West Bragg Creek

The snow has finally started to settle in the front ranges meaning that good XC skiing is only 30 min, rather than 2 hr drive away. The snow started to fall on Saturday night and by Sunday morning we had a good 15 cm on the ground. Snow coverage was a little thin in places but overall pretty good considering how early in the season it is. With the temperature staying around -10 C we may even be able to get a few laps in around our local park. 

Aleisha enjoying our lovely skier set tracks

Gary, the special cat.

In cat related news, Gary is going well with minimal damage to our new furniture. Although he has developed a habit of going to sleep on our necks and chewing on our hair, he's a little special....  

Calgary

We were hoping to head out cross country skiing this weekend but a shock and awe snow storm came out of nowhere and blanked Calgary and surrounding roads with 15-20 cm of snow. Unfortunately little of the snow landed on the Mts so we decided to avoid the slick roads and insane local drivers and spend the day in Calgary.

The walking path was in better condition than the roads.

First ski of the Season - Moraine Lake Road

After a long and relatively warm autumn winter has finally arrived. So far Calgary has only received a few lights dustings but thankfully the mountains have been getting a fair bit more. 

Aleisha and I decided to head out yesterday to the Moraine Lake road which so far is the only XC trail that is open. This meant that we had to contend with crowds of Olympic athletes that put our abilities to shame. Despite being lapped a few times by people 1/2 or 3 times our age we still had a great time. The trip was made even more satisfying by stopping in at the Banff hot springs for a soak afterwards.

Aleisha enjoying the fresh snow.

Looking out to the Lake Louise ski resort

Our cat Gary

Meet Gary, the latest addition to our Canadian family. We adopted him last week and he is already settling in well and making himself feel at home. He is still just a kitten at ~6 months old but so far has refrained from destroying our house. I hope our good luck continues.

Nova Scotia

With Aleisha hitting the big 3 0 we decided to celebrate in style by holidaying in the Canadian Maritimes. The trip was made even better by having having Aleisha's folks, Sylvia and Tony join us.

We flew into Halifax and spent a couple days wandering around the historic town. We then dove down the cost to Lunenburg via Peggy's Cove. The coast of Nova Scotia is stunning with numerous quaint old small towns. We then crossed the island to Digby, the scallop capital of the world. Over the next couple of days we filled our stomachs with all the delicacies that the oceans could offer us. While in Digby we went Whale watching in the Bay of Fundy and even managed to see some Puffins in the process.

From Digby we hauled up to PEI and Charlottetown. While there we checked out the local distilleries and picked up a fine 150 proof paint stripper. We also stumbled across a small town by the name of New Zealand, apparently the people of PEI are not too original with the names of their towns.

Riding the cannon at the Citadel fort in Halifax

The picturesque town Lunenburg

The Bay of Fundy, home of the worlds biggest tides

DIVE! DIVE! DIVE!

I guess PEI spent too much money on the Confederation Bridge to afford a decent sign.

Hey look we are in NZ!

Abbot Pass Hut

I do not think that there are enough superlatives in world to adequately describe the Lake O'Hara region, it is quite simply paradise. We have been there a number of times, both in summer and winter, and after each trip we always come away amazed.

This past weekends trip has been a long time in the planning and I can honestly say that I don't think Aleisha and I have ever been more excited or apprehensive about a hiking trip before. The trip was to the Abbot Pass Hut, the second highest habitable structure in Canada (2925 m).

The trip to the pass was made bearable by some mediocre scenery

When rocks the size of your pack start to slide you know its time to find another path, so we chose the snow.

Aleisha watches a small avalanche from the hut.

After a bit of a scramble I managed to finally get past 3000 m and in the process get a nice view of the hut.

Looking out to "The Death Trap" (I didn't make that one up), maybe next year we will come back via this route.

Chester Lake - An oldie but a goodie

Hiking season is finally upon us so we decided to revisit an old friend, Chester Lake. It is possibly the busiest trail on this side of the rockies and has a car park that would be big enough for a WalMart as proof of its popularity. But it is popular for a reason, bang for buck it cant be beaten! It is an especially good place to take novice hikers as we were doing today. While we have done the hike a number of times for some reason we have never pushed all the way to the end of the trail so that's what we did today. I'm glad we did, as it turned out to be a truly spectacular area.

The second lake, notice the massive avalanche remnants that is half filling the lake, it must have been an impressive slide.

Summer hiking in the Rockies...

Hoary marmot, love those guys.