Images of a summer's day

Thursday, July 12th, was a gorgeous summer's day. The sun was shining, and the outdoors were inviting. I had an afternoon gardening job, followed by a kayak tour of the Niagara River. Here are some of the images of the day:

In the morning, I went to Grand Island Town Hall for a meeting. The meeting was very productive. I then went to the southern end of the island, which is where I stayed for a number of hours.

First, lunch at the Village Inn! The owner, Michael Carr, has owned the restaurant since 1988. The previous restaurant was called Lippen's Grille. It is located next door to a private home that used to be Tucker's Store. The store sign is still on the window. At one time, Tucker's Store was the home of Grand Island's post office.

Then it was time to get to work on a garden! My task was to clear out exess vegetation around a holly bush. The poor bush had become lost in the vegetation. As I cleared out the vegetation, I found some little friends, who were out to have an adventure.

"I travel slowly because I carry my house on my back."

Pretty yellow shell, with snail inside. This was a very shy snail, and I never once saw it emerge from its shell.

Could it be... a snail convention??? By the time I had finished clearing out the area around the holly bush, there was a collection of snails in a small open area. The convention had grown.

After the gardening job, it was onward to Beaver Island State Park for a kayaking tour with Buffalo-Niagara Riverkeeper.

We started by paddling in the lagoon before heading out to the Niagara River.

As a group, we crossed the river. We were instructed to paddle hard because of the strong currents that were coming in our direction. Because my main forms of exercise are walking and dancing, kayaking posed a new challenge for me. It's all about upper body strength. For me, that's something that needs work.

It was hard to paddle against the current, but I did it. Once we crossed the river, we found ourselves in calm waters at Strawberry Island. It is the island that I wrote about a few years ago in this blog. Here is a link to the blog post, dated January 25th, 2015. It is still a work in progress. The land is now owned by New York State Department of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation, and it is now called Strawberry Island State Park.

It was a beautiful day to paddle.

Here we are at Motorboat Island, which was once the home of a motorboat club, owned by Fingy Connors of Buffalo. The clubhouse was opened on September 27th, 1907, and it burned down in 1909. A commercial clambake was held on the island before the clubhouse was opened. The remains of the boat slips can still be seen on the shore of the island. Here is a link to an Island Dispatch article that I wrote about a presentation on Strawberry Island and Motorboat Island.

We then paddled back to Grand Island, crossing the river for the second time. It was a great adventure for a summer's evening.

For conversation: what do you enjoy doing on a summer's day?