determined to get our lunch for free, rain or shine. We heard on the news that the government "invested" $500 million for Canada 150. We sure hope our free pancakes, cake and hotdogs were included in that investment. We thought there must be a way to add more sugar/no nutrition to our day so we made the most delicious s'mores. James might have OD'd on them. There aren't coordinated fireworks at Seba Beach but a lot of people set off their own along the beach. We heard a bunch but we stayed home and went to bed at a reasonable time since we had plans for Sunday morning. Sunday morning we laced up our hiking shoes, packed the dogs and headed toward Edson and Sundance Provincial Park. We didn't completely read the website about the park and were surprised when the road became gravel for about 50 km. The scenery was beautiful, so many pretty wildflowers. We stopped at Emerson Lakes for a bit of a hike. There is a small campground right on one of the lakes. A little further up the road we hiked to the hoodoos which were spectacular. Phin and Westley loved exploring. There were hardly any people in the park - the gravel road might be a deterrent. Back at Shadybrook we relaxed and then packed up for home. While the dogs are always up for an adventure, Phin really loves coming home.
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Does an Airstream survive? We used to have a lot of trees around our site. We still do, but many are now resting horizontally. Shadybrook was hit by a few bad storms this spring and the most recent storm Tuesday night caused a lot of damage. We received an email on Wednesday notifying us that the resort is closed due to damage until further notice. We were sent an additional email that stated our trailer was one that was damaged. The photo attached to the email wasn't our trailer. An email back, and the manager confirmed no Airstreams were damaged in the storm. We thought of our friends Denny & Patty who are living out at Shadybrook and hoped they were ok. The management requested people stay away unless you need to have your insurance company in for damage assessment. We decided to drive out late Saturday evening just to make sure Phoebe wasn't damaged. We were shocked when we saw the resort. And we saw it after four days of cleanup. Our site is a mess. The entrance is completely blocked by fallen trees. The back is the same (lots of trees down) and we have a tree in the middle of our gazebo. The metal is bent and we aren't sure if it can be repaired. There are fallen trees all over the site but somehow nothing fell on the mighty Phoebe. Yet. There is a tree looming over her. Hopefully they get to that soon. We also need to check the roof to confirm there is no damage. Shadybrook was eerily quiet. We walked around and looked at the damage. Our old site has two trees down across it. We enjoyed a fire with Denny and Patty. They were at their site when the storm hit. They had a couple trees fall on their trailer one of them twisted their slide. They tried to leave during the storm but fallen trees blocked the road out. They heard there were more than 300 trees down and 40 or so damaged trailers. Denny's insurance company brought in an arborist for their cleanup and he said the trees at Shadybrook are too tall and the roots can't support them in major wind. Many trees should be cut down by 20 feet. It will be interesting to see how Shadybrook cleans up. Thank goodness this storm didn't happen on a weekend when Shadybrook is full of people. Denny said Shadybrook plans to reopen on Wednesday. They have a lot of work ahead of them, and are dealing with a lot of unhappy campers. Good news. Not one mosquito was harmed in the storm. Shadybrook officially opened this weekend. Finally the ground is dry enough to drive around. However, the water is not turned on yet so there is no staying overnight. We headed west in the afternoon – after AMA came to boost Red’s battery and we renewed Red’s registration that expired in February. Things were buzzing at Shadybrook when we arrived. Lots of people were out cleaning and setting up their sites. And the sun was shining. We received approval to move Phoebe in to what we think is one of the best sites at Shadybrook. We back on to trees and the site is long. We set her up so far back from the road that she almost disappears. The previous renters of the site still had some items to remove. While we were setting up, they stopped by and asked if we wanted to buy the gazebo and shed from them. The price was right so we agreed. Woo-hoo, now we are set for the summer! We got a work out by loading up all our wood in the truck and moving it over to the new site. Ned & Fred have a new woodpile to guard. They are settling in nicely. The Tails (Phin & Westley) supervised the move from the truck. The only thing we still have to deal with is our shed on the other site. If the new renter wants it, we will sell it. If not, we have to figure out how to move it. Anyone have a flatbed trailer? We love the new site. It’s a lot more private and backs on to forest. A 25ft front bed Airstream with large vista windows in the back would be perfect on this site. Come on lottery numbers… We have a new character on our site to name. A stag. We have to get to know him better before we give him his proper name. As we were moving our last load from Wilderness Way to Country Lane, it started to rain. It just wouldn’t be a trip to Shadybrook without some rain.
We'll be back in a couple of weeks for the May long weekend to set up Phoebe for the season. Next weekend we are off to the mountains (without Phoebe). After opening presents and eating a carrot cake muffin (Happy Birthday James), we loaded up the Tails and headed to Shadybrook. We are recently back from a Transatlantic voyage so the boys are happy to do everything with us. Heading west the weather started to change rapidly and the rain turned to snow. Really wet snow. Westley always knows where we are going once we turn off highway 16 toward Seba Beach. He starts howling and barking in anticipation. We thought maybe he would have forgotten the turn off over the winter. He did not. Shadybrook is still closed. It is supposed to open next weekend, but we don't think that will happen. It's really wet, muddy and the ground is too soft. We parked at the entrance and walked in. The purpose of our visit was to check out a different spot in the resort. The spot backs on to trees and we like it! We currently back on to a motor home that has been parked there for years but no one ever stays in it. Odd. We have some theories about it. Hello Phoebe! She looks cold but she still smells like an Irish Spring. And no mouse poop in sight. Ned and Fred have done a spectacular job guarding the wood pile. They've lost their "pinkness" -not enough shrimp? - so we made need to replace (or paint) them. It's hard to believe camping season is just about here. Over the winter we looked at 25 ft Airstreams in Airdrie and Langley. We think it's the right size for us and would love to own one. We just need to win the lottery or sell our house. We have some maintenance issues to tend to with both Red and Phoebe and then we will be ready for our second season of camping adventures. Before heading home we stopped in at the 9 Iron Grill for breakfast. It was delicious with friendly service. And free coffee and tea! Oh, and you may have determined that after much deliberation, we have decided to try another year at Shadybrook. We have both been really busy with work the past couple months so this Remembrance Day long weekend is a welcome break. The weather has been perfect for the past week (we can't say that about most of the Fall) so we decided to go visit Phoebe. We started listening to Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix on Audible when we drove home from Canmore in October. It's a long book - we still have more than 20 hours of listening so we need to plan a long road trip! Shadybrook is secured in the off season (and there are no trespassing signs everywhere) so we walked in to our site. We could see Phoebe glistening from a distance and as we got closer to 42 Wilderness Way, James said "Holy crap, I forgot how small Phoebe is". Cute though! Opening the door we were greeted with the fresh smell of Bounce dryer sheets and Irish Spring soap. These are two things we heard helps to keep mice away. So far - no mice. Whew, it's working! Everything inside and outside looked really good. Our flamingos, Ned & Fred, are doing a great job of protecting the wood pile. We decided to walk around Shadybrook to check out the sites that have been vacated just in case there is one better than 42 Wilderness Way. There are a couple sites that we think are better but there were also other people looking at them. We left a note for the manager to indicate we are interested in moving sites. Considering we aren't even sure if we want to stay at Shadybrook, moving sites might not be a priority. We've mentioned before how we love to hike around Pembina River which is just a little further west down the Yellowhead. We pretty much had the place to ourselves today and the dogs enjoyed ripping it up in the sand. We were pretty hungry when we got back to the city so we tried a restaurant that was recommended by a colleague - Wheat Garden Noodle & Dumpling Bazaar. It's downtown and specializes in Northern Chinese cuisine. When we were in China, noodles and dumplings were our favorite - we had a great meal of dumplings (and beer) in Xi'an. Although the food was not the highlight of our trip to China - learn more about our culinary journey on my travel blog. The food was tasty, the service was friendly and efficient and the prices reasonable. When we left the restaurant (about 25 minutes later) the car was surrounded by five firefighters. The restaurant isn't in the most desirable neighbourhood in downtown Edmonton so when we saw so many people around the car, it was alarming.
Turns out a woman decided to get the firefighters because she decided the dogs were in distress. What?!? We take dog ownership seriously and would never do anything to harm our little dudes! The firefighters decided they looked fine and were in no distress - one firefighter remarked that "they are so cute" and another said they are even wearing their coats to stay warm. We know the woman meant well and probably didn't quite have the capacity to fully assess the situation. James chatted with the guys and found out that they work with a good friend, Brady. If Brady would have been on that night, he too would have come to the distressed dog call at the Wheat Garden. Probably not the best use of city resources. Just another adventure for the Tails! Sept. 24/25, 2015 Getting a trailer ready for winter is a lot of work. We went out on Saturday morning to bring Phoebe home for her end of the season clean. She looks small but she can hold a lot of stuff! We emptied her out and scrubbed her down - inside and out. Some neighbors stopped to learn more about her. Sunday afternoon we headed back to Shadybrook. We made a coffee/tea stop at Starbucks on the West end before heading out. A guy in a Porsche pulled up to Phoebe in the parking lot and was admiring her. He congratulated James on finding such a beautiful trailer. Since you don't see many Airstreams around Edmonton, people are often interested in chatting about them. We are not Airstream experts, but we like talking about Phoebe. Since Phoebe was clean and there was blue sky, we did her Fall photo shoot. She is a cutie! Once at Shadybrook we packed up the site, propped up the picnic table and waited for the guy to come and winterize. He was a bit late and drunk. Or at least he smelled strongly of alcohol. It even overpowered the smell of Bounce sheets mixed with Irish Spring that are gracing every nook and cranny of Phoebe. We were told it helps keep mice out. We'll see. We walked around Seba Beach. The fall leaves looked stunning but the village was was very quiet. The dock at the main beach was taken off, the ice cream store was closed for the season and the bouncy castle is gone. We decided to drive down the road to the 9 Iron Grill for dinner while we waited for the hot water tank to drain. Drain sounds like something is happening quickly. In reality the water was slowly dripping out. And we were hungry. One last check on Phoebe before we headed home. She looked a bit sad sitting in an empty campsite but we can visit her any time we want. That's a wrap for this season. We will continue to post our adventures through the winter as we visit Phoebe and figure out our next move.
Sorry Phoebe, we've been really busy with work the past couple weeks so we haven't spent much time with you. It's not you - it's us. And work. Last Saturday the sun was shining so we drove out to Shadybrook. After picking up some dinner supplies at the Seba Beach Farmer's Market (the last Farmer's Market of the season) and dropping them off at Phoebe, we headed to Pembina River. We love Pembina. Our hike was so pretty with the fall colours and even though the sky threatened, it didn't rain. The river is much higher than earlier in the summer and of course no one was floating down it. And hardly no campers in the campsite. As we hiked around, we found a staircase leading up so we took it. The stairs and short hike brought us in to the town of Evansburg - home of the Grouch. We walked around town and found the story of the Grouch on the post office wall. It's fun discovering how small towns create their own unique "personality". It is definitely fall weather now so we burned a lot of wood in the evening and the dogs dusted off their sweaters. Around 8 pm they opted for the heated blanket in the trailer vs. spending time with us at the campfire. We made s'mores and Jiffy pop (traditional camping food) to finish off this camping season. It was really cold and drizzly in the morning so we headed home. We went to the RV Wars (no one was in combat gear) to see if we would like a larger "box" trailer. While they have a lot of room and amenities (like fireplaces, island kitchens and huge TVs), we still really love Airstreams. In the next week or so we will go out to Shadybrook and haul Phoebe home to clean and winterize her. Winter - augh.
We are still undecided about Shadybrook for the 2017 season. We know Phoebe is too small for Shadybrook so the question is, do we buy a bigger trailer or put Phoebe on steroids? Don't get us wrong. We love the fall - the crispness in the air, colourful leaves, pumpkin flavoured everything (except lattes). But today as we walked around Shadybrook, we both commented that there was a sadness in the air. Families were packing up their sites and hauling their boats away; the leaves are valiantly trying to hold on to their chlorophyll and there is that faint smell of autumn in the air. We only spent the day out at Shadybrook, cool, wet weather this weekend kept us at home watching Netflix. Walking around the site today it was evident, it's definitely the end of summer. But change is good. Tuesday after the September long weekend is like a new year. Everyone is back to work (and school), routines get back to normal and life is in full swing again. There's something really exciting about September. We plan to spend a couple more weekends at Shadybrook before the end of the month. We'll just pack warmer clothes. Campfires and hot chocolate in the crisp autumn air sound perfect. By the way, if you haven't seen "The Fundamentals of Caring", check it out. It will make you want to go on a road trip and pick up a hitchhiker. Or two.
Phoebe was away from Shadybrook at Seba Beach for exactly one month. We brought her back last Wednesday after work. Showing up on a Wednesday at 7:30 pm allowed us to back in to the site without the peering eyes of our Shadybrook neighbours. It also meant we could whipper snip the weeds. This noisy task is not permitted on the weekends. We came out on Saturday morning and walked around the village for a bit before venturing down the road to Kokanee Springs, another seasonal campsite. After touring around Kokanee Springs we concluded that Shadybrook is more our style. Both sites are the same price, about $3100 for the season (May 1 - Sept. 30) and that includes full hook ups. At Shadybrook you can leave your trailer on your site over the winter with a $500 non-refundable deposit toward the next season. Very soon we have to decide if we want to pay the $500 to reserve our site for next year. This is what we know: - Phoebe is too small for a seasonal campsite. - We would need to invest more to make our site more comfortable. (People at Shadybrook have decks built up to their trailers, eating tents, landscaped sites, large TVs with satellite dishes...) - We like exploring and don't want to be tied to one campsite. - Although, it is nice not to have to set up a campsite every time we camp. - We like camping but we don't want to camp every weekend. The Edmonton area is really great in the summer! - If we give up the site we will have to plot out where we want to camp next year and book sites early. - We need to store Phoebe over the winter somewhere. An indoor storage space would be lovely. - Including this weekend, we have stayed in Phoebe at Shadybrook eight nights. If we do the math about the cost per night...o.k., just don't do the math. Right now we still have a lot of questions. We don't regret trying out Shadybrook this year as it allowed us to use the trailer without towing. We're confident the answer will come to us soon.
A few friends suggested we visit Sir Winston Churchill Provincial Park on Lac La Biche. It made us reflect on quotes from Churchill like, “If you’re going through hell, keep going” and of course the classic, “I may be drunk, Miss, but in the morning I will be sober and you will still be ugly.” With a lead up like that we were so curious to see a campground named for such a quotable leader. We were pretty much ready to hit the road when we got home from work on Friday. After hitching up Phoebe and unplugging from shore power the strong sewer smell that we had observed while camping at Emma Lake had returned. We couldn’t blame it on the campground this time, something was definitely up with the trailer. With no handy uncles around to help us, we had to figure it out. Thanks to Google, we determined it was an issue with the battery. We unhooked the battery in question and carried on. Well, we carried on after we turned around on Whitemud Drive to return home to pick up the campsite tag we forgot to print. Now we are off… Three hours later we arrived in Lac La Biche and were treated to a stunning sunset as we crossed the causeway to the provincial park, which is actually on an island. It was beautiful but not the best time to arrive. Especially for newbies. The campsite and trail systems at the park are awesome. A must visit for any kind of camper - there were tents, tent trailers and of course big monster trailers. Next time we will bring our bikes. On the way home Phoebe wanted a photo with the gigantic sausage in Mundare so we obliged. Then we bought some sausage at the Esso - the only place to buy the Stawnichy's products on Sunday. Here’s what we learned from the adventure:
There is a silver lining. Back at home we connected with a very nice couple who are experienced Airstream owners and handy people. We look forward to getting to know them better - they have been on some great adventures with their 23’ Flying Cloud. The “tails”, our dogs Westley and Phin, were thrilled to go on the adventure. They have taken to Phoebe as their second home. Westley sleeps in his bed on the floor with a heated blanket. Phin is the social dude and likes to sleep under the blankets or on your foot or too close to your face. Which leads us back to Churchill and a final quote: “Kites rise highest against the wind - not with it.” Not sure what that means. But we do like his campground.
Here are more images from our weekend: |
AuthorMellissa & James live in Edmonton, Alberta and enjoy exploring. Currently our Airstream is parked at a seasonal site about an hour from our home. Archives
May 2021
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