For the last three nights we've heard a ferocious wind gusting through the chimney rattling about in the fireplace though it hasn't managed to shut down the fire warming us every night. Last night gave us the most intense blusters yet to ghost the house. Despite which we enjoyed a spectacular display of colour last evening as the sun put itself to bed with lovely pinks, oranges and yellows glowing across the sky.

Following hard on the extreme weather of an all-day ice storm and  high winds, we've been enjoying brilliantly sunny days, albeit very cold ones. In the expectation that since we're now into April, I could dispense with the winter-grade duvet on our bed, I substituted a light-weight duvet yesterday when I changed the weekly linen. Irving didn't notice, but the puppies did, sniffing curiously at the new bed covering.

 

 

It was extraordinarily cold today. Partly because that high wind gusting through the atmosphere continues to dominate, despite the sun and the thermometer that now reads 5C. We suspect the thermometer is being tricked by the sun glaring down on it, hardly suspecting that it's really an icy day far below that 5-degree  temperature. Even in the backyard which tends to be a hotbox because it's so protected, the wind tore through our jackets when we were out with the puppies.

And in the ravine bursting gusts of high wind didn't confine themselves as they did yesterday to the tree canopy, but honoured us with chill fingers of ice probing our clothing. Just as well we dressed for it. Still, it appears that the sun is doing its spring job of melting the snowpack, since the creek is running wider and deeper, rushing turbulently along, fully committed to spring.

 

There were crows wheeling about and calling their encouragement. And we saw a small flock of Canada geese crossing the sky, the first returnees we've seen so far on their alternate spring migration. They'll settle in triumph on the Ottawa River, boasting they're the first ones, prepared to welcome others that will soon be returning.

 

It was a visually exquisite landscape that invited us to the forest today. Tough underfoot, though, the snow-and-ice-packed trails turning into ice-crystalled slush, exacting the toll of dragging each step backward, or sinking into the frozen mash, booted feet sliding sideways, backward and lopsided. Possibly it's the prospect of that awkward gait that led to our being the only people out to enjoy the forest this afternoon; all to ourselves.