Joffre Lakes, BC

Photos from a lovely backpacking trip to Joffre Lakes this past summer on a hot weekend.  The Joffre Lake trailhead is about 40 minutes past Pemberton.  The trail is only 6 km or so with elevation gains of 500 m.  It’s pretty rocky with lots of boulder fields though which slowed me down, especially with my bum knee.   Photo credits go to Rod and his swanky new SLR camera.

Boulder fields!

We managed to stake out a nice, reasonably flat tent spot close to the lake.  There were lots of people and lots of bugs though.  I actually saw a woman wearing one of those full face nets and was kind of jealous. 

There are three gorgeous, glacier fed turquoise lakes along the trail.  They get their colour from the rockflour (glacial silt) suspended in the water reflecting the blues and greens.   It was well over 30 degrees and we decided to go for a dip in the glacial fed waters.   Soaking our feet for a while we finally plunged in…and then right back out.  Some other brave souls were actually swimming, but my quad and calf muscles immediately seized up and I could barely walk back to shore on the slippery, lichen-covered rocks.

Two sweaty hikers

Waterfall leading away from the highest lake.

I found it pretty crazy how close you are allowed to camp to the glacier. This is a shot close to our tent site.  It feels like a chunk of ice could fall off at any time and clock you. 

Late afternoon

Twilight

Sunrise

Not too many alpine flowers were out, but Rod captured this beautiful leatherleaf saxifrage 

Relaxing in the evening after dinner

For the first time we were trying the prepackaged dehydrated food.  All-in-all not very tasty, but nothing out of a bag seems to be.  If you’re really organized and have a dehydrator you can create some pretty delicious concoctions (my sister made AWESOME vegetarian chili and dehydrated arrabiata tomato sauce for the West Coast Trail).  For the boil-in-bag stuff I wouldn’t recommend Backpacker’s Pantry Chicken Cashew Curry (tasted like chicken noodle soup with rice).  The Cuban Coconut Black Beans and Rice was better, but packed a punch at 30g of fibre….not good to eat and then share a tent with someone.

My favourite thing about the boil-in-a-bag meals?  You can put the pouch under your jacket and have your very own hot water bottle for 10 minutes.

Lake Louise, Alberta

Happy September everyone!  Hope your summer was wonderful.  My knee continues to talk to me and so I’ve given up on ultimate for this year at least, but am hoping for next year.   In the meantime I’m still doing physio like crazy.  Fortunately I was able to do a lot of hiking and backpacking despite my knee this summer, which was a lot of fun and took me to many beautiful places.  It culminated in the West Coast Trail, but I’ll save that for another post.

First some pictures from a trip back to Alberta.  Dev, Kiran and I managed to sneak away from family engagements to do a quick hike up the Big Beehive at Lake Louise.  Fun facts about Lake Louise:

·         at 1536 m it’s the highest permanent settlement in Canada

·         roughly 2600 mountain goats, 80 grizzlies and 50 black bears call the Lake Louise area home

·         the tea house at Lake Agnes only gets one helicopter supply run a year to bring up all the flour, sugar, propane and other dry goods for the year.

Our goal:

On the way up.  Can’t believe Dev is wearing jeans…

Lake Agnes.  Still lots of snow in mid-June.

Past the snow field and at the top.  Time to pose as the intrepid explorers that we are.

Suddenly a short but nasty hail storm hit, but it left us with a beautiful double-rainbow (better than that ridiculous Youtube video which made the rounds years ago). 

That was it for Lake Louise this year.  Maybe a backpacking trip in the Rockies next year?  Let me know if you are in!

Changing the topic from hiking, Rod and I are doing well in our new rental.  I’ve even made friends with Steve, a beautiful ginger cat down the street. 

Steve: definitely the cutest cat within a 3 block radius.

I also went to the hilarious Avenue Q Broadway musical showing in Vancouver, which I would highly recommend! It’s Sesame-street for adults (caution…some puppet nudity). Its tagline is “Like your life.  Only funnier.  With puppets.”

Other summer activities included rubbing these dogs’ bellies, trying my luck at Rod’s family’s annual ring loss (beginner’s luck and I won!), and enjoying a gorgeous Vancouver evening on the beach with friends for the fireworks (thanks Sarah for the photo). 

 I leave you with one more anecdote left over from moving day a few months back.  Rod and I each sold some stuff on Craigslist.  One guy showed up with a suitcase to pack away the microwave I sold him.  He got the height and length right, but forgot about the depth.  Seeing him stuff it in and strain the zippers was somewhat entertaining.  Even more so though was someone who offered to take Rod’s free couch off his hands:

“Wow what an offer. I am excited to take your possession to a great new home in the Olympic Village.
 I just moved in to a great new bachelor pad that needs to be pimped with the right furnishings, and yours suits my style, looking upon a sunset drinking wine and dining. Oh please call me and you will be just as happy to know it is in good faith to be needed “.

Salt Spring Island

Hope everyone is having a great summer so far!  Unfortunately for the 2^nd summer in a row I’ve managed to injure my knee (same thing as last year….retinaculum tear/strain which will probably take a few months to heal although I’m holding out hope for ultimate nationals).   I’m currently doing lots of cycling, squats, and other physio to try and get back to chasing after discs ASAP though.

That’s the bad news.  The good news is that Van has had some amazing weather recently which has been great for beach picnics, disc golf, watching ultimate from the sideline, and general lounging.   As well, Rod and I took the plunge and moved in together to rent a lovely townhouse in central Vancouver. We have a 2^nd bedroom and enjoy guests, so let me know if you are coming to town!  No more uncomfortable sofa-bed!

Over Easter Rod and I joined my family on Vancouver Island and took a day trip to Salt Spring Island.  Salt Spring is the largest of the Gulf Islands and easy to get to with a short ferry ride from Crofton. 

Hammin’ it up while waiting for the ferry.

Killing more time by taking a walk around Crofton.  Crofton is definitely a lumber town.  Everything is sponsored by the lumber industry including this “Paper Way”.

Ferry ride to Salt Spring

Salt Spring has a great Saturday market with artisans and food producers of all types.  Sculptors, knitters, jam-makers, painters, farmers, didgeridoo-hypnotists, you name it.   The only rule is that vendors have to “make it, bake it or grow it” themselves.    There were lots of delicious free samples (e.g. small batch lemon and basil infused goat cheese, deluxe chocolates with suggested wine pairings, and how about the yummy spiced carrot chips being handed out by a nice man with homemade Jesus-sandals).   Parking was a bit of a show-de-gong, but once we got out of our car it was fun.   

Unfortunately I was too busy downing the free samples to snap any pics at the market, but here are a few from the island.

Funky-looking moving garden statues which twirl in the wind.

Colourful peeling bark and smooth sides of an Arbutus tree.

That’s it for now.  Will post again soon with hiking pics from Alberta and BC.

Winter in Vancouver and the North Shore

It’s been downright summer-like, never mind spring recently here in Vancouver, and high-time to post some photos from snowshoeing and other winter stuff I was up to in the last few months.

First though a shot of my family from January I forgot to include in the last post:

I did a few short snow-shoeing trips up Seymour and Cypress.  Hannah, Matt and I had a good snowshoe one crisp morning up to First Peak at Seymour. The red trail markers helped us from getting lost in the winter wonderland.

 

 I also did a solo trip up Hollyburn (Cypress Mountain) which is always pretty breathtaking during an inversion when the city is under a thick layer of clouds below.

Good shot of the Lions (twin mountains) from the peak.  The Lions are a Vancouver landmark; the BC Lions football team and Lions Gate bridge are named after them.

The ubiquitous whiskey jacks (officially the gray jay) were out in full force, boldly trying to steal lunches and whistling and chattering up a storm.

Once the snow was mostly gone I did an early season hike with Allison and some friends up in Lynn Valley (North Van) to Norvan Falls.  The area was logged in the early 1900s and there are plenty of abandoned artifacts along the way including an old logging cart and a rusty bucket.  There was lots of snow which made it pretty slow going in normal hiking boots (I need to invest in microspikes next year), but the beautiful falls were a nice reward. 

In February I had a business trip to Ottawa presenting some interesting stuff to the Canadian Ice Service to help automatically distinguish ice from water in radar images.  After the work part of the trip I enjoyed a fun-filled weekend with Rod’s sister Annie and her partner Grant.  I was lucky and was there the last weekend that the canal was open for skating.  

Annie and Grant hamming it up on the canal: 

I also tried hot yoga for the first time (sweaty but good!) although I managed to embarrass myself at the beginning of the class by walking straight into the floor-to-ceiling glass wall.   They kept it so clean!  Over the course of one weekend I also went to the restaurant Town (delicious blue cheese salad and stuffed meatballs), walked around Byward Market, had drinks at the stalwart pub the Manx,  dinner with my South-American-travel-pal Val and her 3 kids under 3, and finished the whirlwind tour with a quick cross-country ski in the Gatineau Hills.  Thanks Annie, Grant, Alistair, Amy, Val and Mehmet for a great visit!

To finish this post off are a few shots of art from UBC’s museum of Anthropology (highly recommended for a rainy day in Vancouver) and a beautiful ski day.

Bill Reid’s “The Raven and The First Men” (also featured on the old $20 bill).