Rockies Road Trip

We are now in our final week at Fernie, we have been amazingly fortunate again to have yet more snow to see us through to the end of our stay / the season. Fernie is generally renowned for receiving unbelievable amounts of snow, though this season by normal standards has been pretty light - so much so in fact that alot of the locals & the seasonaires gave up on this season during Feburary, business' were laying off staff, shops were selling off their winter gear at 50%...all a bit premature really considering the way March has panned out - we've had a fairly consistent amount of snow, averaging about 30cm a week - & given the fact that so many people have already given up on the season we have had the mountain almost to ourselves. Literally, we have only queued for 2 lifts the whole time we have been here - & even then only for a few minutes. We have had a great time here.

In amongst our time in Fernie, we caught the Greyhound back to Calgary last Fri (20th March) to spend the weekend with Kelly, Joerg, Mia & Neisha again which was really nice. Here is a shot of Mia & I jamming through the song Mia has written, called 'Chairs In The Ocean', & a shot of Neisha looking like she's enjoying being a little taller!

We turned up in Calgary & it was like a spring day, people walking around in T-shirts, beautiful sunshine, about +13c, by the time we left on Sunday there was another 30cm of snow on the ground & it was sub zero again. The local saying in Calgary is 'if you don't like the weather, wait a few minutes & something else will come along' - & it's certainly true!

While we were in Calgary we also picked up a hire car, so we took a road trip around the Rockies on our way back to Fernie. We drove up to Jasper last Sunday, about 4 hours north of Calgary via the 'Icefields Parkway' - which is a road between Banff & Jasper that is about 260km through some of the most stunning mountain & glacier scenery we have experienced, which is an absolute pleasure to drive. Anyone planning a trip to the Rockies should definitely take the time to venture north up to Jasper - if for nothing else than the drive there. However, thats not the only reason to go there though - as Jasper is a really cool little town right out in the wilderness in the middle of a National Park. We went on a really nice walk through a frozen river canyon (Maligne Canyon), stayed at a great B&B run by a really nice Swiss couple - all in all it was a real highlight of the trip.

We then drove back down south again to a town called Golden, which is basically the base town for the mountain resort of Kicking Horse. We came here mountain biking in 2007 & loved it so wanted to come back & check it out for snowboarding - for which it has gained quite a reputation in it's relatively short existence (the resort only really opened up about 8 years ago). Again, we found a great little B&B to stay at run by really nice people - in fact everyone in Canada seems to be really friendly & nice. We had a days snowboarding at Kicking Horse on the Monday, unfortunately the snow conditions weren't great & it was pretty much a total white out the whole day, so we weren't able to take advantage of what the mountain had to offer. Still a good day though.

Another tough day on the piste...

We've been in Fernie for just over a week now, had a few days of glorious blue skies though with temperatures at about -30c, & a few days of snow fall with slightly warmer temperatures - providing us with a couple of really good powder days. Between Saturday and Monday almost half a metre of new snow fell - as a result a lot of the resort has been closed off while they stabilise the avalanche risk, though there has still been plenty to keep us entertained. If the snow stops tonight the rest of the resort should be opened up tomorrow - we'll be up early for the first lift tomorrow to take full advantage of it.

Here are a couple of clips of us on the mountain today:

A clip of Claire last week taking on her first jump:

On the hill

View of ski hill from downtown Fernie

Our home for the next 4 weeks

...The Mad Stampede to Calgary

So after the craziest couple of days back at home desperately trying to get everything sorted for our departure (& failing in some respects…) at 4pm on 3rd March ‘09 we finally jumped on our BA flight from Heathrow Terminal 5 heading for Calgary. 9 hours & a remarkably painless flight later, we arrived into Calgary at 6.30pm local time (7 hours behind UK) where Kelly was waiting for us with the Wimbert family’s big yellow fun truck to ferry us back to their house in Renfrew, just outside downtown Calgary.

It was 18 months since Claire & I last visited Kelly, Joerg & their daughter Mia in Calgary - though being back here now feels like it was only a few weeks ago. The main difference is that they now have another new addition to their family - little Niescha. It’s strange to think of all the places we will have been to & the experiences we will have had in another 18 months time…

We have just been spending a few days relaxing with Kelly, Joerg & their girls - catching up on what’s been happening, eating some of the fantastic steaks that Kelly‘s Dad farms out on his ranch in Medicine Hat, Alberta. We have been around Calgary city centre on a couple of occasions which is really cool - in more ways than one as it's been minus 18c the last couple of days - not something us tropical Brits are used to!

We set off 7am on Sunday via Greyhound Bus to Fernie, the Rocky Mountain town that will be our base for the next 4 weeks - we should be out on the slopes for the first lift Monday morning…not a bad way to start the week!