Beautiful display of the northern lights when driving home from dinner downtown at the end of September.
Rocks Walls – Decided to build some retaining walls to obtain some more usable flat space. I used the Bobcat to level out an area, and found a guy up the valley who was selling some gabions (wire cages) for 1/3 the usual price so I bought 6. He lent me a table and brake for shaping the cages and an air-driven crimping gun. Worked like a charm. Coop and I placed nice rocks on the front face and used shale type white rocks to fill the rest of the cage.
This area will be an equipment and lumber shed next spring. I will be using the same cedar posts and spruce beams as used for the patio and entrance, and will likely buy roof trusses.
This is the 2nd of the series of benches.
Had time for a day trip with Coop to see a motorcycle museum near Kamloops. The owner said God told him to build it. An amazing collection of interesting bikes. These two are very similar to the first two bikes I owned – a 1970 Honda CB175 and a Kawasaki 400 (two stroke with 3 cylinders and very fast)
Light reflecting through the clouds and off the lake.
And we had a delightful trip to Japan, me for two weeks in October and Mizuho for six. “Enjoyed” two typhoons when I was there. Great to be back in Tokyo, to eat delicious food, and to see old friends and colleagues.
Visited the Ise Shrine where they have been rebuilding a host of shrine buildings every twenty years for the past 1,200 years on twinned sites separated by black river rocks. We were chased out early by the approaching typhoon, so went all the way down to Kyushu on the Shinkansen (Bullet Train).
Also took a mag-lev train out to see a Shiba breeder in Nagoya, and visited the Toyota Auto Museum, which was spectacular and had an enormous variety of cars from the last 100 years. Cars have gotten more efficient over the years, but at the cost of beauty, witness this Rolls and the Blue Beauty (Cord I believe).
After returning, I was busy with cutting brush and limbing trees, and finally building the cabinet doors and drawer fronts for the guest and master bathrooms. Weather has been a bit unusual – some snow 4 weeks earlier than usual, a record low two weeks ago and a record high yesterday. Leaves are mostly down but grass is green.
Also went to several concerts, including an open rehearsal by the Okanagan Symphony that featured an amazing 23 yr old Timothy Choi playing a Strad. And have been going through my records, mostly dating back 3 or 4 decades; many had never made it to CD. Some gems, and some others. I built these drawer fronts below but did not like them so built another set. Cedar doors in the back will go in master bathroom. Photos will be coming next month, along with the back-ordered handles from Lee Valley.
