We started with a few days in Southern California, where we visited Disneyland and Universal Studios and astonishingly I did not take a single photograph. We had a wonderful day at Disneyland, enjoying the rides, the music and the atmosphere generally. We also observed first hand the obesity problem in the USA. Our favourite ride was Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters. "Evil Emperor Zurg is stealing batteries from helpless toys ..." so our mission was to take our laser blasters and zap images of Zurg and his minions as we were trundled round the course. It is clearly designed for the younger generation - so we sixty-somethings rode this one twice!
From LAX we flew to Vancouver, where cousin Sarah lives with her husband, Tom. They made us very welcome, even though Sarah's niece, Lily, was also coming to overflow their apartment. All five of us had an expedition to Granville Island using the ferries that ply False Creek.
L to R: Eve, Bill, Lily, Tom and Sarah
Only a few days after this photo was taken Lily's boyfriend, Thom, proposed to her and was accepted. Congratulations to you both.
There are market stalls offering just about anything edible, but particularly local produce. As at home, berries in season are available by the kilo. You can also get meat, cheese, pastries - you name it. There are also more permanent shops selling all sorts, from traditional brooms to ship chandlery.
From Vancouver we rented a car and set off for the mountains. Our route took us along the Crows Nest Highway to the Cascades and Slocan Valley, out onto the plains and northward to Calgary and then back West and more North into the Canadian Rockies. It is tempting to write a day-by-day account, but I want to get this post finished this year, so you will have to settle for selected highlights.
First wildlife sighted: a chipmunk at Hope Slide
Slocan Lake
Canada is a land of lakes. We never tired of seeing them.
Nelson, British Columbia
We live in Nelson Province, NZ so we could not miss Nelson, BC. The beach is not as fine or as large as Tahunanui, but it is nevertheless a good beach. The water is not salt. That's an arm of Kootenay Lake.
Prairie wildflowers
These were photographed near Head Smashed in Buffalo Jump. Yes, that's the place name. It was where the first plains residents would regularly attempt to stampede the buffalo over a cliff. The head immortalised in the name was not a buffalo's head, but that of a boy who wanted to watch the falling buffalo from underneath and got too close.
In Calgary we were welcomed by Tony Stewart, the captain of the hockey team we would be part of in Hawaii. He not only gave us a room for the night, he carefully wrote down all the places in the Rockies that we really should not miss and provided sketch maps of brilliant clarity.
From Calgary we went to Banff where, to Eve's delight, we found Evelyn's Coffee Bar. This promised, and delivered, excellent coffee.
One of the many very attractive rivers in the Rockies
We saw lots of berries in the woods, but never a bear eating them.
A number of plants produce 'woolly' seed heads.
Just upriver from one of the big waterfalls, whose name I have forgotten.
Moraine Lake (I think)
Who cares what its name is? It's yet another beautiful piece of scenery.
Takakkaw Falls
None of my photos does justice to these falls. The picture above only shows the first section. The main drop is 254m. Even though I'd been to this part of the Rockies before, I didn't know about this stunning waterfall. And if the falls weren't enough, the surrounding scenery was extra gorgeous.
Golden mantled ground squirrel
This piratical rodent is scoffing *my* lunch. We sat on a bench to eat our meal while we admired the view of Mt Edith Cavell when the squirrel appeared. Playing on its undeniable cuteness it cozened us into feeding it blueberries. I was trying to get a photo and put my plate down on the bench. "Where's it gone?" It had disappeared and by some sleight of paw popped up behind us, stretched up to the plate and carefully selected the largest cracker. It then hurried well beyond any retribution and daintily but rapidly nibbled away. "Yes, officer. I have read the signs. I did not deliberately feed baked goods to the wildlife."
Arboreal squirrel sp.
This critter has the good sense and manners to eat what the forest provides. It did not come looking for handouts - in fact it ignored the humans around it while it rapidly extracted seeds from cones. Note the blurring of the right paw as it removes the unwanted pieces of cone.
The first step of the Athabasca Falls
Some waterfalls are very accessible. You park your car in a spacious car park and saunter over to where the noise is coming from, covertly scanning the license plates of the other vehicles to see if you can add to your list of state plates seen. Around the falls there are made paths and fences and, sometimes, signs with sad tales of visitors who have fallen in the water, detailing the date of the incident, the victim's age and how far downstream the body was recovered.
Jasper, which is the nearest town to this and many other sights, has the most expensive accommodation in Canada. Many of the local residents offer rooms at 'only' around $100 per night. That does not generally include breakfast, but the one we settled on did provide good, brewed coffee and toast. Mind you, our hostess insisted that we change to a bigger room after the first night and then charged us $20 extra for complying with her request.
Patricia Lake, near Jasper
Choosing which lake photos to leave out has been difficult. This is one of the few with a close up of a shore. We stopped here after admiring and photographing the more well known Pyramid Lake. It was only a minute or so after we left here that we nearly collided with a deer. We think it was mule deer, but really it all happened so quickly. It burst out of the woods to our right and I didn't see anything before it was in the road and about to collect the car amidships. I did stamp on the brake, but there was no time or room so it was lucky that the animal didn't pause but carried on at the same breakneck speed and vanished into the trees on the other side of the road.
Mt. Robson
After we left Jasper we drove West through Mt. Robson Provincial Park. I'm not sure if it counts as the Rockies or not. The mountain itself is very imposing, and the photograph doesn't really convey that well. But we'd been driving long enough to want a break and a coffee and we got this grand view, too.
Bill and Eve with Okanagan Lake in the background
Even though we were headed back towards Vancouver we had more to see. Cousin David and his wife, Jane, live in Summerland. Jane generously played tour guide and between wineries and gardens took us to this prominent hilltop and photographed the tourists. Thank you, Jane.
Jane and David
From Summerland we continued South to Osoyoos (pronounced as it is spelled - figure it out like we had to) and the Nk'mip Desert Cultural Centre. Nk'mip is pronounced 'Inkaneep' we think. The cultural centre was a fountain of information about the tribe's history; particularly their treatment by Europeans, which was strikingly similar to the early Pakeha insensitivity to Maori in New Zealand.
We were lucky enough to be at the centre at the right time for a talk on the local snakes. The ranger started with small, non-venomous species and worked up to a rattlesnake. He treated us all like adults and didn't try to make the rattler scary. He described its habits matter-of-factly, didn't handle it directly, but did take it out of its box with a stick and put it on the table. The snake seemed to be bored with the whole process and couldn't be bothered to shake its rattle, let alone attempt to bite anyone. Finally the ranger placed the box, on its side, on the table and the snake immediately glided inside and curled up out of the sun, just as the ranger said he would.
From there we drove to Vancouver and a final night with Sarah and Tom before returning the rental car and heading for Vancouver Island.
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