We went on vacation to Myrtle Beach (yes again) the last week and while it’s not cold here in Toronto, it was much warmer and nicer down south.  My mom accompanied us down so she and Brandon shared a room.  It was a very laid back vacation, we’ve been there many times so we mainly enjoyed nature and the beach.

One of the days, Brandon and I did break off and go for a nature walk and to do some birding (more on that later), for the short hike it was interesting that it felt like walking around nature at home but I didn’t recognize the trees or leaves on the ground.  We visited WonderWorks, it’s kind of like the Ontario Science Center but a bit more fun oriented.

For birding, Brandon and I mainly walked along the Myrtle Beach and saw a bunch of brown pelicans and seagulls fishing (and fighting over food).  We also visited Huntington Beach state park where we saw the some egrets and a pink spoonbill fishing in the marsh.

I haven’t taken many photos recently and this trip really revitalized my love of photography which was great.  I also spent some really amazing quality time with Brandon, some of the best moments I’ve had in the last little while… On another note, Brandon really liked using the Canon EOS R6, let’s see over the years he went from the Canon T4i to M50 to RP to the R to now the R6, lol what a lucky kid huh.  He did mention how he wished he could get closer to the animals and yeah his EF 70-300mm lens is a bit short, debating if I should get the new RF 100-400 as that thing looks to be a great value.

We came back yesterday afternoon and you could tell Slinky really missed us. A great way to end 2023, today we’ll just be relaxing at home as I’m tired from all the driving and enjoying the last long weekend of the year.

Picked Brandon up from camp last night and it was great to see him. He said he had a decent week, though was frustrated at the younger kids for not listening and messing around when instructions were given lol yeah that happens.  Next year he wants to attend but as a leader in training instead, he saw a few of the older scouts doing that and thought it’d be fun.

Before I picked Brandon up though I went for a walk with Mike, he wanted to explore the trails at Edward Gardens so I arrived an hour early to take a picture of the bugs and they did not disappoint!

I was using the Canon RF 100-500mm lens and it’s macro capabilities aren’t bad at all at 0.33x magnification (though I’m not selling my Canon RF 100mm macro lol).  As for the park, when Mike arrived, we walked down the main path down to Sunnybrook park.  He wasn’t feeling super hot though so we turned back soon but it was really nice to get out and walk around at least.

With Brandon returning home, I slept much better last night.  He has a lot of experience outdoors so I was not worried something would happen but still I feel better when he’s around.  I’ll sleep the best after Maggie returns from China, right now that looks to be around middle of August but we’ll see.

Well this August long weekend was certainly busy.  Things started early for Brandon and I, we went to the cottage mid day and when we got there built the patio furniture that we bought back in May lol.  We also built two desks that can be used for computers then went to play some Pokemon Go, had dinner and met Maggie at night after her badminton match. Saturday as usual Maggie went to the Belleville farmers market then we went to JYSK to pick up a new center beam for one of our beds.  Their stuff is a bit on the cheaper side, a bit to cheap if you ask me and one of the beds broke.  I have a feeling it won’t get any better so we’ll probably have to replace it soon.

Maggie & Brandon headed back while I took photos and tidied up a bit more, I’ve been really bad and we haven’t done any short term rentals yet, that’s on the list of things to do and it’s definitely on the top of the list.  I took the scenic route home and the Lexus NX is no IS lol…  The drive is still enjoyable but I mean the NX is an SUV that’s high up in the air, with the IS it had grip for ages and you could really throw that thing around the corner.  When I got home, Brandon wanted to go swimming so this time Maggie joined him in the water and I took some pictures. 🙂

Hehe now that I know what to do with the pool to keep it clean and clear, it’s definitely quite nice to have and they spent about an hour and a half splashing.  Poor Slinky could only watch us from the inside of the house…  A bit later I did let him onto the patio however watched him closely as I’m worried he might run off somewhere.

Sunday Eddy & I went to near Algonquin (to our usual spot) to do some astrophotography and it was a ton of fun.  Clouds were in the air but we really lucked out and the weather cooperated once we got on site.  Oh on the way up Highway 35, a black bear decided to run across our path and it’s a good thing it did it during the day because it would have been difficult to see at night!

The sunset looked quite nice so we took a quick stop to take a few photos.  I brought my BNVDs up and also played with the DBAL A3 as you can see, the blue light behind me is from the thermacell mosquito repellants and they work pretty damn well!  The bugs were pretty bad when we got on site around 930pm but by 11 were mainly gone.  I saw a fox run by us on the road under nods and man it’s so much fun to play at night.  I took a time lapse with one of the cameras and it turned out pretty well, I’ll post that a bit later.

Got back around 330am and by 830 I was up and about.  Not too tired and it was a rather lazy day at home, except I had to help Maggie build a drawer set she bought from Structube and that was an absolute nightmare.  It was pretty expensive too but total particle board garbage, I told her never to buy their stuff again. The instructions were pretty poor, there were what I felt a lot of redundant screws and it just took so damn long…  She bought a second for Brandon’s room but I told her there’s absolutely no way I’m going to spend 4 hours building a second one as it was an absolutely horrible experience.

Live and learn though sigh the long weekend is over and it’s back to the grind tomorrow.

So this was certainly a busy weekend & it started with a 6th birthday party for Georgia.  Man where does the time go, I remember hearing her cries outside the delivery room and now she’s getting so big.  It was just our family and we had it at the park where the kids could play, then we went back to Estelle’s house for lunch and cake.

Hehe she’s so sweet and 6 is a very great age, some of my best memories of Brandon were from that time.  Afterwards I went to pick up a trailer hitch for the Lexus NX then came home to unpack, ugh there’s still so much but we’re making progress…

Today Brandon and I went to look for osprey in the morning and was quite successful.

I think there were 4-5 nests with chicks and it was really great to see these awesome birds.  After lunch we played Pokemon Go for about an hour and a half then back home for more unpacking (well I unpacked while he played games).  Overall it was pretty leisurely and tomorrow I get back to work, sigh my “vacation” is over already and it went by so damn quickly but that’s how it always is.