Pink barn

I love old barns. We had one up north, a ramshackle, disintegrating, greying, roomy old building that housed our rabbits, goats, chickens, geese, and horse. Cosily enough, even though the old boards had shrunk over the years, leaving gaps we could see light through. But the fragrant bales of hay in the loft, the trampled hay on the floor provided warmth and comfort all winter.

Sometimes, in the summer, I would just stand there in the cool, listening to the interspecies chatter around me, revelling in the colours and shapes; the silvery grey of old wood, the ripe yellow-brown of the tail end of last year's hay, rich browns of horse and old leather saddle, pitchforks and pails, bags of feed smelling of grain and molasses, a smooth, round goose egg . . .

25 years later, the sight of a decaying barn brings it all back.

Small barn in afternoon sunlight, Fraser Valley.

Moo!

I drove out to Chilliwack for a first birthday party; a noisy, turbulent affair, with a half-dozen excited kids under 4, plus three babies, and their parents and grand-parents all talking at once. Such fun!

So on the way home, I was too tired to brave the freeway in the rain without someone along to keep me awake, and I cut across the farmland, turning south and east, as the roads permitted. I passed fields green (new grass), brown (very wet mud, plowed for planting) and yellow (daffodil farms), crossed canals and irrigation ditches, full of swirling brown water. The rain eased off, and it was barely sprinkling when I passed a harrier criss-crossing a field, so I stopped to take a photo out the window.

Cow barn, half-green hillside, and harrier.

The weather held for a few minutes: I managed to shoot a couple more barns before the bottom dropped out of the clouds.

Red barns and fresh snow on the mountain.

Mossy old barn

Trapped cows

I hadn't noticed the window at the back of the barn until I was looking over my photos.

When Laurie first came to Canada from the UK, long, long ago, he worked his way west across the country as a hired man on dairy farms. He tells me, from time to time, about one farm where the cows were fed in the barn all year, and never released into the field. When the early spring grass sprouted outside, they would smell it and stand at the door, lowing and lowing, wanting so badly to get out there. But that was next winter's hay; they were doomed to eat the remains of last year's.

Sad.

Time is good to wood

I love old wood, especially weathered, hard-working, experienced old wood. Here are a handful of samples from the trip to Bella Coola.

The old Hayden barn, Bella Coola. It was in the orchard in front that we saw the bear cubs picking apples.

Log cabin, Nicola Valley. At present used as a picnic site.

Typical Chilcotin fence. These are made using local trees, a bit of baling wire, occasionally a nail or two. Every fence builder has his own style.

Zigzag fence. A common pattern.

My storage shed, Firvale, already old when we lived here in the 1970s. The house and barn are gone, the fences have been taken down; all that remains is the shed. A new house will soon be built on the hill above.

Tumbledown Dairy

We've been driving past this barn on the Ladner Trunk road for a long time. Each trip, I am surprised to see it still standing, and say, "Next time, we'll stop and take photos." Thursday was this "next time," finally.

Tumbledown barn

Side wall, curved like a boat's hull, but not watertight.

Nor is the roof.

Geometric hodge-podge.

Lean-to on the end. Leaning.

Detail of one wall.

In spite of all that twisting and crumbling, Laurie says the building is sturdy enough. I don't quite believe him, but he has evidence:

Solid underpinnings.

I still wouldn't get too close; I was afraid even to sneeze.

It seems to have been used as a dairy barn:

Surge. 1983 - 1999 logo.

This is on the door of the shed at the rear, beside the old tank. (see top photo) (Would that be for milk?) Laurie tells me that Surge is the name of the milker they were using.*

In a dirty window in the shed, a glimpse of machinery, and a reflection of the farm across the road.

Fans, motor, tanks and stuff. With blackberry runners, both Himalayan and cutleaf or evergreen.

Through another window, a back door and a pile of assorted parts, vintage and modern.

And there was an unexpected bonus; I almost stepped on a patch of large cup mushrooms.


It came with a 1981 penny for size comparison. I brought that home with me. Waste not, want not..

*Here are some of the Surge advertising cartoons. Cute! And a smiling milkmaid on a postcard (scroll down).
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And it's for sale, too!

Old house, ready for demolition:




What we found in the back yard, next post.

Meanwhile, go on over to Wren's place to join her in celebration of the Joy of Birds. (I & the Bird #83). It includes a link to a couple of definitions of a blog carnival, I&tB included. One of them may be a trifle biased:

"A blog carnival is a rotating ego trip that inexplicably always rejects my comprehensive collection of guano jokes."

Go see!
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A break from making lists

Abandoned house; Turtle Valley, BC

And an old barn, with light shining through the roof.

Just because.