WE SURVIVED HURRICANE ARTHUR

The rain and the wind started hitting us pretty hard at night and leaves and small branches were flying everywhere but I wasn't too concerned. I went to bed and slept pretty good.  In the morning, it was still storming pretty bad and I buttoned up my raincoat and went to the barn, did my chores and came home.

There were trees and branches down everywhere in our neighbourhood. George and I had breakfast and I went on my computer to check the weather report. I wasn't on the computer very long before  the power went out,  somewhere around 8:00am. I went upstairs with my camera to take a photo of my back yard and  looked out my upstair bathroom window and this is what I saw half way up the lane and my heart sank.

This was taken with my big lens and it was raining very hard so the photo looks cloudy.
Three of my good neighbours Weeping Willow trees were broken and one was totally uprooted, damaging the corner of his roof.

I told George and we both jumped in the truck to find our neighbour as we couldn't reach them by phone. That's when we saw that the big pine tree with the eagles nest was down. I won't go back to this story but you will be glad to know that both babies were spotted in one of the pine tree and the parents were with them.

Here are some of the photos I took that morning.

So much for squirrel proof  feeders. He opened the top and helped himself like a little looter.

My beautiful flowers were flattered.

The yard is littered with leaves

Up the highway, a fallen tree on the power lines.

My neighbours front yard after his willow trees fell.

Debris in the lane going to the highway.

still damaged trees in the lane

fallen trees in a private drivway

Another old neighbour who's yard is like a jungle to begin with.

My son Vaughan's driveway

My front yard covered with leaves

All these photos were taken while driving around in the car assessing the damage. This is my front yard again.

My old garage door...   All my windows in the front were covered with pieces of torn leaves like this.

Another photo of my backyard.

A big cedar broke in behind our back hedge and limbs are everywhere.

Another view of that broken cedar tree.

Liam and Reid are doing some cleanup.

I'm cooking carrots on the Coleman camping stove. The last time we used it was during the last flood in 2009.

My new little portable Bar-B-Q came in handy. I cooked most of the meals on this , even made some awesome fries in a cookie sheet.

We had a generator hooked up to our house to keep the food cold and for water and the occasional shower but we were pretty much in camping mode as we were sharing our generator with our daughter Jackie. We were without power for almost a week I think. Bill, you can correct me on this. I wasn't paying attention to how long we were without power.

The farm was run with a generator that was run by a big tractor but I didn't took any picture of it. It a three phase generator and was too powerful for my end of the barn as it burns out the light bulbs but I had hot water.

I cleaned out my front yard on Sunday and I was so sore the next day from all the raking and cutting branches.
 I really should edit this post but I'm running out of time so I hope you'll forgive me. George and I weeded till dark tonight and I'm in need of a shower and sleep.

Thanks for visiting and I'm so glad when you care enough to leave a comment.
Hugs,
JB

NASTY ARTHUR, HE WENT AND BROKE MY HEART

When I posted pictures of some of my flowers the day before hurricane Arthur hit, I wasn't expecting for him to be so angry. After all the weatherman had said it wasn't going to be as bad as Hurricane Juan was last year. I knew there was going to be high wind and heavy rain.  We were not overly concerned as Juan didn't do much damage around here although it did a lot of damage in Halifax in Nova Scotia.. The only preparation I did was to weed my garden before the the rain hit so it wouldn't spread the seeds everywhere. The boys got all 500 big bales of hay inside the hay building before the rain started. Big mistake to underestimate the weather, especially when a hurricane is coming up the coast.

How did Arthur broke my heart you may ask? He knocked down the big pine tree where a pair of eagles have nested for the last 10 years in our lane by the barn. There was two young eagles in the nest and one of the parent had just brought them their meal. A gaspareau  fish.

This is a picture I took last year of the pine tree and the eagle nest. It was even bigger this year as they add branches and stuff every year. I think that if you double click you can see the pictures bigger.

and here is a close up of the nest  also taken last year.

The tree broke in many pieces and also the branches and the nest was sprawled for a long distance. You can't really judge the size of this nest. Being so heavy and wet, it's no wonder it fell dowm. Those branches are pretty big.

If you look at the top of the right corner of the picture, you'll see what's left of the tree stump. It's only a splinter left.

You can see George by the fence in the upper right corner. It might give you a bit of perspective.

This is one of the baby eagle. It was raining hard and the wind was blowing hard so it's not a great picture.

Here I was about 5 feet from him and he was hopping with a bent wing.  I had my big lens on and somehow it got to the wrong setting to focus and I wasn't thinking of how to set it right.  It was raining pretty hard and I was also trying to keep the rain from hitting my lens. I missed some real good shots.

This is the other baby eagle near the fallen tree. He's all wet and looked a bit stunned.

As I got closer he lifted both his wings  and  I  decided to leave them alone. Nothing I could do.

Here is the gasperau fish that one of the parents had brought them. It just laid there near the demolished nest. I felt so very sad for them. My heart was in my throat. I can't imagine how it must have been, being hit with such high wind and rain and flying leaves and coming down with such force. They must have been dazed.

The next morning George and I went back to check on the babies and only could find one. We didn't hang around too long as one of the parents was circling around but I got close enough to this one who stayed close to the fallen tree. He looked dry and healthy.

This is a better shot of what's left of their tree.

This is my first instalment on the ravage of hurricane Arthur, the bad boy... More photos and stories to follow.

Stay safe and enjoy the sunshine.
Thanks for your visit.
JB