lake colour

a slightly overcast day... the light diffused

blues softened, pairing beautifully with the grey-green of the foliage

love how it all looks on the sand dunes

Lake Bennett is my favourite of the Yukon lakes

from the beach looking out nothing has changed, no development, no signs of man except for when the train rolls along the shore

 peaceful

last August a friend and her husband went west rather than south, into Windy Arm, which on that day was anything but

same kind of day though, the light diffused, a dead calm

a click of the camera in one direction...

and again in another... ninety seconds apart

if you ever wondered where my love of subtle came from...

"oh there's a land, have you seen it?"

in the pink

pink isn't a colour I tend to work with, nor drawn to, though I don't dislike it...

in recent days I have had a couple of encounters with it that have been pretty special

sunset on Friday night, around 11:15

the days are already getting noticeable shorter, and the night sky has some darkness to it in the wee small hours

the sky started with a soft pink and over the next few minutes it the colours of the sky deepened

and deepened, gaining intensity

the blues becoming more violet-tinged, especially at the horizon

and then it began to fade...

and lighter still

the most beautiful sunset I've ever seen

and definitely the pinkest!

a few days before that I found a "paintbrush" plant whilst walking along the river

clusters of what seem to be red berries of a sort though you really can't see any individual berries

they're in soft clusters that as soon as they're touched the colour is released, staining whatever they come into contact with

I gathered several stalks and pulled the colour clusters off, placing them in a jar in the fridge

a few days later I took one out and rubbed it on a page in my watercolour book

no idea how permanent it might be but not too worried about that - I'll draw into this once I go back and get a closer look at the plants

(my photographs didn't turn out at all)

afterwards I added a bit of water to the jar and cooked it in a pot of steaming water for about 30 minutes, adding a few drops of vinegar and a dash of salt

once the mixture had cooked down a bit I removed it from the heat, let it cool, then strained it into a small jar to use as ink

there was some left over so I used that to paint a few papers

this first one is on watercolour paper

and this next one is on khadi paper

very pleased with both of these and next is to try the ink with my dip pen

made from plants found by the river... local colour

love that I found it and got such great results

the stockpile of working materials to take home to the studio is growing and growing

my heart is full

what we want and what we get

years ago, whenever I wrote a thinking reflective type of post I would begin with an image of Robert Service standing outside his cabin in Dawson City, pipe and papers in hand

for some reason that image made me think of a conversation waiting waiting to happen, something interesting

on arriving from Whitehorse I stood in front of said cabin and though it wasn't for the first time, it was no less special

no renovations have been done to it except perhaps the stairs, but two days after this photo the fence was taken down and in the process of being replaced

on that day we wandered up there for a last look before heading back to Whitehorse

it was too early for the cabin to be open to visitors but the Parks Canada employee working on the fence waved us into the yard to explore on our own 

what a treat to have it all to ourselves!

a faint path led up through the wildflowers and grasses of the front yard and for the first time I noticed the front door

every time I have been there over the years and decades the door has been open for the tours - I hadn't seen it shut before

random strips of wood,  cobbled together as so many things in Dawson City always were, it's full of creative inspiration

I would have loved to take a rubbing of some the textures but didn't dare press my luck; close-up photographs will do just fine

the old rusted hinges and padlock on the door keep it true to the Yukon

later, walking through streets of old buildings in this living ghost town we found this painted on one side

 

fitting words for my experience there... I went wanting one thing, came away with it but also a fresh perspective on life and lives lived, what lasts and what doesn't, what we want and what we actually need and how all of that fits in with the passage of time

random...

this past week has been filled with all sorts of random things... a beach day, another beach day at a different lake, a walk along the river, landscaping, playing

seems fitting then that the photos in this post will be a random collection too

first is a tangle of wildflowers along the Yukon River

a very windy day at Lake Bennett

a glacier lake, the water was icy cold that day so wading only - but I did love the colour bands of the water

zooming in on the far-off mountains 

many Yukon mountains have amazing fractals and I never tire of looking at them

a quick rough sketch - the wind made it just about impossible

I wanted to paint a full-page spread and though I was using elastic bands to hold the pages in place they were impossible to paint around so I took them off but then had to continually fight the wind

still, the messiness of the sketch, especially the water, will always remind me of that day

enjoying the long daylight hours - this was taken at 11:37 p.m., just as I was going to bed

and no, I did not pull the blind!

and finally, Grey Mountain, looming over Whitehorse

this is the mountain my grandson is named after

on a dark rainy day, the sun came out briefly and lit it beautifully

Monday we go to Dawson City for a couple of days and there the days will be even longer

on the solstice people stand on the "Dome" overlooking the city and the watch the sun circle the horizon 

it truly is "The Land of the Midnight Sun"