Visitors

Summer has begun (officially, although the weekend started very chilly here). After 7 weeks in residence, we now smile condescendingly as “the weekend people” and “the summer people” arrive at their lakeside cottages now that schools are out! This week was “Bike Week” in Laconia, when thousands of bikers visit Lake Winnipesaukee and tour the local towns and villages. On Friday a group of 15 kayakers visited the lake and explored every inch on a sunny and breezy day.

 

 

We also have our own “visitor month” in progress, with friends and family from New York staying with us each weekend. Last week’s friends were returning from Maine to Long Island, and loved the (relative) warmth and tranquility of our NH lake. This weekend our older son and woman-partner were up from Brooklyn, and initially found it very cold here compared to perspiring NY City!  But by evening when the wind on the lake subsided with the setting sun, the NY visitors were reveling in the pleasures of canoeing, kayaking and fishing against a sunset worthy of “On Golden Pond.”

 

 

As a nightcap, they got the fire-pit going for the first time since we arrived!

Today was warm with no wind, and felt like summer. A perfect day to visit the local winery and sample NH wines in an idyllic setting. The winery also serves Sunday brunch, so Marian and I will be back there again soon!

Wherever our visitors come from, all agree that the Lakes region of NH is lovely, and a visit here represents a real “vacation” from the daily world of  NY. We are of course blessed just to live here!

 

 

Busy Days

We spent last weekend on Long Island, staying with good friends. The main aim was to be part of a wedding on Sunday 6/7. But we also fitted in a dinner at our favorite restaurant with 6 friends, a lunch by our host for 6 other friends, a barbecue with 3 friends… after all that we needed a day of rest! While I visited two other friends, Marian rested, and later that day we attended the rehearsal dinner/BBQ for the wedding party. Sunday morning we took our host friends to the church we attended before leaving LI, and in the afternoon were part of the lovely wedding of a beautiful young woman we had known since she was a teenager. What a joy, on a perfect summer afternoon in June!

Back on Monday to our now “real world” in NH, we were awoken today by heavy equipment in our front yard as our septic system remediation began! Now we have an expensive large hole where our front lawn was. Tomorrow new leach-field chambers will be installed, and by Friday it will all be be graded and re-seeded! We made a trip to Concord to purchase a new stairlift that will take Marian to the second floor of our home, after she has managed a month of laborious stair-climbing. She is delighted, and only sorry that it will take another week for the lift to be installed!

Meanwhile more boxes have been emptied, and the (back) lawn needs mowing again. We expect our first guests this weekend, and have been working to make the walk-out basement level and its “spare room” ready. Today’s investment was in a dehumidifier! We are delighted to have guests coming, which will next week include our older son and his woman-partner coming up from Brooklyn. A little more shopping for extra storage units has allowed Marian to get her sewing area on the second floor ready for use.

Hanging flower baskets now adorn the deck. We have had a couple of 80deg days, and soon it will be the “official” start of summer, which in this area seems to be on schedule with the weather (unlike Long Island, where Memorial Day really does seem to start the summer!) A busy week or so, but much accomplished, and a real feeling of being “at home” has crept into our lives.

We are very grateful.