Leseur Ridge

Last weekend we attempted to go out for another snowshoe... but really not that much snow in or around Calgary. We took at stab at a new location for us in Ghost Valley, north of Morley. Leseur Ridge was about 8.2 km round trip with 290 m of elevation gain (although lots of little ups and downs on the way. This time we had Duncan & Steph with us as well as the usual suspects of me, Tom & Breanna. We opted to leave Uma at home because the car was packed and we were worried it was going to be chilly there again like the last snowshoe... although it ended up being a gorgeous day and she would have loved it! ... still a bit steep for Kali's elbow though.

We had about 10 minutes worth of snowshoeable snow... then gave up and stashed our snowshoes.

The trail was muddy in places, but overall well-drained. Beautiful hiking conditions! There were a few snowy patches still, especially in the trees...

Great views from along the ridge... looking towards Devil's Gap (I hear it's an awesome hike and will probably be on the books for this summer!).

70 Buck Loop

I'm a bit behind in my blogging, but thought I'd share a few photos. A bunch of us went snowshoeing back on Jan. 9 (the day before I had to head to Houston for 3 weeks of training). We chose 70 Buck Loop, one of the more obscure trails in upper Kananaskis. We were fortunate to have enough snow and got to break fresh trail the whole way! I forgot to save the track, but it was relatively easy. Here's Tom, Uma, Breanna, and James and the trailhead.

The snow was pretty bare towards the top of the ridge... and it was windy up there too.

Kind of lost the trail at this point... and Uma was starting to shiver and cry.

I bundled here up in my wind breaker and down vest to warm her up (I took this shot after we headed back down, not while she was freezing at the top!). She warmed pretty quickly once we got out of the wind and moving again.

Even though we didn't quite get over the top of the ridge it was still pretty scenic. The hill directly ahead is Eagle Hill (biked in previous blogs).

Vacation: Return to Antigua, back to El Salvador

Sorry for the little break in the posts... Christmas and all. Anyway, After a few days in Pana we headed back to Antigua, intending to hike another volcano or two and another bike ride. We planned to take a direct chicken bus to Antigua, but after waiting at the side of the road for an hour or so we found out that the direct bus had broken down and our options were to get dropped off on the side of the road at Cuatro Caminos (four corners) and wait for another bus to come along or to sign up for a direct shuttle that left 2 hours later. We were tired of waiting by the side of the road - and hungry! - so we opted for the shuttle and chilled out instead. The shuttle trip to Antigua was pleasantly uneventful.

When we got to Antigua we splurged a bit and headed of to Las Palmas for dinner (great food)... and lucked out completely because there was a really good blues/reggae guitarist. We ended up ordering dessert and an after-dinner drink just so we could hang out to hear the end of the set.

The next morning we had a leisurely breakfast and decided to wander down to OX tours to see what they were offering (we already had an idea of many of the other places). They have a Ridgeback named Xela there!! Way cool. Anyway, OX specializes in longer over-night hikes of the volcanoes in the area and are just starting to get into bike tours. It turned out that we showed up just in time to sign up for a night hike of Pacaya, one of the active volcanoes in the area (OX is the only tour company running this one), and we also signed up for a hike/bike/swim tour with them the next day. We rushed back to our hotel, pulled all of our stuff out of our packs and repacked with just the essentials for over-night... then grabbed a small snack on our way back to OX.

Turns out it was a big Canadian trip. There were six people on the tour: me, Tom, and Amanda from Calgary, Sarah from Victoria, Stacey from Stittsville, ON... then Jerome from Germany... and our guide Steve from Denmark.

Below is the profile of the hike, starting with the ascent to the ridge we camped on, then the descent/ascent/descent/ascent to the lava and back (not at the top of the volcano, but felt like it at times as we hiked in the dark), and then back to the trailhead.

On our way up to the camp-site we passed a couple of the big lava flows... this was the end of the 1980 flow (and our guide Steve) that was a few minutes walk from our camp.

Setting up camp meant removing a lot of poop. There are horses that come up here regularly to give rides to the tourists who can't make the hike... and as we found out cows. When we got back to our camp after hiking up to the lava our tents were surrounded by cows.

The view of Pacaya from our camp... as the light started to fade you could see a continuous orange glow from the top as it was erupting.

Most of us used head-lamps, but Tom opted for moon-light hiking (there was an awesome full moon! ... thankfully since many of our head-lamps lost power before we got back). The hike started off along an easy ridgeline (where we took sunrise photos the next morning), then scree-skiing (yes in the dark). As we got to the bottom of the scree the last of the day tourists were leaving so it was just the seven of us on the volcano. The hike up to the lava was longer than expected, along sharp, jagged, rubble.

In places there were these nice flow textures and levees from older flows. It was neat because as we hiked over this stuff you could feel the blast of heat and hear the crinkle of rocks and lava moving in the distance.Glowering magma underneath the rocks we walked over:

I LOVE HOT MAGMA!!

Stacey dared Steve to poke the stick with magma... it was pretty darn scalding.

This is Stacey... for her 30th birthday she decided to hike an active volcano! I totally would have done that last year if I had thought about it... but still in my 30th year =o).

After watching Steve to make sure it was okay Stacey also poked the lava...

Roasting marshmallows (we chose smaller cracks of lava so we could stand there long enough)... nothing quite as satisfying as lava-roasted marshmallows. We got back to camp around mid-night, ate some curry, and sang happy birthday to Stacey before crawling into our sleeping bags for a few hours. Neither of our sleeping bags were quite rated warm enough for the temperatures so it was a shivery four hours of quasi-sleep before we woke up at 4 am to watch the sunrise over the volcano. We bundled into all of our clothing and hiked up to the top of the ridge over-looking the lava field where we had bagels with cream cheese and coffee (or, in my case, on of Tom's cough candies in hot water since there weren't any caffeine-free options... so need to start traveling with my own tea!). It was a pretty foggy morning but we did manage to get a few shots between the fog banks.

Sarah and Amanda waiting for the sunrise:

Early morning Pacaya (the sign is warning that you're on an active volcano and could be hurt):

Old lava tubes in the lava field... I tried to get a better shot but by the time the sun was high enough to get decent light the fog had rolled in.

Fuego and Acatenango: The group: Me, Tom, Sarah, Amanda, Stacey, Jerome, and Steve

This dog followed us up to camp then wandered off with other tourists while we were setting up camp... but we met her sleeping at the top by the lava to keep warm. She followed us back down and we found her the next morning curled up under our tent flap. She was in extremely rough shape, but very sweet.

This is the geothermal plant that supplies much of the electricity in the area... although most people still use wood for cooking.

After we got down we headed back to Antigua and grabbed breakfast together... then Tom and I hustled back to our hotel, switched into riding gear and headed out the door for the bike ride we had signed up for... gluttons for punishment or what! We weren't really feeling up to it at first, but after we got on our bikes we got a bit refreshed... and fortunately it was fairly easy. The ride started off fairly promising with some minor free-riding in front of this old church (notice the dog in the bottom left that came out barking at Tom and then ran away).

Then we headed up to a park or conservation area on the edge of Antigua:

Once at the park we wandered up a steep trail, mostly consisting of steep stair-cases and well-groomed trails:After hiking for a while we came out onto a road, hopped into a truck that was waiting for us, and drove up a dirt road as far as we could make it in the truck... then we ripped down the dirt road until we reached this scenic cabin that you can apparently rent for something like $50 a night (includes a hot tub). We stopped off for lunch here then continued down the road... something like 600 or so metres of elevation gain.

This cool, fresh-water pool was at the base of the trail... only one of us opted to hop in because the water temperature was kind of cold and this happened to be one of the few overcast, temperate days... We did, however, enjoy a couple of big beers...mmm.

The next day we went back to Old Town Outfitters and signed up for another bike ride that afternoon, this one is known as the "volcano ride". This one was rated as advanced, but had a comfortable amount of technical stuff. I rode about 90% of the trail, mostly due to accidentally careening off some rocks with my pedals and sliding out on some soft sand transitions. We had the same guide as last time, Pancho. The trip started off with a shuttle to get us out of Antigua, then we rode along the side of the volcano, then back to the shop.

Due to some poor planning it turned out that this ride was on laundry day and we accidentally put all of our gear in the wash. Fortunately we still had a pair of shorts each and we bought souvenir jerseys for the ride. Here we are with Pancho modeling them!... then the next day back to the beach for a few days of surfing! This was a super easy trip for us... except for having to leave at 4:30 a.m. We were the only people on the shuttle so got to stretch out and have a nap... super smooth when we got to the border... and arrived at the beach by 9am! Way quicker than the original route to Guatemala.

The place we originally stayed (La Samba) was packed, but there was room next door at Jose's new addition called Eco del Mar. The price was about double, $25/night, but well worth it!

This was by far the sweetest bed on the whole trip... super comfy new mattress... REAL pillows, not foam chunks or a solid block.

... and a tv...... and a little kitchen!

... perfect for making tomato and avocado sandwiches for lunches!

Anyway... once we got settled we had a nap and then went out to rent a couple of surfboards. The waves were a bit big for me so I gave up on the 2nd day. Tom continued to take a beating... umm... persevered... but at least the beach was relaxing!mmm... and good seafood...

Around 4pm on Dec. 11 we left the beach. This time it only took us 30 min to get to the airport because the river had subsided enough that we could cross it where the bridge been destroyed during the hurricane. We got into L.A., where we only got a few hours of sleep at a nearby hotel, then back to a cold welcome in Calgary. From +30 C to -40 C with the windchill... brr. At least we had a warm welcome from B. who picked us up from the airport with puffy jackets.

Vacation: Panajachel (Pana), Guatemala

The afternoon shuttle from Xela to Pana was pleasantly uneventful. We got in around 5ish and checked into our hostel - Casa Linda, home of the most uncomfortable bed we've ever slept on. The first night the bed was so uncomfortable we didn't even want to sit on it, and we ended up laying across the bed horizontally instead of head to foot since that was the only way to find a spot where my arms did not instantly fall asleep. Unfortunately we paid for two nights up front because it was in a quiet location and we had another early morning hike scheduled for the next day (Volcan San Pedro). The third night we splurged an extra US$4 stayed at a different hotel with a comfortable bed and even a tv.

This is what happens when you don't have good building codes (Mike Holmes would be appalled). That's a circuit breaker IN the shower, next to one of the sketchy electric water heaters that are typical for Central America (don't touch the wires). We discovered the trick to actually getting hot water out of these things... turn the water on until the lights dim, then crank the tap back a 1/2 turn to slow the flow through it (if the lights brighten again you've gone too far). Okay, so yet another early morning hike... this one wasn't until 6am... and weirdly our guide spoke English so that was a bit of a novelty (although we switched guides on the trail and he didn't speak English... but by now we were getting better at conversing in Spanish). The hike left from one of the towns across the lake so we started by walking down to the pier. This is Lago Atitlan... Volcan San Pedro should be looming in the centre but the clouds weren't cooperating.

Tom waiting for the ferry... there were a bunch of silly dogs that followed us down here. They kept chasing birds along the shore.

Some of the farms and mansions around the lake:When we got to the town of San Pedro we stopped for a leisurely lunch, then hopped in a Tuk Tuk to get up to the trailhead.

The hike was 8.4 km with an elevation gain of about 1.2 km, overall elevation was more like what's around Calgary. Look-out at approximately 1/3 of the way up:

By the time we got to the top of San Pedro the clouds had moved in again. The rope marks the edge of the crater.Chilling on the top:

Typical hiking fashion....Tom in the ferry on the way home... Apparently we hiked the trail unusually fast because we were done way earlier than expected... early enough that our guide tried to talk us into additional tours. We decided to just head back to Pana though because this was the place where we chose to do our souvenir shopping. Pana is aggravating because of the over-abundance of pushy vendors (much like Cancun in this aspect), but at the same time that's what makes it an awesome place to get good deals. We picked up a back-up hammock, two hammock chairs for the deck (too bad it's not hammock weather), a blanket, and I had a jacket specially made for me (I'm a giant by Central American standards... most people barely come up to my shoulders...).

The next day we changed hotels to the new comfy one and then hit the Atitlan Nature Reserve, which is a short walk from town and happens to have a zip-line. After the one we did in the Cloud Forest in Costa Rica I jumped at any chance to get back on one (although this is the first time since). This line was much shorter, but still hugely fun.

There was also a butterfly exhibit, although we were too late to see many of them. We found this particularly neat butterfly with translucent wings outside of the butterfly enclosure.

Vacation: Quetzaltenango (Xela), Guatemala

After a few days in Antigua we arranged a shuttle to take us to Xela, specifically to hike some volcanoes in the area. We had some problems with the shuttle though. We were originally supposed to get picked up from our hostel at 5 am, so we got up at 4:15 am and waited... and waited... and no shuttle came. We went down to the shuttle operator and complained - they tried to insist that they had come and knocked on the door, but no way that happened. Thank goodness for my dictionary so I could piece together how to tell them that and demand they still take us. Anyway, we got on the 2 pm shuttle, but the 5 hour drive turned into 7 hours because of an accident on the road (coupled with road construction).

We got into Xela around 9 pm, well after dark. We got dropped of at Posada Don Carlos and quickly headed out to find something to eat... only to find out that nearly everything in the downtown area of Xela was closed. We did find a restaurant though and then headed back to bed. The bed here was comfortable, shared bathrooms were in a chilly courtyard though (Xela is high enough in the mountains that it gets chilly at night), and the open courtyard also meant lots of noise infiltrating.Views of Xela:

View of the Central Park (every town is built around a central park). Tom and I were hanging out on a relaxing balcony - so much quieter above street level.

In the morning we headed off to a tour operator to arrange some activities. At this point Tom was suffering from a head cold and both of us were having some tummy trouble so we lined up a ruin tour for the afternoon and then a hike to Tajumulco for the following day. We thought about doing more but figured we'd see how we were recovering.

We were picked up by a taxi and taken north of town... this was a view from the road. It's really neat to look out over the area because it looks like a giant quilt - we were constantly amazed by the slopes these people farm on. Yes, it is as steep as it looks... check out the profile below of Tajumulco too (they were farming on the slopes of the old volcano).

The first stop was a town that was destroyed by a nearby volcano approximately 30 years ago. Nobody lives here anymore but people from the surrounding area still travel everyday to work the farms.

This bridge was one of two that crossed the gorge cut by the lahar (pyroclastic mudflow). There was a continuous line of people crossing the bridge carrying these massive bags on their backs (I wouldn't be surprised if they were about 100 lbs). This man is carrying pacayas.The gorge cut by the lahar - notice the houses perched on the edge.

The rickety bridge back across the river (and our driver Eddie).

Next it was off to check out some older ruins at Tak'alik A'baj - these ruins were originally inhabited by the Olmec, and then later by the Mayans. Our guide only spoke Spanish, so we understoon only about 60-70% of what was said. It was still really neat!

The sculptures were pretty interesting. There were basically four styles: Olmec, Mayan, Potbelly, and Zoomorph. These were set up around various altars that were aligned based on the position of the sun. The altar facing towards the East (rising sun) were devoted to symbols of life, while the one facing West (setting sun) was for death.

These are two potbelly scultpures. We were able to understand that there was some significance to the position of the arms (whether they went around the belly or hung at the side) but we're not really sure what that significance is.

This is one of the altars with a skull carved on the front, and you can just make out the relief of two human feet on the top right surface.

The zoomorphs are carvings of animals that were important to the Mayans. The toad and crocodile pictured below were our favourites.

This structure is all that remains of an early sauna - too bad it wasn't still functioning!

Tajumulco!!!

Tajumulco was one of the main reasons we came to Xela. It's the highest volcano in Central America, and therefore had to be climbed. It's peak reaches 4220 m, and the hike was about 12.5 km with about 1.2 km of elevation gain. The stats aren't much different than many of the hikes we do at home except the elevation is about 2 km higher (so we were feeling some altitude problems), lack of sleep, and of course Tom had a head cold. This hike is usually done as an over-night hike but we wanted to do it in one since we were short on time (in case we wanted to sneak in some others). Eddie (same cab driver) and our guide picked us up from our hostel at 3 am (so much for getting rested up) for the 2 hour drive towards the Mexican border.

We started hiking around 5:30 am using headlamps. This was the first view of Tajumulco (right blob) at first light: Sun creeps over the landscape:

As the sun got higher the temperature got pretty nice... and views were amazing! The volcanoes in the centre of the picture include San Pedro (climbed it, see the next post) and the series on the far left are the volcanoes around Antigua (Fuego, Acatenango, Pacaya). The far right of the shot should be the Pacific Ocean, but the clouds are obscuring it.

Here's Tom on the trail... the trail was open and well-packed the whole way.

Pan from about 1/2 way up:

The top few hundred metres were pretty barren in comparison with the rest of the hike, and the trail got rubbly.

Made it!!

This pan is from the top. Guatemala is on the left, Pacific Ocean centre, and Mexico on the right.On the way back down we came across some geckos... Tom can't resist an opportunity to harass critters.

Tajumulco from near the trailhead:

Unfortunately Tom's head cold was a bit too severe to do the other hikes we were planning so the next day we grabbed an afternoon shuttle to Panajachel on the edge of Lago Atitlan.

Vacation: Antigua, Guatemala

The trip from Tacuba to Antigua was super long. We caught an early chicken bus to Ahuachapan, where we stood on a street corner waiting for our next bus for a while before realizing that the bus we wanted actually went to a different location... then had fun asking for directions and wandering through the market trying to find the right spot. From there we hopped on a turismo (more like a mini-bus than a school bus) to the Guatemalan border. We walked across the border and jumped on a chicken bus on the other side that said they were going to Antigua. Turns out they weren't... just to Guatemala City (Guate) where we'd have to switch buses. We had a bit of a hiccup because we didn't have enough Quetzales (Guatemalan money) but they accepted part of it in US$. Unfortunately the buses always take off before you pay so we would have just been dumped somewhere on the side of the road otherwise. When we got to Guate all of the locals got off but before we made it down the aisle of the bus it took off. The driver tried to shake us down for more money, but when he realized we weren't going to pay any more he dumped us off somewhere in Guate (no idea where). We found a bank and exchanged some money, then opted to take a cab for the 1 hour drive to Antigua rather than try to find another chicken bus. Our driver ended up speaking English and it was a pretty excellent trip to Antigua from there.

When we got to Antigua we headed for Casa Santa Lucia Hotel, which was recommended in the book for having comfortable rooms with a private bathroom option for a really cheap price. The place was so good we stayed here on our way back through too!

Okay, so Antigua is surrounded by several volcanoes: Fuego, Aqua, Acatenango, and Pacaya.... I think one more as well, but I can't remember it's name at the moment. This is the view from our window, looking towards Volcan Aqua south of town.

View of Volcan Aqua from the streets of Antigua... Antigua is a beautiful colonial town with cobbled streets. We didn't think we'd like it because it's kind of a touristy city, but it's relatively quiet, feels safe, and it makes an amazing base of operations. There's direct connections with Guatemalan beaches, the ruins around Hue Hue in the north, Copan in Honduras, volcano hikes, mountain bike rides, etc... even direct shuttles to Playa El Tunco (which is how we got back to the beach at the end of the trip!). Next time we'll probably just fly into Guate and be based out of Antigua.

We had access to the roof of our hotel - which was one of the tallest buildings in town and had amazing views. The volcano erupting on the left is Fuego, and Acatenango (the biggest in the area) is in the middle... can't remember the name of the one on the right.

View of the city from the top of our hotel. Volcan Aqua is the big one on the left (closest to town), Fuego erupting in the middle, next to Acatenango. I don't think you can make out Pacaya in this shot.

This is a chicken bus... and I suspect the reason that the hotel is so cheap for what you get. There's a bus stop on the corner outside our window so we were woken up every morning around 5 am by the bus people yelling "GUATE, GUATE, GUATE". Everybody yells down there... it seems to be the main form of advertisement. On our way back through we stayed at the back of the hotel where it is MUCH quieter.

On this visit to Antigua we snuck in a bike tour with Old Town Outfitters. Our guide Pancho didn't speak much English, but we had an interpreter with us and there's not much talking required for a bike ride anyway. Apparently Pancho's in training for the PanAmerican games... very cool.

We opted for the Intermediate ride since we didn't have our own bikes or pedals. Bikes were mostly in good shape although gear shifting wasn't as smooth and the bikes were heavier than mine. The trail looped through farmer's fields (growing avocadoes, beans, and corn mostly).

We also got to see Maximon. This is one of the local saints worshipped by Guatemalans. There are two incarnations, one seen below and one in one of the towns around Lago Atitlan. You're supposed to bring rum and cigarettes or cigars as offerings... then the priest beats you with leafy branches and spits rums all over you to chase out the evil demons. Tom thought this was a pretty sweet job, but we both decided to keep our evil spirits and continue biking. It was a great ride and I'd definitely recommend riding with Old Town Outfitters (in fact we did again on our way back through).

Vacation: Tacuba, El Salvador

After a few days in Playa El Tunco we headed out for Tacuba. The plan was to do the more physically demanding stuff first (as well as do the high elevation stuff before we got acclimatized to sea level). It took a very long day of chicken buses... standing and waiting on the side of the road to change loud, cramped buses.

Our hostel in Tacuba wasn't much to look at from the outside (same with most buildings) but inside was a beautiful courtyard with guest rooms set at the back of it.

Our room was relatively comfortable, but the chickens, ducks, dog and cats in the yard and surrounding neighbourhood were pretty loud... very early in the morning. This is Tom hanging out on a coffee-sack-covered couch outside our room. The owners were very friendly, but laughed at us a lot because our Spanish was pretty bad at this point... especially after a long day and attempting conversations with no context. Since there aren't really any restaurants in Tacuba (except papusa stands) we ate most of our meals at the hostel. One night we did go out for papusa... kind of a stuffed tortilla. Tom and I both ate for under $3 including drinks. We went to Tacuba specifically to stay at this hostel and take one of the Impossible Park tours run by Manolo (the son of the owners). We opted for "La Luna" because it had everything - big hike through coffee plantations, playing along the river with a bunch of waterfalls, amazing views of the Impossible Park. Of course I'm a geek so I brought my GPS.. this is the track we did... about 13.8km round trip with approximately 750 m of elevation gain.

We caught a ride in the back of a pick-up truck to the trailhead (and back down from the exit point). Tom wanted to lay on his back in the pick-up and take a picture of me, but I was worried he'd smash his head... he compromised by snagging this one of me. Glad I had my glasses on though because we were dodging bugs and the occasional branch.

This is a pan from the top of the trail looking out on the coffee plantation. You can see the trees are aligned in a grid pattern, basically forming a wind break so that the coffee beans don't knock against each other. I should point out that our guide, Manuel, did not speak any English but thanks to recognizing a few words (thank goodness for all those learn Spanish podcasts prior to going!) and some excellent gesturing on the part of our guide meant we got about 75% of the dialogue.

Tom eager to try out the coffee beans:

The trail was pretty overgrown... you can make out Tom fairly decently in the top one, but in the second one you can only see a little blue patch of Manuel's shirt. Fortunately he didn't let us get too far behind!Another pan of the El Parque Impossible (and our guide Manuel):

We saw a ton of butterflies on the hike! Lots of yellows and oranges... the big blue Mariposas wouldn't cooperate long enough to be photographed though.At this point we intersected the river... time for a swim and some waterfall jumps (for Tom anyway). Tom went wandering up along the top of the cliff with our guide while I swam across this lovely cool pool so I could get a shot of him from below.

I took my time wandering around the pool first... playing with tadpoles and checking out their eggs. Unfortunately after taking this photo I slipped on a rock and crushed most of them =o(.

Tom's Matrix pose:Tom's view of the waterfall:

After this waterfall we walked along the river - gorgeous area!

Tom getting instructions for his next jump... hand gestures were key because of the language barrier... and sometimes demonstrations. Waterfall views (the last and biggest one - La Luna):

Apparently I was attempting to set a new fashion trend.

The hike out was steep (see profile) and by then it had gotten pretty hot - I was wishing for more waterfalls at the end, but no luck. We did get to pass through a shady patch of bamboo forest though.

The flowers were beautiful and huge, but I resisted the urge to become Botany Becky (as B. likes to call me).

The end of the hike:We had another mildly harrowing drive down the hill in the back of the pick-up... then back to relaxing hammock chairs at Mama & Papa's Hostel (we ended up picking ourselves up a pair of these in Guatemala for the deck next summer... different colour though).

And of course a giant beer... this one was 750ml and quite tasty... although in Guatemala Tom got a 1L beer at one of the restaurants... what a great idea these 1L beers!

Vacation: Playa El Tunco, El Salvador

Tom and I went on a 3 week vacation to El Salvador and Guatemala. While we were there we posted updates on Facebook, but I thought it would be nice to share some photos from it. I'm breaking the posts up into more manageable sections. Below is a route map of where we went.

We took the red-eye from Calgary to L.A. to San Salvador, landing in El Salvador around 7:30 am. We found out our luggage was left behind in L.A. but headed for the beach at Playa El Tunco anyway. TACA airline was pretty good about giving us a US$50 voucher and arranging to drop our bags off when they arrived, even though the town was 2 hours away... at least 2 hours away at that point because the main road was washed out by the latest hurricane.

We arranged a pick up from Jose, the owner of La Sombra (where we spent the first few nights in El Tunco, see below). Playa El Tunco is a pretty quiet surf town, and La Sombra was a comfortable place to stay.

The hostel was on a side-lane off the main road. The lane went right down to the beach, so a 1 minute walk to get surfing. Of course the town is pretty small so it was only a few minutes of walking to get anywhere. There's a great coffee shop in town called Dale Dale, a few surf shops and internet spots and a couple of beach-front restaurants... enough that we were able to buy a couple of bathing suits, a towel, and sunblock.

The view up the beach towards our door:

This is the view around the corner from the first shot, where one of the rivers entered the ocean. The beach is cobbly, although at low tide you can find some sandy spots to hang out... although if you want a dry bit of beach to lounge on you have to walk about 10 minutes to the opposite end.

This is the area where Tom (mostly) and I (kinda) surfed. Our bags arrived on our second day in El Tunco so Tom rented a surfboard and tried it out here, doing quite well and catching some waves. On our way back through we weren't as lucky and the waves were larger so we mostly got battered (so I gave up on the 2nd day, while Tom stuck it out for 2 more days of abuse).

Little hermit crab on the beach:

This is the view from our door along the beach. The point in the distance is the place where most of the surfers hung out because there's a long, consistent right-break that you can ride into the beach. We just lack the control to surf in a crowd. The area with the white wall is the main part of town where the restaurants and a few "posher" hotels were.

Ha Ling Peak - the Fall version

Last Sunday Tom, Breanna, and I decided to slip in a hike at Ha Ling Peak. This was the very first hike I when I moved here, but with Queen's friends Drew and Maureen in mid-July. Needless to say it's looks a bit different in autumn and the snow makes it more challenging. It's a 6.2 km loop with 819 m of elevation gain (that's what I did back in July., shown in black on the topo map.. notice I got the distances wrong there, but feel free to skip back and check out what it looks like in the summer). On this trip we only did 5.8 km and 747 m of elevation gain, shown in blue on the topo. The wind at the top was frigid - at least 10 degrees colder than hiking below the tree-line and my hands were burning so we opted to call it at that point rather than complete the summit. This time we took 3 hours to climb because of sliding on snow... I did it in 2 1/2 back in the summer... although some people were putting us to shame by running it.

Ha Ling peak from Canmore... we were pretty sure we would be hiking in snow from the outset but this confirmed it.

Yep... snow at the trailhead.

I love this shot of the mountains over the reservoir at the trailhead!

View of the valley and the snow-covered trail. It was pretty slippery... next time I'm wearing my yaks!

Aha! First sight of the top of Ha Ling!... and the end of the trees.

At this point we started getting chilled - it was the same even in July that the top was significantly colder than the hike up.

I guess the bonus of it being so windy up here is that it blows a lot of the snow off, but there was still enough on the scree to make it slippery.

Pan of the top with some extra-funny distortion: We still had to stop to take a group photo...

We didn't think the first one worked so I went back and pressed the button again... not settings were changed so I have no idea why this exposure happened, but it's kind of funny so I included it anyway.

We got feeling back in our hands part way down, and made it back to the car before it got too dark (although the sun had set behind the mountains.... totally forgot about the sun going down so much earlier since this was the first day of the time change!).

Old Baldy Ridge - Oct. 23

I got a long weekend a few weeks ago so I went hiking with a couple of friends from work. We were all of to a bit of a sluggish start so decided to go with Old Baldy Ridge. The name deceptively suggests that it's a ridge walk, but the vast majority of it is along a river through the valley. Tom had the GPS so we were on our own for navigating except for my (mostly) trusty guide book... which should have been fairly easy except the trail was completely unsigned, very rough, and covered in snow so we couldn't actually see the trail for part of it - just one set of boot prints that we followed hoping they knew where they were going. We lost the trail towards the end of the hike, but I think we made about 12 km (estimated in blue) of the 14 km trail (remainder shown in red) before we lost it completely. No GPS profile on this, but based on the topo I'm estimating we made about 720 m of the 800 m or so total.

Krista, Heather, and Breanna... not quite sure what B's finding so funny here...

The trail:

Looking back towards the highway... not sure what the name of this mountain is, but we got lovely views of it.

In many places the trail was barely wide enough to walk on (probably started off as a game trail) and covered in snow, of course increasing in snow as we meandered up the valley.

This was our point of confusion. We started up a little ridgeline with a lovely view of this little cascade, but lost the trail. We were probably supposed to keep going up it and loop around but we couldn't see any more boot prints.

We spotted some back down in the valley and up on an opposing ridge so we went back down and started up the other side. Tom would be proud that I led them scrambling up this... a very Tom-like off-trail maneouver.

The way up to Old Baldy Ridge? ... there were boot prints at least, but lost them on the scree slope above and couldn't find the trail through the forest to loop back down.

View from the ridge:

Apparently an excellent place for a photo op:

We paused there for lunch, long enough to get a good chill going then headed back down with a few more layers on... stopping for a group shot along the way. Great use of a day off!

Fullerton Loop

Yesterday we decided to go for an easy hike/puppy walk at Fullerton Loop, just outside Bragg Creek leaving from the Allan Bill Pond parking lot. The loop was about 8 km with only 200 m of elevation gain. The temperature was gorgeous, the trail not too sloppy, and the puppies loved it!

Okay... so note that this was largely a puppy walk - no mountains here, but plenty of puppy pictures. Uma's getting pretty big now (red collar). She's 10 months old and almost the same height as Kali (black collar), but still quite a bit thinner and her head is smaller too. Still abundant energy but Uma's now starting to focus on things for more than a micro-second... even enough to follow the laser pointer in the morning (Kali adores it - obsessed even... Uma followed it for a couple of stomps but then got distracted with a play buddy). We're still working on getting her to focus enough that she stops ramming me in the head with her head, and she's still occasionally chewing inappropriate things if she doesn't get out for her morning walk early enough or meet up with enough play buddies to help wear her out on the walks.

The view from the look-out at the highest point of Fullerton Loop:

Prairie Mountain

Back on Sept. 23 I was lucky enough to get a day off! My friend Heather and I took Kali & Uma for a little hike up Prairie Mountain... since Tom had already done this hike with me I didn't think he'd mind. I didn't have the GPS so no track or stats, but it took us a few of hours, I think it's about a 300 m elevation gain, but not over much distance. This is the 360 from the top with Moose Mountain on the right just past the cairn.

Kali and Uma had a great time, especially once we got to the top. They're standing next to a fairly sheer drop that they were fascinated by...

... Kali loves staring off over the edge into the mountains (just check out some of the other posts...)

Apparently someone decided that Prairie Mountain reminded them of Nepal and hung some prayer flags out... I made the girls pose with them.

Unfortunately the snow's been flying around here already so the girls will have to wait for next year for more hiking... they're not really cold-weather kind of dogs. Kali always looks like she's on a death march when we take her snow-shoeing... thank goodness for dog parks!

Grassi Lakes

I'm helping to run the New Hire Mountain field trip for work this week (I posted about it back at the end of June when I went on it). Unfortunately we weren't able to go to the Grassi Lakes outcrop due to a road closure, but I'm supposed to be presenting it this time so Breanna and I went out last Monday to check it out. It was a gorgeous day in Calgary, but not so lucky in Canmore where we got hit by some horizontal rain and cold wind gusts. Just thought I'd share a few pics of the area...

View of Grassi Lakes looking out towards Canmore:

Since we were on company time we were trying to be safety concious, but noticed this sign on the trail only as we were leaving the area! ... kind of had to get in there anyway to look at the rocks.

Okay... so here's the outcrop from afar (climbers for scale... note to self, must come back to go climbing!). For those inclined to notice rock stuff, try finding the stromatoporoid reefs and parasequence boundaries.

And a slightly distorted view of the lake looking up to Ha Ling Peak and the top of the Spray Lake Road/water tower (where we started from).

I noticed I have no close-ups of the rocks... will remedy this when I revisit the site this week.

West Wind Pass

My parents are in town this weekend so we took them for a hike. I chose West Wind Pass, which is a 5.3 km loop with something like 429 m total elevation gain (~387 m max elevation gain)... so comparable to what we tortured Tom & Jane with when they came out. Once again the topo map is having a funny colour day...

This is Spray Lake from part way up:

From the top looking down West Wind Valley (you can see the LaFarge concrete plant in the valley).

Group shot at the top: This is the panoramic view into West Wind Valley. The 360 pan from the other side of the pass into Spray Lake Valley: One last view of Spray Lake:

After the hike we were supposed to head out to Banff for a quick dip in the hot springs... we were running about an hour late but we passed a convenient and completely random phone booth next to an outhouse on the side of the Spray Lake Road (a dirt road that runs through the mountains). I decided to try to call Breanna from there to see if she could let the dogs out... my attempts on the mountain were thwarted by bad reception on our cell phone (it's an emergency phone but is pretty useless as such because of chronically bad reception). We tried to put coins in the phone but it was jammed... Tom managed to shake out 85 cents but still couldn't get out all the coinage. After a bit of trying I managed to get a dial tone and an operator, informed them about the state of the phone, and they patched me through to Breanna's voicemail at work after I coughed up a credit card number... unfortunately did not have her cell phone OR home number with me (just remembered the office extension because I bug her a bunch at work) so hoped she'd get the message before she left for the day. All was well by the time we got home though - Breanna had come to the rescue of Uma & Kali and both pups had been let out and fed!! You're awesome B!

Old Goat Glacier, revisited

Okay... so I'm slowly catching up on blogging. A couple of weekends ago I revisited Old Goat Glacier with Tom & Breanna since neither of them had seen it before. The track accidentally got deleted but it's was 10.5km round-trip with a 620m elevation gain. We got a bit of a late start to the day... partly planned, partly just little things that crop up... but mostly because we got to the trailhead and I realized that I had forgotten my socks so we had to drive back to Canmore and buy some. It was still a nice hike, but we were losing light fast in Old Goat valley and the light wasn't particularly good for the group shot at the end.

Looking to Spray Lakes Reservoir from the edge of the hanging valley: Tom & Breanna on the moraine hiking up to the glacier:

Old Goat Glacier, the panoramic version:

Heading back out:

Puppies

I thought I should post a bit of a puppy update. Uma is just about 9 months now and is close to Kali's height and length, but defintely a lot scrawnier... and has a smaller head. She's a mostly well-behaved puppy but has gotten into a bit of mischief lately when she's bored... for example she's chewed a few pens on the carpet, destroyed Tom's hat, and very recently dug out and eaten carrots from my garden (who taught her carrots were yummy?!). We're doing our best to exercise the mischief out of her and Tom has even taken the girls to work on occasion (he's building mountain bike trails so they get to play in the forest). She's a super snuggly puppy and I love her a ton, but Kali definitely had us spoiled for what to expect from a Ridgeback puppy! Kali is doing quite well and enjoys tackling Uma in the long grass at the park. Her elbow doesn't seem to be bothering her too much.

House renos

Just thought I'd share a few before and after shots of our yard. As you can see we painted the house blue instead of the peach, ripped out the deck and replaced it...

cut down some trees, added a garden...

...and Tom certainly seems happier =o)!

Hiking in Yoho: Day 3 (Heading home)

On Sunday we woke up to a third chilly morning. We were still cold after breakfast, even with multiple layers of clothes on (the sun was taking it's sweet time to creep over the rim of the valley and the clouds weren't helping either), so we decided to hike up to Twin Falls again to warm up and catch the light hitting the Falls better.

To be fair I had to let Tom take a funny pic of me too... A couple shots of Twin Falls... not as twin looking in the morning since the cold kind of put a damper on the amount of melting:

On our way out from the little lookout trail we passed the Twin Falls Chalet. Apparently you can have lunch and tea here, and if you book ahead of time stay in this comfy lodge instead of in a tent on the ground.

After we got back to camp, all toasty at that point, we broke down the tent and packed up our stuff for the hike out. We paused again at Laughing Falls...

Tom had to clamber along this slippery log to get to and back from the rock in the above shot... that's my monkey man!

... more trail shots on the way out

This was the lookout at Lace Falls - Tom is strategically placed to block other people viewing the falls.

From there we stopped off at the Angel's Staircase Falls, although they weren't looking too impressive this early on a chilly day.

There was a brief glimpse of sun so we sat down on the river's edge for lunch. The sun soon disappeared though and the spot became a bit too cold to hang around long so we cut it short and hit the trail again...

Still no sun as we got back to Takkakaw Falls... but the car was warm!

The sun came out again and it warmed up on the drive back to Hwy 1... we stopped off at this lookout to see the Spiral Tunnel and finish our lunch in the sun.

It was impossible to see where the track and tunnel was at first but we were lucky enough to be there long enough for a train to come by so we could see it on two levels.

From here we just headed back to Calgary, got in around dinner time and picked up our pups from their fun weekend hanging out with our friends and their pup. Needless to say, excellent weekend! (especially since we did find the GPS at the end!)

Hiking in Yoho: Day 2 (Twin Falls and the Whaleback)

We woke up Saturday to another pretty chilly morning... good thing for hot oatmeal, many many layers of clothing, and a warm car ride to the trailhead! While Tom was cooking breakfast (and adding some zip to his coffee) I snapped a few shots of our "restful" camp-site in Lake Louise.

This was our site... surrounded by many other tents...

And backing onto the road that looped the camp-site. In the background you can see a yellow line that marks the top of the electric fence that encircled the tent/tent-trailer portion of the campground to keep bears out... and through the night you could hear the sound of trains and road traffic. VERY restful...

For this part of the hike we started from the same parking lot as the Burgess Shale hike at Takkakaw Falls but headed north along the river instead. Since we got back in rain the night before our stuff just got tossed into the back of the car, which led to us misplacing our GPS (we found it when we unpacked at home but there are unfortunately no tracks for this part of the hike... although if I get ambitious I'll scan the map).

Most of the initial hike to our camp-site at Twin Falls was along very easy trails, with only a small section of only slightly less smooth track (kind of nice with full packs on and after having already done one day of hiking).

Part way along the hike we dropped our packs to explore some lookouts along the river =o)

Resuming the hike:The bridge to Laughing Falls (another of the back-country campsites). Laughing Falls: The slightly more rugged trail leading onward to Twin Falls:

This part of the river was pretty neat because there were a lot of these bowls carved out along-side the river where it was under-cutting the rock.

Our camp-site at Twin Falls! There were only a hand-full of tents around, and instead of traffic we got the pleasant sound of rapids! We stopped here long enough to pitch our tent and enjoy lunch in the sun by the side of the river...

After lunch we decided to tack on another 10 km or so loop that took us up to Twin Falls proper, across the boulder field that bordered Marpole Lake and a cliff-face, then up over the Whaleback to the very top of Twin Falls and then back down to camp for dinner! We decided to leave our packs here and just took a light bag with some water and a snack for this part.

Twin Falls at a fairly peak flow (late on a warm day = lots of glacial run-off!):

Pan from the bridge that crosses the river leading from Twin Falls to Marpole Lake. Twin Falls is on the extreme left.

Marpole Lake:

The trail through the boulder field... mostly well marked, but easy to lose if you're not paying attention!

Once we got off the Marpole Loop intersection we had to make a decision whether to back-track, head up over the Whaleback, or to head down to Laughing Falls and then retrace our steps to camp. We were a bit concerned about the time and getting back before dark because we were getting conflicting distance estimates. At one point we met a lady coming of the Whaleback and we asked her how long it had taken her from Twin Falls... she said 5 hours! ... after a bit more discussion we realized that she had gotten the falls confused and the 5 hours had been from the start back at Takkakaw Falls so we forged on ahead over the Whaleback.

We had an excellent view of the mountains across the valley and the big moraines along the edge of the remnant glaciers:

At the top of the Whaleback there was this marker: I don't think we had anything to worry about during our hike though... A few pans from the Whaleback... unfortunately the sun didn't completely cooperate so the pictures are a bit patchy for light.

The trail down, leading towards Twin Falls. There was still snow packed around parts of the river where it would have been shaded for much of the day.

The top of Twin Falls:

From here the trail wound down the cliff in a series of switchbacks... a bit longer than we had expected, but that was probably because we were getting tired and hungry! Still made it back in time to have enough light for dinner (mmm... chili and cheese bannock), and then off to bed for a good night's sleep!

Hiking in Yoho: Day 1 (Burgess Shale)

Last weekend was a long one for me so Tom and I went hiking in Yoho National Park, B.C. It all started when a friend of mine from work decided to organize a trip to the Burgess Shale, but we decided to tack on an extra night there. We drove out to Lake Louise on Thursday night (stayed in the campground there Thurs & Fri nights), hiked the Burgess Shale on Friday, then backpacked into Yoho on Saturday and out on Sunday.

The hike started from Takkakaw Falls, North America's second highest waterfall. The hike was something like 24.7 km and an elevation gain of 740 m (I have a track and profile that I'll add later).

The morning was quite cool (about 5 C or less...) but we warmed up fairly quickly heading up this slope, although since it was a guided hike there were many stops so the whole thing was fairly leisurely. Lake Yoho:

Beyond Yoho Lake we entered Yoho pass where we saw this sign warning people they aren't allowed in the Burgess Shale quarry unless they have a guide with them (although everyone is allowed to hike along the trail that goes past it, just not the turn-off up to the quarry).

Panorama of the area... The falls to the right are Hamilton Falls on Hamilton Mountain (Emerald glacier on top and behind that mountain), and you can just see the tip of Emerald Lake in the centre.

Pan of Emerald Lake:

We stopped for lunch at what must have been a popular lunch spot because the chipmunks were obviously used to people - here's one munching up some crumbs that Tom had dropped from his lunch:

Probably a common shot for people hiking here... this is the turn-off to the Burgess Shale quarry... although the quarry isn't up at this mountain, just around the far right of photo.

The quarry! The guides have a bunch of representative fossils they keep in the green cabinet so they can whip them out to show people... of course the fun part is sifting through the scree to find your own (not that you get to keep them). Unfortunately we didn't get to spend too much time here because the hike was kind of leisurely and then we had to get back for a specific dinner reservation that Tom and I ended up missing anyway.

Of course we saw some neat fossils, some of which would definitely not been obvious to me me so I'm just showing a few that actually look like something people might recognize... like this trilobite!This is the jaw of the critter shown to the left... the name of which is completely escaping me at the moment (starts with an O anyone?)... I'll update this once I remember.

This is a crab-like critter named Waptia:

Marella, the lace crab: The group, mostly consisting of co-workers, co-worker spouses, and a couple friends of co-workers:

From here we got to descend at our own pace (Tom and I were in the lead and didn't really see many people from the time we left the switchback out of the quarry until we got to the parking lot). When we were about 15-20 minutes from the parking lot it started to pour, but after a bit of debate since the car was so close we pulled out our rain gear (not wanting to have to dry stuff in a tent).

Guinn's Pass and Galatea Lakes

Tom, Breanna, and I decided to hike Guinn's Pass last weekend and ended tacking on Galatea Lakes as well. It was a 19.4 km round-trip, with a maximum elevation gain of 870 m (although over 1km if you count all the ups and downs). The day started off kind of cool, but was comfortable for most of the day... really until the last hour when we were hiking back when we got poured on. This trail is particularly known for the amazing wildflowers!

We started from the Galatea parking lot where there was a fantastic view of Mt. Kidd (featured in a previous post). Unfortunately it was also a super hazy day so many of the scenery shots ended up a bit washed looking.

The trail started off with this lovely suspension bridge, and I think there were 8 bridges in total of varying types.

Just a few shots of the river... the trail wound back and forth across the creek providing ample scenic river shots and bridge photos.

The trail was beautiful and relaxing too! It was a fairly comfortable hike over a soft forested trail, pleasantly shaded, and very peaceful...

Relaxing on one of the bridges:

Another bridge... losing count at this point:

Heading out of the trees...

Okay... so the flower pics begin again. This time the botany lesson is scattered throughout the post... and Breanna threatened to start calling me "Botany Becky" after the numerous stops to photograph them. This one is an Orange Agoseris. It was pretty neat seeing the progression of flower types. The lower slopes were dominated by red, purple, and white, moving upward progressed to yellow, blue and white, and then at the top only light yellow and white.

I think this one is a Tall Jacob's Ladder.

This one was harder to track down... I've noticed it on previous hikes but without the berries so I didn't clue in to look in the shrub section It's a Bracted Honeysuckle, otherwise known as Black Twinberry. Don't eat this one - considered somewhat poisonous and apparently tastes so bad that nobody would really want to eat it anyway.

Yellow Columbine: This lovely one is Low Larkspur (aka Delphinium)

The scree trail leading up Guinn's pass (the trail actually zig-zags only part way up and then exits towards the left of the shot).

I was kind of wondering over these plants for a while. They looked a bit funny with the "fruit" being attached to the leaves...

Tom threw a bit of enlightenment on the matter by breaking it apart and revealing a parasitic worm inside.. kind of neat though.

Many of the rocks on the slope had some fantastic dune trough cross-stratification (for all you geo-geeks):

This one was pretty neat - a pretty purple with yellow-tipped stamens. It's a Silky Scorpionweed, aka Silky Phacelia.

Don't know what this is... maybe if I could have seen it earlier in the flowering season, but it looked neat:

The scree slides were pretty neat looking along the trail to Guinn's Pass: A view up Guinn's Pass: A view down Guinn's pass: Red-Osier Dogwood: I think this is a type of Parnassia. These two are pretty common... Purple Aster and Red Paintbrush.

Panorama from the top of Guinn's Pass. The view was amazing!! I'll definitely do this one again, but maybe hike over Guinn's Pass, overnight in Ribbon Creek, and then hike out through Kananaskis Village and back along Terrace Trail. This one is highly recommended!

It was a bit chilly on top so Breanna and I bundled on some layers (you know this one was going to show up B!).

We came across this little guy on our way out. He was popping in and out like a whack-a-mole, but I managed to catch this shot of him anyway.

Heading back out:

We were making pretty good time so we decided to swing up the other fork of the trail to Lillian Lake (only an additional 0.9km).

Then from there we figured we might as well tack on the extra hour to make a quick round-trip to Galatea Lakes at the far end of the trail (although if we hadn't done this we would have got back to the car just before the rain hit rather than hiking in it). This is the trail up to Galatea Lake: A hazy view of us at Galatea Lake and a panorama of it:

No photos of the way out... it was raining too hard and we were all getting hungry so we booted it out pretty quickly... awesome day as usual though! Any day in the mountains is a good day!

Rawson Lake

Tom Sr. & Jane are in town visiting so we took them on a drive and walk through the mountains. We opted for Rawson Lake because it's a wide, easy trail with a relatively low elevation gain and distance. The horizontal distance ended up being 9.45 km (rather than the 7.8 in the book), and 347 m elevation gain. I don't know what's up with the topo map today but the lakes are showing up in yellow. The grey line that runs along the bottom marks the border with B.C.

The hike started from the Upper Kananaskis Lakes parking lot, across the lake from Mt. Indefatigable (shown below), which we hiked earlier in the season.

The wide-open trail started off along the edge of the lake before cutting up to Rawson Lake.

Fairly soon we came upon this little waterfall:

Tom, Tom & Jane checking out the waterfall:

I decided to take a few pans of the lake. Unfortunately there was a lot of haze so the colours are pretty muted.

We stopped for a while at the lake to enjoy the sun and harass the chipmunk that kept trying to mooch food off us.

We took the Spray Lake dirt road back up to Canmore to give the folks a different view of the mountains on the way home and managed to see a coyote and a couple of moose on the side of the road.

BBQ on the new deck!

We had our first BBQ on our new deck last Friday... not that the deck is necessarily finished (still waiting on a railing and pergola), but we were getting tired of putting it off... and we wanted an excuse to pick up a Party Pig. There's a brewery in town called Wild Rose Brewery where you can pick up a pig-shaped vessel to transport your favourite brew (we chose Velvet Fog). It holds the equivalent of 25 bottles and is hilarious! True to form I didn't take pictures of any people at the actual event...

Trip to Thunder Bay

I went home to visit my family in Thunder Bay last weekend. Apparently I'm not super great with taking lots of photos during family events... I usually feel awkward taking photos of people. This is my grandma, with my nieces Seren (on her lap) and Breanna. Everyone's looking pretty in pink...

The reason for the congregation was my sister traveled from Seattle to Thunder Bay for Seren's 1st birthday... and what's a 1st birthday without a caky face?

Amy and her daughter Breanna:

Tonya:

James Walker Creek and Wild Flowers

A couple of weekends ago Tom, Breanna, and I hiked the James Walker Creek. This trail (green on the topo map) is just a canyon south of the Headwall Lake/Fortress/Chester Lake hike (blue) I posted back on July 4. It was 18.1 km round trip with 664 m elevation gain.

It was a bit hazy out for most of the day so some of the mountain shots aren't that spectacular. Here's looking back on the overgrown trail at Breanna as she fiddles with her camera (she only brought one this time). In retrospect the haze was probably from the fires around Kelowna.

It was hazy enough that there was a nice halo around the sun. The first tarn in the James Walker Creek valley:

We came across a number of cascades along the hike - most of mine didn't turn out very well, but here's a shot of Breanna making some attempts. Hopefully her's came out better!

One of the few waterfall shots that worked... had to do a bit of a panorama stitch to get it though!We stopped in a clearing at this waterfall for a group photo. Like the straw cowboy hat? I picked it up after stampede for $10 and figured I might as well wear it since it's a lot cooler than my oilskin hat... and it's hilarious!

After the brief photo op continued the trek up the debris slope...

View up the left fork of the canyon towards Mt. James Walker: Tom checking out the bedding dips:

View of a fold from an upper tarn. The moss was an amazing green here!The creek feeding this tarn was still edged in ice and Tom couldn't resist taking a few shots of it... kind of reminded us of summer in the arctic!Tom & Breanna's victory pose:

To go further up the valley we had to skirt the edge of the tarn by crossing some snow - fortunately it held up and nobody got wet... although Breanna thought it was a perfect time to toss snowballs.

A bit further up the valley we realized we had gone a fair bit further than the trail indicated, and since the "path" we were on was getting impassable due to sketchy snow across the creek, so we headed back down to check out the other canyon fork... Tom again leading the way on his make-shift toboggan...

Back down at the upper tarn... haze finally starting to lift to show some lovely blue sky.

Crossing James Walker Creek: The view from the forks down the valley: Tom couldn't resist having a brief nap in the moss... I was jealous.

I took a panorama in the right fork valley, which lead towards Mt. Inflexible (right edge of pan). We didn't go too far into this one because we were short on time and we could already see the end of the canyon from this point. If you look closely you can see Tom & Breanna.

Back at the lower tarn - the lake was beautifully still with a vivid blue sky so I couldn't resist snapping a few (okay, Breanna also demanded that I do this since she was using black & white film at this point).

... okay, on the botany lesson. On the Mt. Allan hike I was inspired by the beauty of the wildflowers so I picked up a wildflower book and decided to take the time to photograph some of the flowers we saw:

Okay... so this one isn't in my book, but it looks like it's part of the Aster family.

I think this one is Roseroot, a succulent that is supposed to have edible roots and leaves (although I think I need to get better with my I.D. before I eat it).This is a Prairie Crocus - they tend to be quite common on the hikes we've done, sometimes with a pretty purple hue.

These cute little flowers are Mountain Forget-Me-Nots.

This hike was the first time I noticed these pretty Alpine Lanterns.

Streamband Groundsel, part of the Aster family:

Scarlet Paintbrush, a relatively common flower on our hikes:

This was the first time we saw it in vibrant pink and purples though:

Okay... I don't know what this one is either - it doesn't look like any of the ones in my book. If somebody can identify it please let me know.

This one is Blue Clematis, aka Blue Virgin's Bower.

Mt. Allan

Last Sunday Tom & I decided to push our elevation gain by hiking Mt. Allan. Our guide book boasted this hike as having the biggest elevation gain in the Canadian Rockies with a supposed 1.7 km vertical combined with 14.4 km out & back. Our GPS pegged the hike at only 1.5 km vertical and 17.6 km hike. It was a bit of a slog to start with, the scenery not as nice as last weekend, but once we hit the sub-alpine zone the wild flowers were amazing! Still made for an excellent day.

The route:

The profile:

The trail started off on a nice wide trail, ironically called "Hidden Trail" despite it being incredibly obvious. The trees were fairly thick around the trail, blocking the wind. We were thinking we'd be running out of water before the trip was done, but thankfully once we got a bit higher out of the trees it cooled off to a perfect hiking temperature.

Unfortunately this was pretty much it for snow on this trek... just a dirty pile amongst the trees on the side of the trail.

This is the top of Mt. Olympus, a little bump really half way up to Mt. Allan.

Once we got up this ridge we got our first good view of Mt. Allan (other than from the highway). .. and this is where the hike started getting good.

Apparently this is where they do the weather measurements for the Kananaskis recreation area... There were two stations set up here, and a partial one on Mt. Allan.

... and also the top of the chair-lifts for the Nakiska ski resort.

Most of the hike was through Cretaceous conglomerates (I'm pretty sure they're equvalent to the same stuff I found dinosaur tracks in during my work field trip that I posted back on June 30). In this spot the conglomerates were all turned up on end forming this palisade wall and some of the rubble blocks had slickenslides.

From the top of Mt. Allan! Yay, victory!

Pan from the top:

There was a cement block on the very top with this survey marker:

We also found another little bit of interest up here... a small plaque stuck to a precarious rock (black rectangle on the rock to the far right of Tom).

Here's a close-up of the plaque. Tom & I thought this was a really awesome idea and hope we can have a similar memorial on our favourite hike some day (although we have to check out many more hikes so hopefully not any time soon!).

This is the view on the other side of Mt. Allan. If you want to turn this hike into a shuttle trip you can follow this trail down to the valley and head out to Hwy 1.

This is the gentle part of the ridgeline back towards the trailhead.

View of the ridge of conglomerate on the way back.

I stopped to take some pictures of the wild flowers on the way down. I don't know what they are but I think I'm inspired to head out to the bookstore to find out.

Storming the Fortress

On Friday Tom & I thought we'd take advantage of the Stampede Parade keeping the crowds in town while we got the heck out. We originally opted to hike up to the Headwall Lakes, a 14km round-trip with only 430 m of elevation gain, with the possibility of tacking on the Fortress or popping over the ridge to come out on the Chester Lake trail. Instead, we ended up doing both, so hiking up the Headwall Creek canyon, climbing to the Fortress, and then out Chester Lake for a total hike of 20.8 km loop with 1115m of elevation gain, most of it at the Fortress.

I tried putting labels on the profile but for some reason every time I've tried to upload it the words are missing. The Headwall Lakes are after the first steep slope on the left ~7km, the sharp pointy part is the Fortress ~11km, and Chester Lake is on the right at ~17km.

The trail started off on wide cross-country ski trails rated blue and orange (which are the easiest here rather than the yellow and red equivalents back home in Ontario).

After about 45 minutes or so we took a small trail marked by a cairn and headed up the Headwall Creek trail.

Headwall Creek:

The forested trail shortly gave way to a rough bouldery trail marked by small cairns (rock piles).

Once again we hit snow, pretty minor at first...

But then more snow... and by the end of the trek my ankles were a bit chilly from having snow packed around them and my socks were a bit soggy.

Lower Headwall Lake - that's ice on the lake in the foreground.

Tom checking out the cut-throat trout in the Lower Headwall Lake:

View down the valley from the top of Headwall Lake. At this point the creek was gushing out of the ground. A combination of thick scree and karsting of the limestone means that the creeks run underground for a while.

Upper Headwall Lake:

Some crinoids on a boulder - centimetre scale at the bottom. Tom laughed at me because I had my scale card stashed in camera case. With preservation this good I wish I could poke around the bed this came from to see if there was a calyx to go with it.

First view of the Fortress:

Entering the sub-alpine valley above Headwall Lakes with Headwall Creek running through it.

The steep snow-covered slope leading up to the ridge separating Chester Canyon from Headwall Canyon, with the trail going up to the Fortress starting from the ridge-crest.

On the trail up to the Fortress looking back at the ridge-crest...

We found a geocache at the top of the Fortress!

This is the view from the Fortress looking back to Headwall Canyon.

The view slightly to the right of the last, looking towards Chester Lake.

360 degree panorama from the top of the Fortress:

The scree trail leading to the Fortress:

The scree slope leading from the ridge-crest down to Chester Lake. Just below this we hit deep snow. It was so steep we decided not to toboggan down it, but it was a pretty good, although precarious at times, boot-ski.

Finally off the rubble trail, looking back to the Fortress. Chester Lake - the wild-flowers were amazing!

The well-groomed gravel trail that leads from Chester Lake to the parking lot. This part of the trail is rated easy.

In the end it took us just over 5 hours of moving time, more like 7 total though once snack time, photo-ops, and lounging around various lakes and the top of the Fortress were taken into account. Made for another sweet summer day though! Needless to say, we decided to take it easy today...

Mountain Trip

Last week I went on a trip to the mountains with the other new hires at work, really it was just a bit of geo-tourism to familiarize ourselves with the local foothills geology. I thought I'd share some of the neat things we saw (okay, neat to geo-geeks maybe).

A view of the dam near Mt. Yamnuska where several of the following pictures were taken.

Dinosaur tracks:

I believe these trace fossils are Rosselia, which is generally interpreted as the dwelling tube of a terebellid annelid (a type of worm). This is the trace fossil Ophiomorpha, which is a combined dwelling and feeding burrow created by shrimp by lining it with fecal pellets.

This trace fossil is Diplocraterion, which is a U-shaped tube with spreite within the "U". The organism lives in the tube and moves the burrow up or down depending on sedimentation, erosion, or growth of the organism. Trace maker unknown.Trace fossil: Asterosoma, trace maker: unknown. The organism would have been farming the sediment by burrowing down and then digging burrows out from the main tunnel in a star-shaped pattern.

Mt. Kidd - one of the most photographed mountain in the Rockies. The structure here is the result of a fault-propogation fold. I had planned to sketch out how it formed in photoshop but haven't gotten around to it... so this photo may be updated at a later time (or not).

Panorama of Mt. Lorette - Tom and I took shots of this last season when we hiked Wasootch Ridge. Lots of neat thrust faults here that give repeating stratigraphy (that I also had planned to sketch in and might do later).

Mt. Indefatigable (aka Mt. Fatty)

Tom & I headed out for another hike on Saturday - it was weird not having Kali with us, but she's not quite up to it anymore with her bad elbows. We've been wanting to hike Mt. Fatty, a 7.6 km round-trip with 920m elevation gain (although our GPS recorded around 1100 m). The trail started with a brief foray into the woods, but with an instant hit of steady climbing.

This is the view from the lower slopes of Mt. Fatty back towards Upper Kananaskis Lake.

Out of the trees and up the rocky slope: I paused here to take this pan:

Our first view of the peak of Mt. Indefatigable:

The Opal Ranges with Kananaskis Lake in the foreground. At 2266 m we hit snow. Most of the trail wasn't too bad - compacted footprints made for decent footing and closer to the top the drifts had been blown away. Tom making snow angels: A snow-filled valley looking up to the peak of Mt. Fatty:

Getting close to the peak:

From this point we decided to take an impromptu ramble towards the northern outlier of Mt. Fatty. This is a view back down to where we came from.

A view of the wild flowers growing up the slope of the northern outlier: A view of the northern outlier from Mt. Fatty: A peek over the edge of Mt. Fatty:

Tom on a lower peak, but the highest we got to.

From the secondary peak up the ridgeline towards the real crest of Mt. Fatty - it was a bit more than Tom's hand could handle. Tom suiting up to take the fast way down. If you strap a wind-breaker to yourself you can use it like a toboggan and slide down the snow (note to self: always pack wind-breaker on a trip like this!) Tom getting the hiking poles ready for braking: Tom en route: Since I didn't have a wind-breaker with me I had to settle for boot-skiing down the snow. Heading back down, and loving how beautiful the day was - great hike, great weather, and a beautifully lit fold =o)!

Hailstone Butte

Last weekend Tom & I decided to go hiking (since it's one of our few one-handed activities these days) and brought along Nikole (our guest) and our friend Breanna. We opted for a couple of easy hikes to get us warmed up for the season, but were a bit delayed getting out of town because we mistakenly ended up on the same route out of town as a bike race so didn't complete the second one (but it will be excellent for the folks when they make it to town!). The first hike was Hailstone Butte, a 4km round-trip with only 327 m of elevation that ended with a fire look-out. Our guide book was a bit confused on the location of the trailhead and actually sent us route-finding up a bit of a harder hill that tacked on some difficulty and time, although we found the trail on the way out and it was much easier.

... but if we hadn't gone that way we probably wouldn't have noticed this lovely fold!

The fire look-out on top of Hailstone Butte; much newer than the one on Mt. Burke that we visited last year and in much better condition!

View along the butte from the fire look-out:

Eww... Franken-Finger

Just thought I'd share this lovely shot with everyone. A couple of weeks ago some boulders decided to get even with Tom and crushed his hand. He needed 15 stitches in one finger and the rest of his hand was pretty swollen and mangled looking. Needless to say he's being forced to take it easy now, but is recovering.

Visions of Moab

Sorry I've been a little lax on updating the blog lately. These are just a few shots from Moab from my work trip back in May - hopefully there will be many more in the future when Tom & I go ride it!

Pictographs painted by "Archaic people" from Barrier Canyon, Utah

A picturesque fault outside Moab:

S.W. U.S. trip: Climbing Mt. Baldy, Orem, Utah

We got an afternoon of free time on the trip so the Canadian Contingency (minus one who chose to go golfing instead) decided to climb up Mt. Baldy. We started at an elevation around 4400 ft and got up to about 8000 ft ... or for us Canadians an elevation gain of about 1500 km. We ended up taking about 6 hours for the trip. The trail started pleasantly enough with lovely views of Orem and the surrounding mountains.

The view up to Mt. Baldy:

This is where it started to get a bit rough... we lost the trail heading up to Mt. Baldy and started bush-whacking from the base to the summit through some scratchy shrubs.

There was still a good amount of snow near the top so we paused for some scenic shots and a snowball fight.

A little further up we found a ridge that went up to the top. It was covered in a few feet of snow still but firm enough not to sink through... although the summit was still deceptively far away and difficult to run to on the snow.

View from the top of Mt. Baldy:

What else would we do up there except build a snowman?

We named it after the missing Canadian and left him up (minus the cowboy hat) there hoping we could see him from the bottom with our binoculars... never did get a chance to check it out though....

We couldn't see the trail from the top. Mark decided to take a short cut and used his rain jacket as a toboggan and slid down on his bum.

Part way down we came across a sign-post indicating we were on the right track.

There was a little bit of trail at first but we lost it again and ended up picking our way down the gully between the mountains...

When we got close to the bottom we found the trail again and came across this idyllic setting (and sign). Apparently we started the hike from the wrong side of the parking lot. The trail we started on didn't actually go to the summit... but it was an awesome hike anyway!!

S.W. U.S. trip: New Mexico

I got back on Friday from my geo-tour work trip of the S.W. U.S... most of these will just be scenic shots. I've broken the trip up into a few different posts to make it more manageable. We flew into El Paso and pretty quickly headed into New Mexico where it was a bit uncomfortably hot (35 C or so).

This is the El Capitan Reef... a classic carbonate reef facies that you'd see in all the text books. We didn't actually get to see much carbonate facies... pretty much just 15 minutes on the second day.

Just a close-up on this pretty cactus:

One of the trails we took started at this little house. The story is this little house was built by a guy back in the 1900s (ordered pre-fab from Sears or something like that). He advertised for a bride but when she got there and saw the place she turned around and went back home.

View down the trail towards El Paso (roughly):

New Mexico desert:

This is a roll-over fold (the curved beds on the right) that was created by layers collapsing along a fault.

This is White Sands Park. We got to drive by and see the gypsum dunes, but didn't actually get to stop. They also pointed out Carlsbad Caverns as we drove past but we didn't get to stop there either.

Uma's first trips to the dog park

Tom has told me that I've got a ridiculous number of puppy pictures on the blog now, but whatever, they're cute... and here's a few more. Uma is now officially allowed to go to dog parks - all up to date on her vaccines. We took them to Nose Hill park for the first visit because there's not usually too many dogs there so she can work up to larger groups... but that also means she's fair game for Kali. Uma started the wrestling but there wasn't really anywhere to hide so Kali chased her down and rolled her... and Uma came running to us for protection since she's not quite fast enough yet. Kali doesn't hurt her or anything... just pins her to the ground and won't let her up.

Of course after all that playing puppies definitely need some snuggling in the sunbeam time... whether Kali wants the snuggle part or not...

Who knows? Maybe she does... Uma is pretty warm and a perfect pillow size...

This morning we took them to Bowmont Park because there's a combination of fenced in puppy areas and nice walking areas. Here they are sporting the new collars my sister made for them - very styling and we got a few people asking where we got them and saying she should go into business making them...

There were actually quite a few dogs around and Uma started making some friends... although I'm pretty sure she was expecting them all to want to pin her like Kali does. We'll be taking Uma for a few solo trips too... and pretty soon puppy school.

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Puppy shots & new puppy bed!

It was gorgeous yesterday and we knew the snow was coming again so we took Kali & Uma to a nearby, relatively secluded park where we could play and do some training. Tom decided to chill out in the sun for a bit but Uma took it as an invitation to try to jump on him...

Uma's still growing of course... up to 25 lbs now. She still wants to snuggle with Kali but they're running out of room on Kali's bed. I picked up some more upholstery foam so I can make a bigger bed...

Napping in the sun...

Something wrong here... while I've been working on making a cover the two foams were individually covered with old bed covers but whenever the girls wrestle the beds end up flying all over the place. This time the beds somehow ended up stacked with Uma victoriously hanging out on top... probably one of her few victories...

This morning I finally found time to work on the bed cover. The girls were a hassle of course, trying to help with the pinning, climbing under the table where the pedal is (Uma at least), and just generally hanging around.

Here are the girls snuggled up on the new king-sized puppy bed. One of the foams was a bit smaller than the other so I might stuff the bed to make up for it. It's a thick, smooth, soft fleece on one side and the grey side is a fuzzy, woolier fleece.

Mooks has been feeling like a bit of a neglectarino on this site so I thought I'd slip in a cute shot I took of her... She's still ruling the roost of course, but Uma likes to push it.

Yard Work

Last weekend it was so beautiful that Tom and I took advantage of the weather to do some yard work. The previous owners kind of let the trees go, and many of them were planted too close to the house, or fence, or randomly jutting into the yard. We're clearing out most of them so we can put in a vegetable garden and leave room for the dogs to run around.

This is a shot from the backyard towards the door and shed that provides the back of the carport (a bit of a needed sound barrier as well). The sliding doors lead to the bedroom.

A view from the deck towards where the last shot was taken... By this time the trees have been thinned quite a bit from what they were, but they'll be gone completely. We were going to keep the one in the very corner but after trying to clean it up we realized that it's not going to be very salvageable (and I got really frustrated with thinning it) so we're going to put in something like a Japanese maple... something with a nice simple trunk and canopy that develop all kinds of suckers. Both Kali and Uma have been up on the deck and find it pretty nice for sunning... although the stairs are way too narrow and rickety to be safe and Uma fell through them on her first attempt up.

This is the deck and back of the house... no idea why there are no windows out here but that will be changing soon. We're shaving off some of the deck to make it narrower and free up more yard, extending it out to cover most of the back, and adding a single patio door on the right. This crab apple tree is one of the two we are keeping. The deck is actually in rough shape with some rotting boards so we're going to redo it completely and put in some safe stairs that will lead off this corner by the tree.

View of the far corner and Tom working on clearing out a second apple tree... it's still a work in progress. You can see the pile of brush we've already cleaned at this point, and it's still growing. The brush pile is over the area where the garden will be.

View from where Tom was standing showing the width of the yard. It's a good-sized yard but most of it is length rather than depth. The girls spent most of the day outside with us helping to remove branches by chewing them... sooo helpful.

A final backyard shot looking down the far side of the house with the second entrance.

We just got 10+ cm of snow last night so the yard doesn't look like this anymore... so much for the hint of spring...

Another Puppy Update... wow, 12 weeks old already!

It's kind of hard to believe Uma is already 12 weeks old, but she's growing like a week. She's close to 25 lbs now - 10 lbs more than when we got her a month ago! Some days it seems like I go to work and a she's scrawny, and by the time I come home she's visibly grown... Last monday we took her in to get her second round of boosters - only 1 more during the first week of April and then we can finally start taking her to fun places like puppy parks. She's still not quite sleeping through the whole night, usually waking up around 4am. Tom suspects that might be when the buses start going by and wakes them up because it certainly isn't my alarm clock or when they get fed. She had a bit of a relapse with the house-training during a cold snap we had last weekend but seems to be back on track now that it's nice and warm again (+7ish the last couple of days!). Uma's also doing quite well with walking now... we've had her out for a few 1 hour walks around the neighbourhood. Fortunately she loves copying Kali so leash training has been mostly a breeze although if Tom & I walk them together (1 dog each) there's a bit of pulling going on because Uma wants to walk beside Kali or hassle her.

Tom chilling with the girls:

When we had the cold snap I bought some fleece to make Uma a little puppy coat so she'd go out easier/longer... I got a bit lazy (and I needed it fast) so I only threw in a few stitches and ended up making a puppy cape (she'll out-grow it soon anyway). Meet Super-Uma!

I love this picture because it's hilarious. Mookie was sauntering by, considering snuggling Kali and I caught her mid-yawn. I love it because it looks like she's attacking them...

Zoom back to previous posts to check out the comparison of this shot with when we first got Uma to see how much she's grown. I'm sure they're wondering why we're always snapping pictures of them... especially when they're sleeping...

Uma's big enough that she's having trouble fitting onto Kali's bed. I picked up some more upholstery foam and fabric and I'm working on extending Kali's bed into a double-puppy bed so she can sleep without having Uma on top of her...

Tom and Mooks snuggling, also wondering why I keep harassing everyone with the camera...

Puppy Update

We've had Uma for a week now. Uma's been busy getting used to the house and learning all kinds of things. By the second day she had picked up on her name and started getting used to going outside instead of peeing on the floor... although we still had trouble getting the timing and signals down... and she had trouble navigating the steps to the door. This weekend she's big enough to get down the stairs on her own and I think she'll be pretty much house-broken from now on. She also had to get used to being in her happy-fun place (a.k.a. crate). She had trouble sleeping through the night most of the week and often woke up at 4:30 (fortunately Tom was sweet enough to take care of the middle of the night problems). Since about Thursday though she's been sleeping in until 5:30/6ish when I get up for work anyway.

Kali spent the first few days trying to avoid Uma, but Uma's persistence has paid off. They now nap together frequently...

... and they've become great friends play together all the time!

Mookie's been doing well too. Uma has been a bit hesitant about approaching Mooks, but they've had a few encounters where Uma got put in her place. The only problem we've had is that Kali's decided to try to push the pecking order too and has been trying to gang up on Mooks whenever Uma tries to check her out. Overall they're all getting along and Mooks can go wherever she wants mostly un-harassed.

... and sometimes all four of us get to hang out together.

Complete Overhaul

We had a pretty busy weekend... had friends over Friday & Saturday night, helped another one move Saturday morning, and then both Saturday and Sunday afternoon were filled with the last in our series of bike maintenance classes at Bow Cycle. This one was the Complete Overhaul, so we got to dismantle, clean, assemble, and adjust our bikes. It was definitely worth taking because I learned a lot and got to reinforce what I learned from the previous three classes... and best of all my bike hasn't been this clean since I bought it and it's ready for summer! No waiting to get it taken care of at the shop and we can do it ourselves now.

New Car....

Well... we bought a new car. After having our car in and out of the shop all month we were told that our engine was down to 3.5 cylinders and failing. Replacing the engine with a used one (with more km than we had!) would have cost just about as much as the car was worth so we headed out to check out a few used CRVs and ended up buying this pretty one. It's a 2006 with less than 40,000km on it so we're hoping it will last quite a few years... sure put a damper on our reno budget though.

I mostly took this shot for a picture of the front of our house. We're getting some new windows next month and might paint it this summer since neither of us are a big fan of peach.

More puppy pictures

Well, we brought Uma home on Friday. Kali wasn't so sure of her and mostly just ran away from her and growled when Uma got too close. Of course, Uma was fascinated by having another Ridgeback and just wanted to play and cuddle. Uma & Mooks haven't interacted too much yet. Uma's watched Mooks from a distance and wandered after her once, but no face to face. Mooks has been only slightly more scarce than usual.

When we went to pick up puppy stuff we saw a little bunny that matched the one that Kali had so we had to pick it up for Uma... but when Uma got home she ended up romping around with the big one and Kali was checking out the little one... I'm pretty sure in this shot Kali's saying "Why am I stuck with the little one?".

This morning they were on a bit better terms with Kali growling a bit less and letting Uma get closer. Uma keeps trying to crawl into Kali's bed, but she's not having any of that quite yet (although Uma will probably wear her down). Apparently it's okay for them to sleep near each other with a "mom barrier"....

And once they were settled for a while I was able to sneak out and leave them on their own beds next to each other.

Meet Uma

We picked out our puppy this weekend! We decided on the little ridgeless girl. Meet Uma Makena (or just Uma). She was born on Dec. 16, 2008 and gets to come home with us on Feb. 13. She was a lot more active this time, in fact all of the puppies were. When we showed up we were swarmed by 11 litttle puppies all trying to jump up for snuggles and nibbles.

We were initially deciding between the ridgeless male (left) and Uma (right). They're both adorable, but Uma ended up having some traits that we decided we liked better... besides looking exactly like Kali did as an 8 week old puppy.

For example, we got to take both of them out individually from the pack. The little male went right for our shoes and started trying to chew them... Uma on the other hand went off exploring, figured out how to navigate the couple of stairs by herself, and entertained herself by playing with the pillows and an empty plastic water bottle.

The top two puppies are Uma and her ridgeless brother playing outside.

Anyway... should be interesting getting Uma home and introducing her to Mooks and Kali. We've tried telling them that she's coming, but I don't think they believe us yet. We'll post more pictures next weekend!

Birthday Puppy

Tom decided to get me a puppy for my birthday this year now that we've got our own house. It's going to be another Rhodesian Ridgeback of course... ridgeless again even. The breeder is Kariba Ridge and they have two ridgeless puppies for us to choose from (out of a litter of 11) - one boy and one girl, but we're not sure yet which we will choose.

The little puppy on top in the red collar is the female. She's really sweet and shy, but got a bit rambunctious once the other puppies all went back to bed. She reminded us a lot of Kali in her looks and temperament.

Close-up of the girl:

This little guy was a bit more out-going and feisty than the girl... probably will be a bit of a trouble maker, but then he crashed hard and became a cuddler (definitely a big selling point if you know me!). When I tried to put him down to go he crawled right back into my lap.

Any votes on which one we should choose? The girl is very mellow and sweet, just like Kali. The boy is a rambunctious cuddler, and may possibly develop some minor attitude, but nothing we wouldn't be able to handle.

Tour the new house...

Tom and I have now had our house for a week... we've been there every day painting and starting to put in hardwood floors in the upstairs bedrooms. Apparently we forgot to take pictures of the front of the house and the backyard so I'll post those later. The house is 1080 sq.ft, located near the University and a bunch of really big dog parks. It's a 1960s bungalow and some of the features definitely show it... some we like (like vaulted ceilings) and some have already been ripped out... We'll post more shots of the updates as we get various rooms done.

Entryway complete with little milk door under the window:

Kitchen, in need of a make-over for sure. It's a bit cramped and the cabinets aren't super functional. The appliances are fairly new at least!

Kitchen skylight:

This is the divider between the living room and kitchen, totally wired up for power and provides some much needed extra storage.

The living room and other side of the divider .... with the lovely faux fireplace covered in some yellow-green laminate. We've ripped off the laminate and it looks much better already. Eventually we want to replace it with a real gas fireplace.

Upstairs hallway:

Master bedroom with sliding glass doors that open onto the deck:

The ensuite off the bedroom (or pee closet as Tom has named it since it's really about the size of a closet and very ugly).

The two other bedrooms (and one of the closets... all of the closet doors were removed and just had ugly drapes covering them).

We'd like to redo this main bathroom as well... obviously the people who were here before were quite short since the showerhead is about shoulder-height. Down to the basements... with this lovely painted wood panel and un-insulated walls. Behind that door is a downstairs bedroom: Tom's new workshop is in the basement too: View towards the other end of the basement and laundry room door: Laundry room, furnace room (door to the right) and downstairs bathroom: Basement bathroom:

Wasootch Ridge

Tom, Kali & I got a bit of a late start hiking on Sunday, but still managed to enough time to hike Wasootch Ridge. It was an 11km round-trip with 1010m of elevation gain, although the ridge-top was rolling so it felt like more.

This is Mt. Lorette from near the top of the first steep ascent.

The trail at the first leveling-out point: Kali-roo with Barrier Lake and Hwy 40 in the background (looking north): The snowy trail ahead... this crest is still about 4 hills away from the top of Wasootch, but it looked deceptively close from this spot. View from the first cairn looking back towards the trailhead. Views from the summit cairn towards the very top of Wasootch (a bit of a scramble to get there and we were running out of day-light).

Mt. Lady Macdonald

We climbed Mt. Lady Macdonald on Saturday (recommended as a moderate-level shoulder-season hike in our guidebook). The trailhead is right in Canmore, starting at a paved path along Cougar Creek at an elevation of 1383 m.

The hike to the shoulder of the mountain is 6.6 km roundtrip with a total elevation gain of 917 m, or if you go to the top of the summit it's 7.6 km round-trip with 1117 m of elevation gain (top of the mountain is 2500m). The trail rose steadily but wasn't too challenging. The parks web-site said there was snow on the trail so we came prepared with lots of layers - but the weather was unseasonably warm and instead of layering up we were wishing we had shorts and ended up with pretty stuffed packs! The very top of the peak was a bit cool, but still made for a beautiful day of hiking.

A nice perk to this hike is getting to see some more ruined buildings at the top - not quite as nice or as old as the fire look-out on Mt. Burke, but I'm definitely liking the additional points of interest... I guess at some point someone had the brilliant idea of building a teahouse on Mt. Lady Macdonald and then flying tourists up by helicopter - I have no idea how that would have been economically feasible, but the residents of Canmore vetoed it (not before parts of it were built though!). I'm glad that this one is merely a relict now and not a tourist trap!

View of the teahouse:

View of the helicopter landing platform and the summit of Mt. Lady Macdonald.

A little pagoda near the edge of a cliff below the teahouse. It was the perfect spot for lunch and a nap in the sun. This was the only spot where we saw snow, and that was restricted to the areas shaded by trees - but this hike is steep and south-facing so it tends to be fairly free of snow this time of year...

View of the mountains across the valley - lots of snow on the north-facing peaks!

View of the platform (whitish square to the right), teahouse (whitish blob just above and to the left of the platform) and pagoda (whitish dot to the left of these buildings on the edge of the cliff) from near the top of Mt. Lady Macdonald. This part of the trail was a bit more challenging. There was no real defined trail other than where people had come sliding down the scree on the descent. The scree was pretty loose and for every two steps you took you slid down one.

Kali-roo with Mt. Lady Macdonald summit in the background. We hung out at the bottom of the scree slope for a while, just enjoyinging the sun on our faces...

It was a really pleasant day that I didn't want to end, but eventually we decided we should head back down before it got dark and find some dinner. The sun was sinking behind the crest of the mountains as we wandered into the parking lot...

Hang-gliding!

Tom and I took a beginner hang-gliding class this weekend. We had a few hours of ground school on Thursday to show us the basics of how to do it, then we got to do some practical air-time on Saturday and Sunday morning. Saturday was really windy and chilly, but meant we didn't need to run as hard to get in the air. We got a couple hours of practice with the instructor's assistance before it got too windy and we had to call it a day. Today was colder but the wind was calmer, and we got to stay out for the full four hours. We were on our own today for balancing the glider, which was a fair bit more difficult. The glider we were on was actually a bit too big/heavy for me so I was pretty sore by the end of the day... Both Tom and I managed to get some brief lift, but it was a bit difficult to catch it in the photos. I think we've found ourselves a new hobby... just have to wait until spring for more practice time and the intermediate gliding class!