True Day of Vacation

Ahh. Today is my first day of true, full, vacation. My sister and mum left yesterday afternoon, and this morning my only alarm clock was my bladder. It felt like I slept and slept - in reality I lasted in bed until about 8:45 am - it was the ultimate luxury. The familial visit was terrific, but I am now even more excited to have spare bedrooms at my disposal. Setting your mom up on your couch and your sister on the floor just does not seem like the most adult of situations...

We had a terrific Christmas eventhough Mother Nature was less than accommodating. When I was small we used to go cross country skiing around some local parks (around Guelph, ON) and so when thinking about mountain activities for this week, I turned back to the planks and sticks. I rented three sets of skis from the University of Calgary, and we spent some time on the 25th trying on the various boot sizes that had made it into the living room. On the 26th we packed up the car and headed west. Innocently, we stopped at Lake Louise to check out the ice castle and frozen lake before lunch and felt smug that we were headed for 'better snow' over in Yoho for our first ski. When we got to Field, the park guy at the info center laughed at my condition inquiry as the area was well into it's third straight day of rain. Even with rentals, skiing on rocks was not our intended activity. Luckily, there is a FANTASTIC restaurant in Field, owned by the friend of a friend of my mom's. Faced with nothing else to do that afternoon but drive to Golden, we got comfortable and ate! Good stuff.

Arriving at Golden, we checked into the Kicking Horse River Lodge (we reserved a private room at the Hostel), jeff went to the hill to pick up his pass-thingy, and mum, claire and I walked along the river checking out the ice jams. Dinner with our friend tracey at eleven22 perfectly topped our day of great food. With no snow for skiing, mum claire and I spent the morning of the 27th walking along rocky trails, looking out at the valley choked with low clouds. For a late lunch we took the gondola up to the Eagle Eye restaurant at the top of the mountain, still stuck in the clouds. I hear the vistas are breath-taking, I'll just have to get up there again sometime. In good family form, we spent the afternoon eating excellent food and puttering at the bottom of the hill waiting for jeff to elbow himself through the line up for the lower chair lift to get off the hill. After a little decompression/movie watching time at the hostel we went for dinner at the Cedar House. Awesome food once again.

The morning of the 28th we decided to head back to Lake Louise as that had been the only good cross country spot we'd seen all week. The weather finally cooperated and we spent an excellent 4 hours in -5 temps on great, groomed trails. In order to soothe our skied out bodies, we headed to the Banff Hot Springs - the ultimate tourist destination - and soaked with the most diverse crowd of cultures this side of Toronto. As having a good dinner in Banff between Christmas and New Year's without a reservation is about as rare as a sasquatsh, we piled in for the next leg of driving, getting to my favorite restaurant in Canmore. Good food every meal for days is quite a Christmas present!

When we got back to Calgary there was the crazy 'mom sleeping on the couch' situation, a slow quiet morning walking around the neighborhood, one last house check to the NW (we have shingles!) and I got them to the airport with ample time to spare. Though I do still romanticise Toronto, Calgary seemed quaint, small and relaxed yesterday and I was really happy that I could stay behind as mum and sis flew back east. This afternoon I'm heading wall climbing and then to yoga class, and tomorrow I'm going snowboarding at Sunshine - somehow I have to burn off all these three-course meals! It was nice to showcase my part of the world; it made me really appreciate the blind wisdom of the move west last year. I don't think I had any idea this would be my life at the end of 2005. 2006 here I come!