Picks of Canada

Archive for March, 2007

Given the vagaries of the weather these days, how does one know that Spring is coming in Canada? Well I can’t speak for all of Canada but in Eastern Ontario, the sure sign of Spring is the Warkworth Maple Syrup Festival which occurs the second weekend in March.

It is back to school in colorful parkas and yellow school buses that port people from downtown Warkworth (lots of good shopping) to the Maple Syrup Festival grounds. Or you can drive there yourself, as the Festival is just north and west of town off highway 25. You just follow the signs and the tall pointing Jack Pines.

Oh you might want to listen for the music, because there is a lot of fiddlin’ going on. In fact there are lots of activities for young and old alike including horse drawn sleigh rides (yep, snow is usually still lurking around), taffy making and syrup drawing demonstrations, square dance and step clogging/dancing fun, and a fiddling concert by Classic Country and the Potter Band.

But be sure to come with an appetite – because the Maple Syrup Festival is all about pancakes, sausage and syrup. The Warkworthian cooks and dough flippers are well practiced in their talents. And a chill day has been known to put an extra pancake or two on the plate -to say absolutely nothing about your waist line. But remember the syrup is just hot distilled, often before your eyes from the surrounding maple forest and woods nearby.

Actually pancake and sausage fanciers will really have a treat as the batter always has a special brew each Fest. And I always sneak in a few blueberries to add a fruity garnish to the pancake feast. The cost is reasonable – $6 for adults and $3 for children 12 and under. I always try to sneak in as “Pancake Child at Heart”

And not worry – they don’t spare the syrup – there is plenty more of that on brew all day long.

The fun of the Maple Syrup Festival is just getting together with old friends, having a good meal, not having to do the clean-up and dishes. Oh and the music. If you like down home and country with some fancy fiddling riffs – the Fest will serve you fine.

Fest Cleaners up and Batters up

So if you are looking for signs of Spring and a fabulous country meal – check out the Warkworth Maple Syrup Festival – its early in March, just before Spring officially arrives.

Thanks to Mary Weilandt for the photos from past Warkworth Syrup Festivals.

Before the Warkworth Maple Syrup Festival and well after the GroundHog’s Day tom-foolery, in the nether world between times comes Intimations of Spring. Here in picture, prose and poetry is that time in the Northumberland Hills of Eastern Ontario.

Intimations of Spring

Lost in thought
the winds crack a tree
a branch shudders, swooning
cracks again- a deathly silence
Shutter fall, wooing one more time
And caw caw … wisping away.

Spring comes this year in strange investments and associated garments. Bone chill cold brings a night even more so such that I retreat to the basement, turn off the furnace and steadfastly fill the iron stove to the full of birch and maple cuttings of two summer ago. Only these glowing embers, life forces up the chimney and into the night can staunch the shiver fog’s sway throughout the house.

Shiver Cold Fog

The stove’s radiant life of warmth is layered between two blankets – dozing off I think “am I keeping the cold out or maybe just as well the benevolent heat “… but before an answer arises to mind there are dancing trees. Trees that no the winter having their own radiance -

My oh Ma

Lost in the midst of the mists
whisps singular and throbbing in aura
like the heart but in shimmering glow
like an act of goodness amongst uncare
like an awaiting wind to carry a seed thing.

The weather gods still shake
in the canopy above to the roots below
but tawny have the winter endured
but shaders have become transparent
but only Springs tap and jive will abate.

But my dreams have their own music and drive, as if the arbours had come alive and wanted to swing and dance every care away in the middle of what I know, I feel, I sense all around is …

Ma oh Ma

I walk within a spirit of you
my thoughts become evident in silver breath hints
merging tippy top with fog’s Spring lyings.

Mon un Ami
Still you chill stealthy
if not biting in deep past severs
slicing divine at mine and expectations.

Ma oh My
what has shaken me most
is the writhing withinas if I saw a ghost of you in me.