Flickr Galleries

Beziers - Friday Market, originally uploaded by Charles G Thompson/100 Miles.

Recently I discovered a new Flickr feature called Galleries . With this feature you can create a gallery of up to 18 photos from other unrestricted Flickr photos on the topic of your choice. So I've been having fun creating Galleries relating to my planned trip to France this coming winter.

I plan to spend February in Beziers and the surrounding area:

Beziers Gallery

I love the fresh markets, flower markets and flea markets in France.

Markets of Beziers Gallery

The Canal Du Midi which connects the Atlantic and the Mediterranean was designed and built by a man from Beziers and goes through Beziers and I plan to do some practice hiking along the Canal.

The Canal du Midi Gallery

Starting March first I hope to start walking the Camino route from Le Puy en Velay to Saint Jean Pied de Port on the French - Spanish border.

The Le Puy Camino Gallery

As you can see some very beautiful photos, hope I'm able to take some that are as good.

The square foot garden project.

The square foot garden project., originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

First crops planted in my Square foot Garden Project. The Garlic the I ordered from Salt Spring Island Seeds arrived and I planted it along with some garlic that I had in the kitchen. This will give me a chance to compare the results from the expensive seed garlic to the regular store bought garlic.

Before I planted the garlic I added a generous amount of Seafood Compost to each square foot cell and worked it into the soil. The use of Seafood Compost seemed very appropriate as the variety of Garlic that I had selected from Salt Spring Island Seeds is called Fish Lake # 3. The Fish Lake cloves are much larger then the store bought variety so I allowed them more room in the square foot cell. Each head of Fish Lake only had four cloves though which was a bit disappointing, considering the price including shipping was $13.00 for two heads. The cloves should have a good chance to set roots and get established before the ground freezes in late November or early December.

Last of the cucumbers pickled and the last of the tomatoes canned.

Last of the cucumbers pickled and the last of the tomatoes canned. , originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

This years canning is almost finished just a couple more things to do the cranberries and the apples both of which wont be ready to pick until we have a a few frosts in early October.

The grow bag garden has been quite successful especially in my little greenhouse. I only had two hybrid greenhouse cucumber plants and they produced enough cucumbers to make three batches of pickles, one batch of dill and two batches of sweet bread and butter, and that is besides having a steady supply of cucumbers for salads and sandwiches since mid July. There were six tomato plants in the greenhouse and they did very well, mid August before I started getting ripe ones but there has been a good supply since then and I have four quarts canned for pasta sauces this winter. I had another dozen plants in grow bags in the garden but after the five weeks of rain in late June and all of July they were hit by a blight and died along with my potato plants. I didn't get any tomatoes off them and potato harvest was very small, but tasty.

The square foot garden project.

The square foot garden project., originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

I filled two more frames with compost from the grow bag garden and it took four of the eighty five liter bags to fill each one, so I should have enough to fill all six frames. The rest of the grow bags are still in use in the greenhouse and the small garden in front of the house so I will have to wait until the crops are finished growing or hit with frost before I can fill the other frames.

Next I set a dozen fence posts and put up the rabbit fence. I bought fifty feet of fence and had just enough with only a short piece left over. I decided not to put a gate into the garden, I figured that would just create a place where they could squeeze through, instead I'm going to make a stile out of cinder blocks on both sides of the fence. Hopefully rabbits aren't clever enough to figure out how to use a stile.

The square foot garden project.

The square foot garden project., originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

The day began with a visit to the hardware store to buy more nails so I could finish the last raised bed frame. After building the frame it was on to the 12 X 12 foot site where I hoped to be able to put all six frames. As I cleared the grow bags and removed the black plastic mulch from the area it became clear that if I put all six frames in this area it will be over crowded and very difficult to work around, so I decided to put only four frames in this area. The other two will be placed in another area where I already have a large raised bed. Since this new area will be the only area with a fence to keep the rabbits out I will need to remember to grow crops that the rabbits don't like in the two beds that will be outside the fence. This year the rabbits didn't bother the onions, tomatoes, potatoes and squash so I should be able to fill those beds with these crops.

I also harvested a nice crop of potatoes and squash from the containers and grow bags.

After I removed the plastic I spent a couple of hours with a garden spade tuning the soil over in the bed because it had become quite compacted from walking on it this summer. I was pleased to see that the sod that I had turned over in late spring had composted nicely.

I was able to fill one of the frames with the compost from the potato containers and one grow bag. I have nineteen grow bags left each containing eighty five liters of compost not sure if that is enough to fill the three remaining frames or not.

I divided the filled frame with cedar laths that I bought for this purpose. My square foot garden isn't divided into square feet however, for a couple of reasons, the inside dimensions of the frame ended up being 46 X 46 inches and also the width of the dividers take away from the growing space. Each section is 10.5 inches square.

The square foot garden project.

The square foot garden project., originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

My square foot garden project began last spring when I turned the sod over on a 12 foot square area of the back lawn. I then covered this area with black plastic mulch and gardened on top of this with grow bags for this summer. Today phase two of the project began with the arrival of the lumber to build six four foot square raised planters with and also the posts and fifty feet of fence to help keep the rabbits out.

I built the first planter in the driveway where I had the lumber dropped and quickly discovered when it came time to move it to the back garden that assembled they are too heavy for me to carry comfortably. So I carried all of the building supplies out to the back garden and continued the construction out there. Fortunately I ran out of nails about the same time that I ran out of energy. I got five of the six planters built and will finish the other one as soon as I get some more nails.

I ordered garlic yesterday so I need to have one of these planters ready to use as soon as it arrives so it will have a chance to get rooted this fall.

Camino Friends Meeting Lincoln, N.B. September 12, 2009

Camino Friends Meeting Lincoln, N.B. September 12, 2009, originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

I attended the annual meeting of the Maritime Chapter of the Canadian Company of the Pilgrims of the Camino, this past Saturday. It was great to get together with people who have already experienced the Camino as wells as those who are making plans for a future Pilgrimage. Our special guest was Peter Coffman and his wife Diane who walked the Camino with the late Oliver Schroer and his wife Elena in 2004. Peter gave a beautiful presentation of that walk illustrated with his slides and the music that Oliver recorded along the way in the Churches of the Camino. We also had presentations from several of our members who walked the Camino in the past year and of course like any good maritime gathering we had a fabulous pot luck buffet luncheon.

Peter Coffman

Oliver Schroer

Onions, Shallots and Garlic harvested and laid out to dry.

Onions, Shallots and Garlic harvested and laid out to dry., originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

I'm so pleased with the success that I've had this year growing Onions, Shallots and Garlic. I have never been able to grow onions of any size before and I've tried many times. This year a friend who is a master gardener told me not to plant onion sets but to start my onions from seed in the house . He recommended starting them in February, I got a little carried away and started them under lights in mid January and the result has been amazing. I harvested them all this morning and laid them out on my front deck to dry in the sun. There is a good crop of Shallots too also grown from seed and some small garlic grown from garlic cloves. I didn't plant the garlic until late spring and I think they would be larger if I planted them in the fall so that is my plan for this year.

1. Garlic, 2. Onion Cortland, 3. Onion Greek Salad, 4. Shallots Ambition

Created with fd's Flickr Toys

The Reluctant Prodigy | CBC News:The National

A video from the CBC National News September 7, 2009, an amazing 14 year old boy.

The Reluctant Prodigy | CBC News:The National

Shared via AddThis

Beziers in February

DSC03924 Beziers, originally uploaded by fotoart1945.

As I said in an earlier post I'm making plans to do another Camino walk this time from Le Puy en Valey starting the first of March 2010. I hope to be able to average 20KM per day which will give me lots of time to walk the Chemin de Saint Jacques from Le Puy to the foot of the Pyrenees at Saint Jean Pied de Port , by the middle of April. I would like to do lots of practice walking before I start on the Chemin, as a matter of fact I started last week. The problem that I always have is our bitter cold winter weather in January and February some times for weeks on end it is just too cold and windy to get any serious walking done, so I started thinking about going over to France and renting a GÎTES or apartment for all or part of February to give me some time to get in a few practice walks. The criteria that I set for my location was snow free, reasonable temperature, in a small town or city, good transportation links by both train and bus, reasonably priced accommodations, walking trails in the area and in a good location for day or overnight trips to other areas of interest. After doing some research I have settled on Beziers in the Languedoc-Roussillon region of southwest France. A small city of 69,000 very well served by both train and bus, you can take one of several TGV high speed trains daily leaving Paris Charles de Gaulle International Airport direct to Beziers in under 5 hours. Once in Beziers there is good train and bus connections to other locations of interest in the area. I'm planning to stay at an Apart-Hotel which rents studio and one bedroom apartments called Le Fonserane I have been quoted a rate of 210 Euro a week for a studio in February so I will make reservations for the whole month. They won't accept reservations for 2010 until November. Beziers is only a few kilometers from the Mediterranean and short distances from Carcassonne to the west and Montpellier to the east. The Canal du Midi goes through this part of France connecting the Atlantic and the Mediterranean and there are walking trails that follow the canal both east and west of Beziers I'm not sure but I think the trails are the tow path along the canal. I hope to make this a two or three day walk at some point during my stay.