Canadian forest fires

I'm a fan of the tour, but sometimes I just put the TV on mute (perhaps stick some music on) and enjoy the imagery. In the past the commentators would give a bit of history about a paticilar chateau or priory .
exactly - to much verbal, it's as if they have to justify their pay. I was lucky when we still lived in the Aveyron as the race came right past our front door. It was on a tight bend and if it had been raining I'm sure there would have been a chute. The atmosphere builds up just before the pelaton arrives with the gendarmes shouting 'they are coming'.
 
I lived for a couple of years in northern Galicia. Originally it was mostly oak forest with conifers on the mountainsides like the rest of NW Spain but these were cut down for shipbuilding. The extended family downstairs was led by Manilita, the grandmother and she told me that when she was a girl the countryside was rolling grasslands and valleys and plains growing wheat. Then the fascist Franco ordered that everywhere should be planted with Eucalyptus. This alien tree sucks up all the water and the land has a horrible grey/green colour. It is impossible to go walking through these plantations because the trees shed bark which is very oily and of course they catch fire very easily, which does no harm to the trees just provides them with wood ash fertiliser. The families that left because of starvation in the 1950s still retain ownership and employ contractors to cut every 12-15 years and replant.

Moving to inland Andalucia the only trees you see now are plantations to produce paper when once Andalucia was mainly forest which the Moors and Jews revered. Some land was cleared for crops and olive trees but then Granada finally fell to the Christians and they began to cut down all the forests. We lived in Guadix for 7 years, the river that in the time of the Moors ran all year, only once did I see a trickle of water. There is a road running out of the town which has the name in Spanish - foresters road, sad.

Desertification is a word that is hardly ever spoken in Spain but it is already happening and still the Spanish abuse their water resources. In 10 years there will be no wine made in Rioja. There is something about walking through a forest, a very primal experience. I had a friend now departed who went to visit a once fiance (they remained on good terms) who lived in the NW of the USA (Oregon) he decided to take a break in the great forests that are a part of life there. After 3 weeks she and her husband became worried as he had not returned, so they went to find him. They did but he refused to leave the forests, he actually told them to f/o. They literally had to drag him out. When he got back to the UK he said he found real tranquility in the forests. Even though both our dogs are now gone, 14 and 15 I still walk every day through wonderful woodland, the seasons bring change, every day is different and I get free brain massage. Steve Millar - people in the city are going insane but people in the country know one thing sure, everyone charming when they let themselves go - absolutely.
 
Black markets? Jack, I got a chuckle from that as we all know the colour of bitumen. I am curious though about your Lybian comment. Where does it go if not into asphalt?
if this is political, please send me a PM.
One the radio pundits did part of his research in ancient military history for his PhD in Libya, the car they were in fell into an enormous pothole and everyone had to get out and pry it out. He asked the driver why they don't fill in the potholes as Libya was a huge exporter...and that's the rest of the story.
 
Bill,

I haven’t even mentioned the deer that ate all (around 100) of my tulips. Seems they love them!
Yup, had to give up growing tulips at my last house because of the deer.
My garden was planted in the 1950’s by a few owners ago. The rose bush of the type available then doesn’t have great roses but championship thorns.
That may again be because of the deer. They ate all my roses down to a stump. Only dog roses escaped.
Bill I suspect you don’t have to watch out for deer while driving!
Oh I do. Have nerfed a few into the ditch in my time (gentle nudge mind). Round here only Roe and muntjac but where I used to live there was an old stately home that the govt had taken over. Back in victorian times* it had had a large deer park. Of course the deer had escaped and now roam around. These are the bigger fallow and I've had a fully grown white stag leap out in front of me from the braken. They did used to have an annual shoot to keep numbers under control which kept the local butcher stocked up. A dozen fallow in your garden can really give you the jeebies when you go out to the car in the dark to fetch something.

*seen 'Remains of the day'? The family in that story owned it.
 
Hate to point it out but England is only one part of the island off the European mainland. The vast oak forests of Cymru were still in existence until coal mining really took off and the Highland Clearances didn't begin until well after that little drunken wastrel Charles Edward Stuart (unfortunately a a blood relative of mine) had destroyed the Highland way of life.

Hey Black, we may be related. I'm a Stuart from Aberdeen. Mind you, I've lived in Oz most of my life. I don't know much about my family tree though.
 
The smoke is terrible this morning. There is an air quality alert for the area today; they said seniors should stay inside. It smells like there's a forest fire across the street. They said it will get worse as the day goes on.

This has been affecting my exercise regime. I cannot walk nearly as far as I usually do and I have been skipping days. I have developed a hoarse cough like I used to have before I quit smoking cigarettes. I hope someone in Canada is doing the rain dance. This is terrible and it's affecting millions of people in North America.
 
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Some south of the 49th as well, so y’all can practiced yer rain dances as well
It’s almost as if this was a -yikes, let’s hope no-one gets triggered - a global thing.
 

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Some south of the 49th as well, so y’all can practiced yer rain dances as well
It’s almost as if this was a -yikes, let’s hope no-one gets triggered - a global thing.

Yeah, I'm scared of wildfire for probably the first time in my life. It's so dry and windy and if I didn't know any better I'd think there was a fire right in the neighborhood. It's hard to believe smoke this thick is coming from so far away.

One lightening strike could start a wildfire in these conditions.