Dear Millstone,
Thank you for keeping us connected and abreast of what’s happening in our community.
This year’s forest fire season came early across Canada bringing smoke and poor air quality to most of North America. Some days the air quality was worse along the Eastern Seaboard than even here in Canada. One day Toronto had the worst air quality in the world. We were warned to stay inside and some of us wore masks when we went out. Yes, back to wearing masks again! We had never experienced such poor air quality in our town. Climatologists predict that this summer will be the worst for fires on record in Canada.
A couple of weeks ago while biking on the Ottawa Valley Recreation Trail south of Arnprior I came upon a couple cycling north through the haze towards me. We stopped to chat and in short order formed a strong bond based on our common interests of cycling, community development and the environment. Jenni Hershey and Michael Johnson Chase had planned a trip from their home in Manhattan that brought them up the OVRT from Smiths Falls to where we met that day. Before we parted we shared our contact info so we could stay in touch and I could follow the rest of their journey while offering advice on available routes and points of interest. Upon their return they stayed a night with us and enjoyed dinner and stories with local environmental reporter, Chandler Swain and husband Mike Reynolds.
Michael and Jenni host a blog of their environmental cycling journeys across North America called “Carbon Stories, the good, the bad and the beautiful as seen from a bicycle.” Michael writes and Jenni illustrates.
Millstone readers might like to subscribe to their Carbon Stories blog. Here’s their most recent blog post documenting the journey that brought them through our community. It’s called “Free Markets, Wildfires and Conspiracy Theories,” https://www.carbonstories.org/allblogposts/pswnkadbkw8ehb25l7jzhtdgbf676t
Cheers
Jeff Miils
