Percé Rock at Percé, Quebec, with its distinctive bow shape (left) waterline hole (right).
First, a flashback to Gaspé
A while back I set up one of my favourite photos of the iconic Percé Rock as the wallpaper on my desktop PC. It was to get me in the mood for, and remind me of, an then upcoming train trip to Gaspé, Quebec.
The Gaspé Peninsula
The town of Gaspé is on the tip of Quebec’s Gaspé peninsula, which separates the Bay of Chaleur, between Quebec and New Brunswick, and the St. Lawrence River, where it opens up into the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
When the kids were younger and we were spending a couple of weeks each summer at a seaside cottage in Prince Edward Island, we’d always save the last week for touring some maritime area before heading home. One year we finally drove around the Gaspé Peninsula and it was beautiful.
We spent a night in the town of Percé and it was magical, especially the carriage ride around town with all the trees decked in white Christmas lights and patios and backyards all around with people partying in a gentle, happy manner. (No open drunkiness or rowdiness.)
Percé Rock from a distant train.
Unfortunately, on the train trip we didn’t get anywhere near the rock. Just a distant view from the tip of the bay just above the rock in the map/picture above. Though I was eagerly looking forward to another look at this magnificent rock, I should have realized the very steep inclines leading in and out of the town of Percé would obviously affect the train route.
The train stuck to the forests on a ridge west of the town rather than going right through the town. Thus the only view from a distance. Oddly enough, it didn’t matter. The distant view was enough to remind me of the rock’s grandeur. Also, we’d already determined that we’d have to come back and next time, like our new-found friends on the train, we’d stay over a few days, rent a car, and tour the area, including the short trip down from the town of Gaspé to Percé.
Then we’ll get all the closeups we want of the rock and the surrounding area. This time the waves — which on our first visit were a beautiful aquamarine with white frothy tops — may not be too large for the tour boat to dock at Bonaventure Island, which is a bird preserve literally covered with sea birds. Another great reason to go back.
Getting to the point — at last
OK. Time to end this digression — as wonderful as the memories are — and get back to answering the question posed in the title of this submission.
Recently I went to the official site of our hometown NHL hockey team, the Ottawa Senators, to look up some information. While there, I decided to check out their 2009 offerings of wallpaper. There were two, and I did download both. I even saved them to my Senators subfolder in the Sports subfolder of the Wallpaper subfolder in my Pictures folder. (Am I anal, or just well organized?) 🙂
It turned out I didn’t particularly like either one of them.
One featured some text — “A FORCE UNITED” — beneath a logo with a splash of colour with sharp, ragged edges as if scraped (mutilated?) by hundreds of skate blades. Pardon the pun, but I expect the designers considered this graphic pretty edgy. For an old coot like me, despite its simplicity, it was far too busy for my liking. And to be looking at every day.
The second one featured another splash of colour with the Centurion face graphic peeking around the edge of two stacks of calendars — for the six and a half months of the 2008-2009 regular season — with all the scheduled home and away games marked on the calendars.
The big problem is that even at 1600×1200 resolution, the calendars are needlessly hard to read.
So scrap those two.
An old favourite
And then, while in that folder, I noticed a wallpaper photo from last year featuring my favourite Sens player, and captain of the team, the highly talented and equally hard-working Daniel Alfredsson — aka Alfie.
I figured why not. The team really struggled last season and lost their opening game at Madison Square Gardens against the New York Rangers last Saturday to start this season. So maybe I should throw Alfie back up as my wallpaper as a sign of support, and hopefully a good luck sign.
So up he went. And last night guess who scored the winning goal — on a penalty shot — against our arch rivals, the Maple Leafs, right in their home rink. Looks like Leaf fans may have to go back to booing Alfie each time he touches the puck.
On the play, Alfie was filling in for injured new Sens forward Milan Michaleck, who has been high-sticked in the face on a drive to the Toronto net. With Michaleck holding his bloody mouth while being lead to the dressing room — he returned and played well later — Alfie stepped in to take the penalty shot.
It was slightly ironic that on the shot, Alfie easily beat fellow Swede, the huge rookie goaltender known as The Monster (for his size, not his demeanour). The Monster, whose real name is Jonus Gustavsson, played well despite the loss. Certainly better than the so-called No. 1 goalie for Toronto, the ever-so-leaky Vesa Toskala.
My hero
Special mention should go to low-paid, well-motivated grinder Shean Donovan, who was inserted into the lineup for this game, no doubt to provide Ottawa with more grit and determination around the opposing net. It paid off with Ottawa’s first goal.
But the real hero for the night, because as usual he lead by example all night, but especially for scoring such a pretty winning goal, was of course Alfie.
I think I’d better leave my current wallpaper up for a while. 😀
Daniel Alfredsson, No. 11, and captain of the Ottawa Senators
(If you’d like a wallpaper-sized copy of the above photo, send me an e-mail at bill@provick.ca)
No. 11