Walking In A Winter Wonderland
Well back from Ontario. Was great to see everybody and get to hang out, celebrate, and be the craziest/best family there is for a week. Bonnie and I have said several times since returning that we were very lucky. About 2-3 hours after each of our flights, the London airport was hit with 60-80 MILE per hour winds. Bonnie brought up that I was trying to get flights that were slightly later for a better sleep pattern and, odds are, we never would have had those flights. Whew.
So we left the balmy 13-degree Ontario and landed into a snow-covered (and still falling) -10 degree Calgary. Was nice to finally get home after a quick stop with her dad, home-cooked food from her parents, and a snowy drive through the mountains. We had a pretty low-key day yesterday and ended up both in bed by 10:00, which was something new (but had plenty to do with waking up at 3:30am in a different time zone, I'm sure)
Anyway, my friend Lila was in town over Christmas and house-sitting for us for the week. She's leaving tomorrow and so today she I went out for about a 3.5 hour hike on the Hoodoo Trail, which goes along the Bow River in a place you can't see from town for a while, before rising up on a large....I don't know..hill...thing...(not a mountain) before going back down to the actual "hoodoos". By the time we got to the last possible turn-off before the hoodoos, it was too late to make it to them and back before dark, so unfortunately, we didn't get to that. But here's somebody else's photo taken of them so everybody knows what I'm talking about. They're these large sandstone/shale things that inexplicably thrust up out of the land around here
So, as you can see that's clearly not now in the dead of winter, but you get the idea. On to the pictures I took and how things went. First of all, all the winter gear is great! Outside in -15 for over 3 hours without a jacket and I was just fine. In fact, at times I was too warm and considered taking some things off, but since I didn't have any layers, this probably would not have been very welcome. I guess we'll start with a shot of Lila and Mount Rundle
Taken lots of shots of Rundle since it's right next to town and rather big, but this one should be from a different angle. Still, things never seem to stop being new and beautiful around these parts.
Saw something that I Haven't seen in 2 years of hiking out here too: another reminder that we live in a very wild place. Not once, but twice we passed the dead and half-eaten carcasses of animals. One an elk or deer, the other a coyote. Both gruesome and unexpected, as well as directly on the trail. We were puzzled at what would have killed and eaten a coyote in the winter (other than aliens and bigfoot of course). Anyway, as not nice as it was, it was nice to be reminded again that we are very much visitors here.
As I said before, the end of the trail goes up out of the valley. Here are a couple shots to the south and east from 2 different lookouts up there. I like the one with the 2nd one where you can see the sun peaking out through the clouds next to the tree.
And finally, the first 2/3 of the hike go right along the riverbed, much of which is frozen solid and able to be walked on now (much easier than the rough trail, to be honest). So the last 3 shots are all of the Bow River in the winter and my favorite 3 that I took today. Enjoy! Was great to see everybody over Christmas and we're looking forward to hosting a few more guests at 124 Beaver Street in the near future.
So we left the balmy 13-degree Ontario and landed into a snow-covered (and still falling) -10 degree Calgary. Was nice to finally get home after a quick stop with her dad, home-cooked food from her parents, and a snowy drive through the mountains. We had a pretty low-key day yesterday and ended up both in bed by 10:00, which was something new (but had plenty to do with waking up at 3:30am in a different time zone, I'm sure)
Anyway, my friend Lila was in town over Christmas and house-sitting for us for the week. She's leaving tomorrow and so today she I went out for about a 3.5 hour hike on the Hoodoo Trail, which goes along the Bow River in a place you can't see from town for a while, before rising up on a large....I don't know..hill...thing...(not a mountain) before going back down to the actual "hoodoos". By the time we got to the last possible turn-off before the hoodoos, it was too late to make it to them and back before dark, so unfortunately, we didn't get to that. But here's somebody else's photo taken of them so everybody knows what I'm talking about. They're these large sandstone/shale things that inexplicably thrust up out of the land around here
So, as you can see that's clearly not now in the dead of winter, but you get the idea. On to the pictures I took and how things went. First of all, all the winter gear is great! Outside in -15 for over 3 hours without a jacket and I was just fine. In fact, at times I was too warm and considered taking some things off, but since I didn't have any layers, this probably would not have been very welcome. I guess we'll start with a shot of Lila and Mount Rundle
Taken lots of shots of Rundle since it's right next to town and rather big, but this one should be from a different angle. Still, things never seem to stop being new and beautiful around these parts.
Saw something that I Haven't seen in 2 years of hiking out here too: another reminder that we live in a very wild place. Not once, but twice we passed the dead and half-eaten carcasses of animals. One an elk or deer, the other a coyote. Both gruesome and unexpected, as well as directly on the trail. We were puzzled at what would have killed and eaten a coyote in the winter (other than aliens and bigfoot of course). Anyway, as not nice as it was, it was nice to be reminded again that we are very much visitors here.
As I said before, the end of the trail goes up out of the valley. Here are a couple shots to the south and east from 2 different lookouts up there. I like the one with the 2nd one where you can see the sun peaking out through the clouds next to the tree.
And finally, the first 2/3 of the hike go right along the riverbed, much of which is frozen solid and able to be walked on now (much easier than the rough trail, to be honest). So the last 3 shots are all of the Bow River in the winter and my favorite 3 that I took today. Enjoy! Was great to see everybody over Christmas and we're looking forward to hosting a few more guests at 124 Beaver Street in the near future.
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