Nature's Palette

We've been a long time absent from our once-favoured hiking playground. Aeons ago, when our children were young and so were we, every spare leisure minute was spent up at Gatineau Park. There we learned to canoe on the wonderful lakes that supported all manner of delightful aquatic creatures, enthusiastically introduced to us by our younger son.

We snowshoed there, over winter-frozen lakes, hearing the ice settle and crack under us. We undertook frequent summer-time hikes, and often for the purpose of gathering wild strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and blackberries. All in their fragrant, colourful and most edible seasons. In competition with area bears, some of whose scat we would occasionally step in.

It's where we often headed after a long day's work, to picnic with the children, and to dip our paddles in the quiet lake, no one else remotely near to where we were. There, at dusk, we would see deer come out, lift themselves to mouth ripe red apples from wild apple trees. There too, we would see raccoons skimming the water of the lake, looking for clams to pull out and enjoy sitting on a nearby rock. There too, we would paddle past beaver ponds and hear the loud slap of a territorial tail.

We would hear the wild lunacy of loons declaring the lake theirs; ours but to enjoy in the most fleeting, temporary of manners. There, the great blue heron and the smaller green herons nested and treated us occasionally to leisurely views of their ongoing pursuits. We would watch kingfishers dive for prey, breaking the smooth surface of the slumbering lake. It's where our budding child-biologist trapped small-mouth bass to take home to his aquarium. It's where we first heard and saw pileated woodpeckers.

So, since the forecasted weather for today promised a high of 28 degrees under a clear blue sky with slight wind, we decided we'd give it a go. Once on the eastern Parkway, we had the best of omens, a beautiful goldfinch fleeting past our vision, its gorgeous colour in synchrony with the bright yellow trailing lotus spilling over in lush abundance on the highway shoulders, enhanced by the true purple of cow vetch creeping over all the upright grasses.

There we also saw daisies in abandoned bloom of white, and Queen Anne's lace, newly blooming its embroidered presence alongside pink, and mauve clover. Recreational bikers out in droves, enjoying the prospect of a long and lazy day, the sun warming their scantily-clad bodies. It's a nice wide road with ample room for everyone. Still, one wonders why they'd choose the highway when there are specific-use bicycle pathways alongside the Ottawa River; far more picturesque than the highway.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police sleek black herd of equines are all out there, in their enclosure, at pasturage. It's where people like to take their small children, to park alongside the fencing, to allow them to see these wonderful horses close up and personal. The horses, themselves curious about the presence of other creatures, often make their way over to the hopefully excited children, to allow them the experience of hesitantly stroking a velvety head.

At the Aeronautical Museum there seems to be a run on the prospect of viewing the contents. All the parking spaces are jammed with cars, and there is spillover parking in places never before imagined. There too, we see signage advertising that day's CHEO's Teddy Bear picnic where indulgent parents will encourage their very young children to bring along their well-worn stuffed animals for tender loving care by CHEO volunteers.

What child could ever, thereafter, feel fear at the prospect of having to enter that Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, for treatment? Any hospital that would go out of its way to love and care for beloved inanimate objects that at night offer comfort and slumber-security, could most certainly be trusted to love and care for bright young children whose brightness has temporarily been dimmed.

The Parkway delivers its own inimitable pleasures. It boasts a landscape of perfect tree specimens, from the huge pendulant willows, to the perfectly shaped pines, spruces and firs. The balanced puffed heads of bass. Careful grooming of the area lends it the air of a monumental garden. Which it most certainly is; not only Nature's intimate devising with a little help from the National Capital Commission, but ours, as well.

As we approach Chelsea, in Quebec, we see the usual congregation of bicyclists and casual week-end drivers, mostly young and hip, eager to spend time looking and being observed, having brunch and lunch or munchies at the hippest food establishments in the area. Operating from within converted, rambling houses of superior vintage and construction, whose perennial gardens have been carefully tended to resemble Ye Olde English Gardens of yore.

They sit there, the young and the beautiful, the fit and the wanna-be's, al fresco, carefully selecting from a menu that promises organic produce, home-cooked-style meals and crafty presentations in an atmosphere of having arrived at a nirvana of the cool and the hip. Chatting among themselves, gesturing emphatically to emphasize their brilliant conclusions, and assuring themselves of good company, great food, superb ambiance.

We turn down the roadway to take us to Kingsmere; our destination, more or less, for our anticipated hike. The road has been made even narrower by the installation of pop-down warning sticks, that the narrow road must be shared, the bicycle lanes outlined aggressively in buttercup yellow. So drive slowly, and be aware, ye motorists, for this is the playground of other lawful users, as well.

Further along, we turn onto the Gatineau Parkway, where the median and the shoulders of the road are softly fuzzed with purple-blooming creeping thyme. A haze of fragrant herbs further setting the atmosphere. Farther along, beside the roadway, there are blue-blue cornflowers, daisies, floral-dangling milkweed, and ferns. Bicyclists crowd the road, painted a solid yellow no-pass.

No pass? When bicyclists are riding six abreast, not single- or double-line? Nice and slow, careful does it, but pass we do, the bicyclists seemingly oblivious to needs other than their own. There are others, hundreds of others bicyclists who travel singly or in pairs, and who do consider the need to share the roadway fairly, and somehow we all manage to do just that.

The lot at Lake Mulvihill is surprisingly empty; one other vehicle besides our own, which we park under overhanging branches to take advantage of the shade they offer. And then we're off. There are opaque-white cowslips in bloom alongside the road, and pale yellow potentilla, spiral-white daisies and Solomon's seal.

Once on the trail proper we appreciate the presence of towering old maples, oak and beech, which tend to dominate the area. Although ash, birch and ironwood also make their presence from time to time. This is the deciduous side of the trail; evergreens will appear eventually, as we proceed. The undergrowth is devoted to ferns, Solomon's seal, and the truly ubiquitous columbines, no longer in flower.

But geraniums, fleabane, thimbleberry and hawkweed do flower in places where the sun manages to fleetingly filter through the green canopy. There are also clusters of bright red baneberry, peeking through the dark green foliage surrounding them. The emphatically distinct trill of thrushes drown out the less intrusive song of robins, in the overhanging trees.

Button and Riley toddle along, stopping often for prolonged, deep sniffs, obviously entranced by odours too particular for us to be aware of. In the depths of this inner trail with its mature canopy, we're shielded from the sun, and a light breeze riffles by, sifting nicely through our hair. Although at this time of year for the past several, we've been plagued by the presence of blackflies long past their normal season, none are now in evidence.

Nor are there many mosquitoes to detract from our pleasure in this hike. For that matter, even though it's a lovely Saturday summer's day, there are scant few other hikers sharing the trails. An amazing turn of events, altogether. Quite different from what we had expected, imagining encountering the usual dozens of people taking their constitutionals.

As we approach the area where a creek, normally low at this time of year, feeds into a small waterfall at the conclusion of Kingsmere's "waterfall trail", an almost thunderous sound of falling water grows louder by the footstep. Accounted for by all the rain we've experienced, the last several months. The steam is wide and full, its water crystal-clear and running swiftly. On its banks, flowering rue, in white powdery drifts.

We hear an ovenbird distantly calling. Black-winged, iridescent-blue-bodied Damselflies flutter about one another, in a late-season display of ritualized mating. We're surprised at how dry most of the trail is, but for the occasional plot of muck, easily avoided. Button steps daintily around the muck. Riley plods stolidly through it.

Rock-strewn ascents and gravel-laden descents take us through the deciduous forest, where only a few months ago wild garlic, beloved of country folk, grew in abandon - but protected by law - at the bases of gnarled old trees. Inviting us to pluck them - quickly, stealthily - pop them into our watering mouths to enjoy their fresh, pungent aroma and taste.

As we ascend the last long hill leading to the Larriault trail which completes our one-and-a-half-hour circuit, a young man, jogging alongside a large yellow Labrador comes into view. Combative Riley gets hoisted, but we allow Button to stay aground, noting the jogger has his dog's leash firmly in hand. Button trots on beside me, unconcerned, while Riley is frantically barking and snarling at the large dog, from his vantage, under-arm.

I smile, greet the runner. The dog pulls as he passes us, and lunges toward a startled Button. It's growling, straining toward Button, who has drawn back, hesitating to proceed. The dog's owner jerks it sharply away, and continues his run, his dog chastened, right beside him. Just as well, given our stupid little dog's temperament, that there are so few people there this day.

Approaching Lake Mulvihill we hear the deep-throated thrum of bullfrogs and are delighted they're still there. It's well accepted that pesticide and organic-waste run-off from farm fields and chemical waste run-off from cottages have impacted deleteriously on aquatic life-forms. Frogs of all types have been the first to give firm indication of just how impacted wildlife has become.

A small orange-and-black butterfly, its colouration and conformation similar to that of the much larger Monarch flits past us. A question-mark? A comma?