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I spent some time with
Joyce and James Mackenzie who retired to Elliot Lake some eight years ago
and they tell me it's a wonderful place to live. It's very friendly and
the many organisations are friendly and helpful. They were considering
going to the USA to retire but as they had no luck in getting a green card
and visa to retire down there they looked around and saw that Elliot Lake
offered them great prices for housing and of course they were in the
country surrounded by forests and lakes. They kindly showed me their home
and I was certainly impressed with all the wild life around their garden.
They do also say you need to watch out for bears and the city has recently
passed a bylaw to ensure that rubbish is kept out of reach of the bears
which is starting to persuade them not to come into the city.
Joyce does a lot of quilt making and James
does some painting
Joyce's quilted wallhanging, "A Second
Chance" won second place at Quilts Canada 2004, Trendtex-Challenge in
Winnipeg, Manotiba. The inspiration for the piece came from a painting by
Chapleau artist, Wabamagueil, who very generously gave permission for
Joyce to use it in her quilt.
As you can likely see from the above there are
birds, squirrels and chipmunks as well as their dog Angus and they tell me
they've had a bear in the garden and hawks have flown in as well
Joyce far right with a friend and picture on
left is an 1888 edition of the newspaper
Angus in the canoe
James and Joyce in the winderness
On the 28th July 2004 Joyce and James kindly
entertained me to a most enjoyable dinner and I took the opportunity to
take a few more photos so they could pass them to family and friends and
here they are...
On the way down to the quilitng room Joyce has
a picture of her father and great-grandmother who was 92 in that picture
And this is how it all starts and on the right
you see work in progress
You do see wee reminders of Scotland around
the house as Joyce of course comes from Brechin in Scotland.
And a wee reminder of James's Police career
And more Brechin :-)
James's father in football gear
And a few photos for the family album with
Angus included of course!
And many thanks to you both for looking after
me on my trip to Elliot Lake and getting me out to see so many places and
people while I was here. It has been a memorable visit :-) |
