So yesterday Jenny took me on a roadie to Revelstoke! I love that day trips in Canada are anything up to a 4 hour drive lol in NZ if you gotta drive 2 hours away then it's gotta be at least an over night thing if not a weekend trip :p
We left around 1030 and once again I was hit with the realisation of how beautiful the Okanagan is.
I love being in a valley. I'm not sure if that's the bias of me growing up in one, but maaaan valleys are beautiful! This is Lake Kalimalka (hoping my spelling is correct!) we stopped at this pull off to take some photos and looking around, look what we spotted across the hill!
That's a mama deer and her beautiful baby fawn! If you can zoom in on that photo then you should definitely do that!
We continued on our way and almost immediately we saw more eagles! I forgot how many eagles there are in our area! They are so beautiful and majestic I just love how big they are and their colouring!
We got to revelstoke in pretty good time! Oh first we stopped for Tim Hortons :) YUM. Tim bits are sooooo cheap! It was under $4.00 for 20 timbits! And you get so many different flavours.... People always associate donuts with cops but I think it should really be donuts with Canadians lol Canadians know how to make a gooooooooooooooood donut!
The drive brought back memories! The busing Janelle, Paige and I adventured on in the middle of winter to see my then boyfriend and other friends, family trips which I had completely forgotten about, a bridge that janelle and I photographed, I loved being up there! Also revelstoke bridge was where some of this xmen wolverine dam flashbacks occurred in the first film! It was just sooo gorgeous. Jenny and I could both imagine living in the valley between all these mountains!
So we get to the mountain and we had to pay to go into the park there. We drove 20km up the mountain to a check point where a shuttle bus would take us a further 2-3km and we would have to walk the remainder 2-3km to the top where there was a lake and some cabins!
The people who left the shuttle looked Jenny and I up and down with a look of "what are you girls thinking!?" As we were in summer short shorts and tank tops with just light rain jackets on and they were all bundled up and warm looking lol when driving up the mountain we watched Jenny's fancy cars outer thermometer drop from 20 degrees down to 9 and that was only at the 20km mark.... How cold would an extra 5km up the mountain go!?
When we got on the shuttle the driver was goin on a lunch break and informed the new driver that there was only one group left up there. When we were dropped off one group was at the pick up point to be taken back down so we were alone on the mountain! Or so we thought....
Well because we assumed we were alone and we both had to pee really really really bad and the driver said no one has cleaned the Lou at the top of the mountain all winter (so for a decent 5-7 months) we decided to drop our drawers and just go right there in the middle of the road cuz it was raining and if we fell into the ditch we would get soaking wet. So we did it. I haven't peed on the side of the road (in this case the middle of the road) in so long it was such a freeing experience! Haha
Once finished, we continued walking and just turned the corner and another group of people was on the mountain! And further behind them was a couple! Lol we were NOT alone and our little pee break could have ended up being even funnier....
Anyways........
The walk was beautiful and the trees and rock formations stunning!
Something we did not expect to see.......
SNOW!
And LOTS of it!
We worked out how many stories of a building would be the equivalent to 1860m and it would be about 900 stories! That's a tallllllllllllll mountain!
We then made our way back down (after heaps of videos and photos and snow ball fights and snow angles.... In our summer shorts lol....)
See! A valley but actually just run off in the ditch beside the road and small baby trees!
So it was time to head home at this point :) well to Jenny's family home where we were to have dinner with Jenny's parents :) on the way we stopped at D'Dutchmen Dairy to get some ice cream for suppers desert and they had these awesome bottles there that were sooo cheap! And I love cows so I had to get this 2L bottle of milk, which by the way was only $3.60! So cheap!
Oh and I love cows....
I've decided tha tone day I'd like to own a cow just for like a year or two :) would be a fun adventure!
So we got to Jenny's parents home and are greeted by her beautiful dog! Hehe just look at her smile!
This home is beautiful and secluded away from the highway and overlooking Lake Kalimalka :) so stunning! They also had an orchard with pair trees, apples, Cherries, apricots, and others! But the cherry trees were ripe for the picking sooooo I got to do one of my goals of this trip and do some cherry picking!
Lol we'll Jenny picked and I played with the dog and took photos.... I got a bit distracted. I think I picked 20 of these....
Then we got to watch the sunset in the reflection of lake Kalimalka and if your look closely you'll see the base of a rainbow on the mountain side.
On Wednesday, we slept through like 5 alarms lol and woke up late! So I packed up my things and Jen took me to her favourite cafe! It was so cute. It used to be a butcher so when they made it into a coffee shop they left up all the old rails and old sliding doors and such it was very cool!
Then the big pass over was made! I swapped homes yet again making it 5 different beds in one week! This is awesome! I'm enjoying my holiday emmensly!
Aunty Niki took me grocery shopping with a free pass to put whatever I wanted in the shopping trolley! I wish I had my camera on me to take photos of how crazy these Canadian grocery stores are. There was a entire section devoted to pickles. And the cereal section at least 4x longer than the kiwi cereal sections! Oh and their small size cereal box is bigger than our biggest size cereal box in nz! Lol I love my cereal!
So Aunty niki and uncle Bruce took me to their home Wednesday Arvo and WOW! They did the nicest job making this home! There's so much detail and attention to the practicality as well! I'm so happy for them and how blessed they are by this house :)
Wow sorry guys on how long this blog is! I just haven't had the time to write!
Yesterday was Thursday which was also a fantastic day. To start it off Aunty Niki and I went shopping where she surprised me and spoiled me rotten! We went to winners where there are shopping trollies lol we easily filled our shopping trolly of stuff to try on it was so fun!
Then I was handed over to Uncle Bruce where we went for lunch and I got an a+w poutine! Yay so yum the we wandered around the mall for half an hour and Uncle Bruce also spoiled me! I'm feeling so blessed and touched by their generosity and kindness. I'm just loving it here!
Then last night we went to We Are The City's concert at Kelowna community theatre. They were sooo great and I got to see Denise, Stacey, Steve, Ayla, Simon and even Sam Oram! Man those boys have gotten HUGE! They are all so so tall! It was great to see them!
And after the concert I ran into Andrew! It was soooo awesome to see him! Lol he was so sweaty and gross and sticky lol but the hugs were good and long awaited!
Oh and yesterday we drove this crazy as truck around
And west Kelowna has been putting up these awesome sculptures everywhere!
I LOVED your post! I love how you are seeing everywhere you grew up with new eyes.....things you would have taken for granted if we'd never gone on this adventure called NZ! Enjoy every minute, sweetie! Keep writing!
ReplyDeleteWhat an adventure. Super Cool. cool cool cool :o)
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