Snowshoeing in Banff

After eating too much on Christmas day, the Savills took us to Banff to go snowshoeing & cross-country skiiing in Sundance Canyon, Banff National Park. It was another clear day which also means cold, but we were rugged up and rearing to explore the countryside.
On the way to the track we stopped in at Marshall's place of work, (which happens to be a dog-sled kennels with 175 huskies & one wolf!) where we picked up an extra member buy the name of Pecon Bill, a 12 year old former sled leading dog.

Photos from the day:

Hiro & Maple

Wesley Savill

Pecon Bill

Marshall & Bill

Calgary Zoo

Trish & Walt shouted us to a trip to the Calgary Zoo. This place is incredible. We checked out the the Canadian Wilds section of the zoo which had a large range of beautiful native animals living in their natural habitat. We completely forgot that it was -25 degrees outside as there was soo much to see and do.
Evening came ond so did the 1.5 Million Christmas lights the zoo had out on display. It was a very special time, we even got to play in the kids section until we wer politely told to leave, lol.
Kirsten and I also got to have a chat with santa via video conference, which was nice.
The Photos:

Mule Deer

Bighorn Sheep

Great Horned Owl

Great Grey Owl

Hawk

Wolfs

 

Night Lights in the Zoo

Kirsten, Trish, Jax, Wes, Walt

The Savill Ranch

This is the Savill's home and farm where we are staying. It is such a beautiful place, we are really enjoying our home away from home.
The following photos are from around the yard and work areas.

Greyhound Bus Trip Through The Rockies (Dec '09)

We were on the bus and on our way to Kamloops (situated in the middle of the Rockies) early saturday morning. We were really excited about taking the scenic tour through to Calgary; only problem was that the bus had the dirtiest windows you can imagine and we could not see much at all on our first day. There was plenty of fog and low cloud to further block our views of the coutryside, but we had a fun trip anyways.

Once in Kamloops we made the most of the sunshine left (its dark at 3.30pm) and went exploring the town. there was no snow around the town or surrounding hills so we didn't have to rug up too much. We enjoyed a very tasty dinner at an Irish Bar & Grill, where Kirsten was introduced to the wonderful creation that is the: long island ice tea, and I, as always had a few Guiness...mmmm.

Sunday morning we awoke to a foot of snow, so we quickly got dressed and headed out for a wonder:

 Kirsten outside our Hotel

Downtown Kamloops:

Kamloops - Calgary:

At lunchtime Sunday we were back in the bus depot waiting to board; two hours waiting in line and meeting some very interesting folk. We finally embarked on our final leg of our trip to Calgary a bit late but in good spirits, the bus driver let is sit right at the front and gave us a running commentary of our journey through the Rockies. The snow was coming down thick and fast and our driver was starting to worry that we might be stuck in the hills overnight. In between getting stuck once and a few hairy moments we arrived at a small town called Revelstoke. Here we got a big feed of MD's and the driver called in reinforcements.

It was 2am by the time we arrived in Calgary and were met by Trish, Walt & Leigh Savill.

Vancouver Dec '09

Downtown Vancouver:

Kirsten, Jax & I took the Sky Rail from Richmond to Downtown for a looksee, where somehow we found ourselves in a 3 story building selling high end designer clothing, including shoes over $1200; the girls seem to have a nose for these places...

 

Curling & Christmas Dinner with Robyn & Ed:

 It was a really fun evening watching Robyn curl, the food was fantastic and so was the company.

Ed's 'Barcardi Shed':

I have to say that this is one of the coolest shed's i have been in, 9 working TV's, a dart board and hundreds of Bacardi bottles drunk each year by the members. This is the ultimate Man Shed!