Friday, October 14, 2005
Fall doesn’t suck THAT much…
Ah, another Friday. It has been busy, but I have not accomplished much lately.
Last weekend was very nice – Canadian Thanksgiving long weekend here. I enjoyed a couple of outings with my sister, Lala, and we went hiking in Lake Louise. We drove out towards the mountains with the intention of taking a bit of a nice walk in the woods type of arrangement, and Lala said she knew of a Ribbon Creek walk that wasn’t too onerous. She said it was just around Canmore, and that she’d know the turnoff when she saw it.
Well, we drove by Canmore. No turnoff. Then she thought it might be around the Banff townsite, so we drove there, too. No turnoff. I asked her after a bit if she wasn’t referring to the Ribbon Creek area in Kananaskis. And sure enough, yes, that was the one. Nowhere near Canmore or Banff at all, really. So instead, we just kept on going to Lake Louise, and thought we might hike up to the Tea Hut instead.
We stopped for lunch at the little plaza there, and went into the café/bakery to get a sandwich or something. On the way into the parking lot, a little wizened old man stood defiantly in front of my car, in the middle of the road, and stared at me. I slowed down, not wanting to get old man on my car, and he did not move. It was not unlike encountering a cow or an elk on the road, where they just stand there, and look at you like they have no idea what you are doing. After a minute, I thought he might charge, so I went around him, slowly. Lala commented that “holy cow, that guy MUST be European.”
So I look at her, and laugh, and say “what makes you say that?”, and she says “Those Europeans are always doing shit like that. So inconsiderate.”
When we got into the café, it was packed. And people cut in line in front of us, and the servers were extremely slow and recalcitrant. I was not at all impressed. There were a million desserts, and they all looked tasty and tempting, but we did not buy ANY, because of the horrible treatment we received at the place. We got sandwiches and got the hell out of there as fast as we could, with Lala rounding out her cultural commentary with “God! All Japanese men smoke. Disgusting!”
We then made our way to the Lake Louise Lodge so we could find the tea house trailhead, and as soon as I turned into the parking lot, I knew it was a bad idea. Circling once, I decided we would NOT hike here, but go back down the mountain to another little trail I had spotted that looked decidedly less crowded. We landed, finally, at Pleasant Creek or something like that, and went into the woods. Lo, they were dark and cool. And got colder and colder as we proceeded up the trail.
The trail forked, and of course, we picked the steeper fork. We started to see snow on the ground, and more and more of that, and eventually Lala said she couldn’t take the cold any more. I, myself, was freezing, but there was no way I was going to admit that sort of defeat. So we turned back. We got back to the fork, and took the other one, which seemed like less of a climb. We didn’t get very far, of course, before we ran into a trail closure with a little “ATTENTION!” sign. Lala said “Oh, well, I guess we head back…” but I could not go back without reading the sign. Which said, sure enough, “Hiking permitted in groups of six or more only, due to bear activity in the area. Bears are currently frequenting the Pleasant Valley area and bla bla bla other areas…”
We had a little discussion, then, about why six was better than, say, five, and whether we would be alright if we just made the noise of a six-person hiking party, which we proceeded to do all the way back down the trail. Really, we were probably perfectly safe, because we were being pretty loud on the trail before we saw the sign anyway. We did make it back to the car without being eaten at all.
It was a fun day, all in all. I hope we can do more of that. Lala has broken up with her ex-fiance-boyfriend-guy, so she’s a lot more available these days, even if she is a little sad about the whole thing.
On Monday, Rob was back from camping so we did some errands around the house, and picked some apples. We have an apple tree in the back yard that is about ten times larger than the ones out front, so we have a lot of apples to go through this fall. I spent most of Tuesday evening peeling, cutting and freezing apples to be used later in baking. And I only went through ONE bag of apples, whereas we managed to pick SIX. In 30 minutes or so. And we really haven’t touched the tree yet.
I have also started volunteering with the group that rescued dogs from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina down in Louisiana. This group brought back 56 dogs and 12 cats from the area, and they are being housed by Pet Planet here in Calgary. On Wednesday this week, I went and spent a couple of hours with the dogs getting them out for a breath of fresh air while their kennels were being cleaned. I fell in love with all of them, really, and am having a hard time telling myself that I really can’t have another pet. I want one, I really do. These dogs are so wonderful and well-disposed, you would never imagine they have just been through a hurricane.
We have also been very lucky with our weather this week – the trend of unseasonable cold has pretty much ended, and we have had some nice temperatures. I think it’s just winter’s way of teasing us before it snows on us next week. Tomorrow is supposed to be quite warm, really (+18C), so I’m going to try and finish my garden off and get some more apples down.
If I’m really lucky, the warm weather will hold over until next week, and I can be lazy about the garden…
Last weekend was very nice – Canadian Thanksgiving long weekend here. I enjoyed a couple of outings with my sister, Lala, and we went hiking in Lake Louise. We drove out towards the mountains with the intention of taking a bit of a nice walk in the woods type of arrangement, and Lala said she knew of a Ribbon Creek walk that wasn’t too onerous. She said it was just around Canmore, and that she’d know the turnoff when she saw it.
Well, we drove by Canmore. No turnoff. Then she thought it might be around the Banff townsite, so we drove there, too. No turnoff. I asked her after a bit if she wasn’t referring to the Ribbon Creek area in Kananaskis. And sure enough, yes, that was the one. Nowhere near Canmore or Banff at all, really. So instead, we just kept on going to Lake Louise, and thought we might hike up to the Tea Hut instead.
We stopped for lunch at the little plaza there, and went into the café/bakery to get a sandwich or something. On the way into the parking lot, a little wizened old man stood defiantly in front of my car, in the middle of the road, and stared at me. I slowed down, not wanting to get old man on my car, and he did not move. It was not unlike encountering a cow or an elk on the road, where they just stand there, and look at you like they have no idea what you are doing. After a minute, I thought he might charge, so I went around him, slowly. Lala commented that “holy cow, that guy MUST be European.”
So I look at her, and laugh, and say “what makes you say that?”, and she says “Those Europeans are always doing shit like that. So inconsiderate.”
When we got into the café, it was packed. And people cut in line in front of us, and the servers were extremely slow and recalcitrant. I was not at all impressed. There were a million desserts, and they all looked tasty and tempting, but we did not buy ANY, because of the horrible treatment we received at the place. We got sandwiches and got the hell out of there as fast as we could, with Lala rounding out her cultural commentary with “God! All Japanese men smoke. Disgusting!”
We then made our way to the Lake Louise Lodge so we could find the tea house trailhead, and as soon as I turned into the parking lot, I knew it was a bad idea. Circling once, I decided we would NOT hike here, but go back down the mountain to another little trail I had spotted that looked decidedly less crowded. We landed, finally, at Pleasant Creek or something like that, and went into the woods. Lo, they were dark and cool. And got colder and colder as we proceeded up the trail.
The trail forked, and of course, we picked the steeper fork. We started to see snow on the ground, and more and more of that, and eventually Lala said she couldn’t take the cold any more. I, myself, was freezing, but there was no way I was going to admit that sort of defeat. So we turned back. We got back to the fork, and took the other one, which seemed like less of a climb. We didn’t get very far, of course, before we ran into a trail closure with a little “ATTENTION!” sign. Lala said “Oh, well, I guess we head back…” but I could not go back without reading the sign. Which said, sure enough, “Hiking permitted in groups of six or more only, due to bear activity in the area. Bears are currently frequenting the Pleasant Valley area and bla bla bla other areas…”
We had a little discussion, then, about why six was better than, say, five, and whether we would be alright if we just made the noise of a six-person hiking party, which we proceeded to do all the way back down the trail. Really, we were probably perfectly safe, because we were being pretty loud on the trail before we saw the sign anyway. We did make it back to the car without being eaten at all.
It was a fun day, all in all. I hope we can do more of that. Lala has broken up with her ex-fiance-boyfriend-guy, so she’s a lot more available these days, even if she is a little sad about the whole thing.
On Monday, Rob was back from camping so we did some errands around the house, and picked some apples. We have an apple tree in the back yard that is about ten times larger than the ones out front, so we have a lot of apples to go through this fall. I spent most of Tuesday evening peeling, cutting and freezing apples to be used later in baking. And I only went through ONE bag of apples, whereas we managed to pick SIX. In 30 minutes or so. And we really haven’t touched the tree yet.
I have also started volunteering with the group that rescued dogs from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina down in Louisiana. This group brought back 56 dogs and 12 cats from the area, and they are being housed by Pet Planet here in Calgary. On Wednesday this week, I went and spent a couple of hours with the dogs getting them out for a breath of fresh air while their kennels were being cleaned. I fell in love with all of them, really, and am having a hard time telling myself that I really can’t have another pet. I want one, I really do. These dogs are so wonderful and well-disposed, you would never imagine they have just been through a hurricane.
We have also been very lucky with our weather this week – the trend of unseasonable cold has pretty much ended, and we have had some nice temperatures. I think it’s just winter’s way of teasing us before it snows on us next week. Tomorrow is supposed to be quite warm, really (+18C), so I’m going to try and finish my garden off and get some more apples down.
If I’m really lucky, the warm weather will hold over until next week, and I can be lazy about the garden…
