Red-Winged Blackbird (near Princeton, BC)
Welcome to July, month of vacations and beach reads! Yesterday was Canada’s 150th birthday, and our community celebrated with a big party. I’m old enough to remember our 100th birthday and a special Centennial train that visited communities across the nation, like a traveling museum. What fun it is to see my beloved country — the true north strong and free! — celebrate another major milestone.
My husband and I took a vacation trip with our truck and holiday trailer within the province of British Columbia in June, so in this month’s Sunday Editions I’ll be sharing some of those photos with you. We traveled from the southeastern part of the province west, north, and west to the ocean inlet at Bella Coola, then spent several days visiting friends and fishing on the Chilcotin plateau west of Williams Lake. I hope you enjoy sharing my non-beachy vacation over the next few weeks.
Today’s photos are from a new stretch of road to us: Princeton to Merritt. It’s full of windy highway, little lakes, rolling hills, and lots of wildflowers and wildlife. Hubby definitely wants to go back and do some fishing in those lakes!
Water Lilies in bloom (near Princeton, BC)
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prizes at inspyromance dot com
Merrillee Whren’s winner is Colleen!
Lee Tobin McClain’s winner is Gina Johnson!
Valerie Comer’s winner is Patricia La Duca!
Don’t forget… every comment you make qualifies you to win one of the monthly Amazon card giveaways!
Today’s Deals
Janet W. Ferguson’s novel, Blown Together, is 99 cents through today only.
Staci Stallings’ novel, More Than This, is free through Monday.
Wild roses (near Princeton, BC)
Last Week
On Monday, Lee Tobin McClain is looking for More Time to Read!
On Tuesday, Krista Phillips shared The Little Things that make a difference.
On Wednesday, Autumn Macarthur talked about Comparing Ourselves with Others (plus giveaway).
On Thursday, Valerie Comer shared an Interview with Danica Favorite (and giveaway).
On Friday, Kimberly Rose Johnson shared the story behind her new release, Brewed with Love.
On Saturday, Staci Stallings talked about More Than This (free through Monday).
Next Week
Monday: Alexa Verde
Tuesday: we will be closed for the Fourth of July
Wednesday: Annalisa Daughety
Thursday: Heather Gray
Friday: Sally Bradley
Saturday: Deb Kastner
Common Loon carrying a chick (near Princeton, BC)
On Board for Romance (Homegrown Love 1) (Arcadia Valley Romance 7) by Annalisa Daughety
Memories of Mist (An Urban Farm Fresh Romance 3) by Valerie Comer
Cherish by Autumn Macarthur, Heather Gray, Elizabeth Maddrey, and four others
Learning from Experience (re-release) by Ginger Solomon
Season of Hope (Rios Azules Christmas 3) by Alexa Verde
June 2017
Falling for the Rancher (Aspen Creek Crossroads) by Roxanne Rustand
Engaged (Surrendering Time 3) by Julie Arduini
The Cowboy’s Baby Blessing (Cowboy Country) by Deb Kastner
An Encore for Estelle (Melodies of Love 2) by Kimberly Rose Johnson
Brewed with Love by Kimberly Rose Johnson
A complete list of Inspy Romance books by our authors is always available on our BOOKS tab. Find our audiobooks and our permanently free e-books, as well as new releases, on our NEWS tab.
Valerie Comer is a USA Today bestselling author and a two-time Word Award winner who writes where food meets faith and fiction. She injects experience laced with humor into her green clean romances. Her life on a small farm in western Canada provides the seed for stories of contemporary inspirational romance. Like many of her characters, Valerie and her family grow much of their own food and are active in the local foods movement as well as their church. She only hopes her creations enjoy their happily-ever-afters as much as she does hers, shared with her husband, adult kids, and adorable granddaughters.
Hi Valerie. Thanks for sharing your photos, it is great seeing and learning more about other places- and happy birthday Canada!! We have started term holidays- 2 weeks:) and are heading down to Phillip Island for awhile to explore.
Blessings:)
Hi Valerie and thanks for hosting July’s Sunday edition. I enjoy being an arm chair traveler. I have traveled the following two Canadian provinces Manitoba and Ontario, but never to British Columbia so I researched the area. So thankful for modern technology. Your June vacation reminds me of our back road trips through Michigan, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Windy roads through a lush green canopy of trees with chirping birds and rippling brooks and rolling hills with inland lakes makes for a refreshing road trip. Being retired, we never travel on major highways. Your wildlife pictures are spectacular. Thanks for allowing your readers to see beautiful Canada through your eyes. Happy 150th Birthday to my northern neighbor. Enjoy your summer and happy writing.
Hurray 4 Canada!
Thanks for sharing your photos! Happy 150th birthday to Canada. I live in USA..GA …was in Canada for honeymoon many years ago!
Thanks for your reviews. I love the pictures!
I googled Phillip Island. It looks amazing! I hope you have a great time.
I was born in Manitoba! Thanks for researching our route. In BC, we don’t always have a choice whether to travel on the major highways or not, since only three routes actually stretch across the entire mountainous province from east to west. If there is an avalanche or a major accident or something else that halts traffic on a major route, it’s possible there will be no detours within hundreds of miles. It can be (has been) a very big deal at times.
In this case we traveled on Highway 3 and Highway 1 (the Trans-Canada Hwy), two of the major highways, as well as 5 and 97 for north-south travel, then #20 west of Williams Lake. While we were out west, 150 meters of Hwy 20 was washed out on the approach to the Fraser River. http://globalnews.ca/news/3539000/one-person-ok-after-wash-out-on-b-c-highway-west-of-williams-lake/ It took 2 weeks to fix the mess enough to re-open it to traffic just yesterday. Thankfully, there were other routes across the Fraser, but many dusty miles out of the way! So we saw more new country than we’d planned on, and it was fine.
:)
Thank you! What part of Canada?
Yay, thank you!
Happy Birthday to Canada! I didn’t realise you were newer than New Zealand (we date ourselves from 1840, when the Queen’s representatives and the local Maori chiefs met to sign the Treaty of Waitangi).
Niagara Falls area!
I suspected it might be there or Banff! I’ve been to Niagara once… 1972, I think. I bet it’s changed a bit. Not the falls. The commercialism.
Interesting! I didn’t know you were older, either! We saw some (assumed) Maori petroglyphs near Bella Coola, BC. They have some tales of how the aboriginal people used to travel and trade across/around the Pacific. So cool.
Love the vacation pictures you shared and am looking forward to seeing more in the following weeks! I hope you have tons of fun, Valerie!
Happy SONday everyone and congrats to the winners this week :-)
Thanks :)
Happy Canada Day, Valerie! :D Thank you for the break down and links of the posts for the week as there were some posts I missed. May you have a wonderful week ahead! :D
You’re welcome! Thanks for coming by.
Happy Canada Day! I once had the opportunity to be in Canada on this day and they made a really nice party everywhere. It was really fun!
Yay! We can do a pretty nice party! I’ve been in the USA a few times for the Fourth, and that is, too.
Happy Belated Birthday to Canada! And I loved your vacation pictures. So lovely!