Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Day 79: Fieldville



Yes, you read the title right. The Field family does have a claim to fame. Katie’s family came over from Ireland in the 1850s during the potato famine and landed in Quebec, north of Ottwa. There were a number of brothers each or whom started a farm and a family in a clustered area that became known as Fieldville, and it is still there today. Katie’s second cousins Lorraine and Ruth picked us up early to take us to this historic place. To us this is one of the highlights we were most looking forward to on this trip, and it turned out to be everything we hoped for.

Lorraine and Ruth are fantastic tour guides, going above and beyond our expectations. They started off with a scenic and informative drive out of Ottawa, and continued detouring by experimental farms, natural springs, old high schools, hydrodams, quaint towns and, most importantly, second breakfast spots.This is a moving vehicle shot of the experimental farm, a practically downtown farm that grows, as one might expect, experimental produce. Ottawanians are particularly proud of the fact that this land has not been sold to development companies.
Second breakfast. Ruth is in the middle. Lorraine on the right. Katie's hiding behind Brandon's arm.

This was all just preamble for the main event, a visit to the Field farm and the Fieldville cemetery. We were treated to an interesting greeting at the Field farm Under close inspection, you'll see that this ordinary looking photo actually captures a fierce gaurd dog sounding our arrival from the confines of fortress, aka the crawl space under the porch to which it ran to the instant it spotted our approach.

The Field farm is where Katie’s Grandpa Hank was raised, and is still owned by Hank’s brother’s widow, Eileen. At the graveyard we saw the graves of members of the Field family dating back to Katie’s great grandpa Patrick Field.

Across from the graveyard is the Fieldville church to which generations of Fields have visited.

Katie taking a picture of a wall plaque commemorating her great grandparents donation to the church.

Lorraine and Ruth aren’t actually Fields, but McCarthys. Their mother, Kay, was Hanks sister, but she married a man by the name of McCarthy. They are still pretty cool though, and they still sound blooming Irish, especially Eileen, which was really exciting to us. Our next stop was the McCarthy farm where we met Doug, our tour guides’ brother. Doug is the proud owner of a small black bear:She’s pretty friendly though, albeit thick.

The bear has a vicious tactic where it captures its victims by flopping its entire weight onto its victims feet and demanding endless belly rubs.

Doug's cat/dog duplex creation. He's quite handy, in typical Field fashion.

The penthouse resident.

We made a quick stop at the McCarthy cottageson McCarthy road (they are very proud of this claim to fame) before returning to the McCarthy farm for a sugar shack tour and dinner. We now not only know how to make maple syrup, but we can eat it too. Aunt Jemima, you’re history. Thanks Doug.Doug uses these corks to plug the sugar maples after tapping them to extract the sap.....

.....as seen here.

Steak and potatoes, wine and beer and tons of funny stories about Field ancestors capped off this already perfect day.Sorry for the bad aim Ruth.

Capturing this pillar was mandatory before heading back to Matt's.


B&K

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