Our last day of skiing and finally the skies are clear. The sun is shinning and we still have leftover snow from the dump we got yesterday.
We spent the day going from one lift to another. I managed to get pictures of all the areas.
The fun part was taking the t-bar up to the top. What a view! I got to see the Cliff chair area where they had an avalanche earlier this year. Unfortunately one person died. It’s not going to re-open this season.
Again we had no lift lineups. It’s been a good week of skiing. Each day seemed to be better than the day before.
We take in our last hot tub session of the vacation then eat a yummy (I made it but concensus agreed it was tasty) coconut shrimp pasta dish.
We headed to the Crystal Inn to play pool. Pauline and I really took it to the guys. I think we agreed that we tied the guys but I’m not so sure about that! At one point we noticed the staff cleaning & sweeping around us. The “Open” sign had been extinguished. We closed the place. Time to go back to the condo for our final sleep.
I’m ready to go home.
We woke up to 15cm of fresh snow. That was totally unexpected. The forecast was for flurries followed by sunny skies. Of course not one forecast has been accurate yet!
We headed to Gem Lake again since the grooming report had the most un-groomed runs there. As we approach the summit we see that it is fogged in. There is a bit of a side wind. The 15cm has drifted in places making the top quite a slog to get through. There are no tracks so we take turns plowing along. It is not easy breaking a trail in deep drifted snow, poor visibility and with wind blowing at us. Follow the yellow poles. Stay to the left of the poles. You don’t want to fall off the edge! Is this what it is like to climb Everest? It sure feels like it to me.
Once we get through that and make our way down the first pitch we are amazed by the snow. We have some laughs as a few in the group visit the snow up close and personal. The first run takes a little longer than the previous day. There’s nothing like un-tracked fresh snow.
There are no lift lineups. It is strange to us to have fresh tracks and 1st tracks after the lifts have been opened more than an hour. There are a few people out there with us. We stopped along the runs to wait for others in our group, catch our breath and give our legs a break. Sometimes a stranger might be doing the same. We always spoke to one another. We never do that back home. Here you don’t run into other people on the run that often. Usually we are skiing down alone. It’s like we have our own private ski area.
Runs undergo a transformation on a day like today. Those we skied yesterday feel like new runs today. It is exhausting but exhilarating. As the day progresses the conditions change. The snow accumulates in bunches but has not yet turned to moguls. It is challenging as the piles get thick.
It starts to warm up and the sun starts to peak out from the clouds. By lunch it is getting warmer. The summit stays socked in but the sun is shinning down on us everywhere else. It is melting and turning the once powdery snow into mushier wet stuff. In just a few hours we’ve gone from a blizzard at the top to spring skiing.
You can hear the water dripping everywhere as the snow melts on rooftops. It certainly has not been cold. Even the Everest like conditions this morning were mild. No worries of frostbite.
We have one more day at Big White. What will tomorrow bring?
There was 5-8 cm of fresh snow this morning. Ronnie is feeling a little better. The four of us head to Gem Lake to ski that area today. The Gem chair is over 8,000 feet long. There are many glade runs. Where to start?
The first few runs we take are the groomed ones. They are exactly what you expect of groomed runs. They aren’t all that exciting. We decide to take some black diamond non-groomed runs that start off in the glades. Now we’re talking! We had so much fun with those. They are very long and continuous.
It starts to warm up and the old snow softens up and mixes well with the new snow.
We had a fun day ending with a session in the hot tub. Dinner is a nice leg of lamb prepared by Alison.
Life is good!
It’s a foggy foggy day. Only Dave ventures out. As he puts it “It’s scary out there”. He skies most of the day while the rest of us stay hunkered down in the condo. Pauline goes for a massage. Alison & Steven head out for a walk.
Ronnie hasn’t been feeling well since we got here. He went to the clinic to get checked out. The Dr. deals primarily with sprains, bruises and occasional broken bones. The Dr. puts on his coat and leaves to get his stethoscope. He doesn’t use it much at the clinic. Ronnie has the flu. He is given a couple of prescriptions. The drugs do make him feel a little better. He still is walking around with a sweater and a blankie though. Poor Ronnie.
Alison prepares a wonderful pasta meal for us (fresh roasted tomatoes, portobello mushrooms, prosciutto & white wine). It was delicious.
Time for tubing! After dinner we head out to the tubing hill. Huge snowflakes are falling and the accumulation is looking extremely positive for tomorrow’s day of skiing. We have a lot of fun acting like a bunch of kids. There is rock music blaring. We had a great time.
Skiing is all planned out for tomorrow.
Our first day of skiing started after lunch. We had to wait for our luggage and skis to be delivered.
We headed out hoping that conditions were better than they appeared near the condo. They weren’t what we were expecting. Some of the runs were icy. There wasn’t a lot of loose snow but it wasn’t hard-packed either. It was OK but the harder runs were not any fun. We didn’t stay out until the end of the day. The hot tub was fantastic though. We overlook a run and it seemed strange to be sitting outside in water watching people ski by. We are up high enough that we have privacy so it’s a “we see you but you can’t see us” kind of situation.
We did get some snow overnight. Depending on which part of the mountain we were on the accumulation was more than reported. We had a fun second day trying a lot of runs, some with moguls. We could use more snow though. Good thing the company, condo etc. are all great.
Big White is a very relaxing place to ski. There are no lift lines (especially during the week). It is very low key which is just what I like. On many runs we had fresh tracks. By the end of the day there was still unskied snow to be found. The glades are very varied. Some are steep while others are well spaced. There is something for everyone.
It’s been overcast/foggy so far so we have yet to go to the highest peak. I’m attempting to try every run at least once. So far so good!
We are on holidays this week skiing in Big White near Kelowna, B.C.
After the frantic house renovations, it’s nice to get away. There’s a plan to all of this. Do our own renovations and save money. Take the money and run off somewhere for fun.
This vacation is one of those “cheap” ones. Our plane tickets were with Aeroplan points. We are sharing accommodations with 2 other couples (Ronnie & Pauline and Steve & Allison).
They have done this before. We’ll share the rental of a van and stop in Kelowna to buy groceries and beverages. Nice when things work out.
I’ll post pictures when we get back.
Vacations always come with unexpected problems and surprises. Our flight from Ottawa was at 6:00 AM. For the first time I was on a plane that needed de-icing. We taxied to an area marked with signs like “Contact the iceman”. They sprayed the wings with chemicals until they turned a fluorescent green. This put the flight behind by 30 minutes. That was our first concern. We had a tight connection in Toronto and now it was looking very problematic.
Thank goodness there are no speed controls up in the skies, no officers to pull you over and ticket you. Our pilot made up the 30 minutes and we arrived on time. Our flight from Toronto to Vancouver was late leaving too but made up time and landed in Vancouver early. Unfortunately our gate was occupied so we sat and waited, and waited, until we finally arrived at the gate late. Again more concern because we have another tight connection. We arrived at the gate as boarding started. No problem, we’ll make it to Kelowna – but will our luggage?
We arrive in Kelowna and wait for the baggage to come. I get my bag and we wait. Nothing else is coming. Dave’s bag and both of our ski bags don’t appear. We fill out missing baggage claims and we are told they will be delivered to us the next day. We can’t understand how 1 of 4 pieces made it and the rest didn’t? Dave phones the number on the claim in case our bags arrived on the last flight of the day. We are told they did not and will be shipped overnight.
We find out that the plane from Vancouver can hold only 1/10th of the baggage of the plane we arrived on. Since almost eveyone flying to Kelowna are coming to ski it seems they will be over-taxed with luggage. The girl is very co-operative and explains that 325 bags did not make it to Kelowna. They ended up trucking the bags overnight.
The driver phones us at 10:00 AM and delivers our bags to the door. He seems to know the area well and finds us easily. It must be that they do this probably every day.
If you are ever flying into Kelowna get a direct flight from Ottawa or Toronto!
I ordered our appliances on Thursday from Universal Appliances. Dave and I had been in a few weeks ago to price them out and decide on the models.
I managed to get our order in while the refrigerator was still on sale (barely). There was also a new “green” promotion for buying GE energy saver appliances. We’ll get a rebate of $200. That was a nice unexpected bonus.
We have never had really nice appliances so this is a real treat. The stove (GE Profile) has so many features. It’s a convection oven, has a probe and is self-cleaning. Our old one has none (well none that work).
The refrigerator is also a GE Profile. We decided on a 1 door vs 2 door refrigerator. The way our kitchen is setup we have plenty of room to walk around the open door. With 2 vs 1 you loose space on the shelves on the doors. We also felt we would end up opening both doors most of the time. This one worked for us. I’m looking forward to the freezer on the bottom, fridge on the top.
I had looked at getting a microwave drawer. They seemed really cool but in the end I couldn’t see how you would clean the interior since the drawer didn’t come out. I went for a Panasonic model that we can build in instead. It’s a microwave/convection oven. It has a tiered rack so you can reheat 2 plates of food at once. That’ll come in handy at our place.
We don’t have a fan hood and we do set off the smoke detector frequently. It’s a running joke that if the smoke detector is screaming that means dinner is ready!
We picked this fan hood by Zephyr. It’s a stand-alone piece. We decided on this because we have an old house with slanted floors/ceiling. We figure this will break up the upper cabinets and it will be less apparent that the ceiling is out from one side to the other. That and it looks really cool.
We also ordered a Miele dishwasher. It is supposed to be the quietest & best quality. It’s all stainless inside with a cutlery tray along the top. I really like that. I forgot to take a picture of that but it’s basically a stainless steel door on the outside with a few buttons and lights.
They should arrive shortly after we get back from our trip.
Once we have them we can order cupboards. I better get my plans ready!
Kathryn bought a yogurt maker. She uses goat’s milk when making her batch. It’s very good but a little expensive for all of us to eat, especially if we don’t need to.
I never realized this until now but she has never had whole milk. We always had 2% and lately we buy skimmed milk. She is off to shop and I ask her to pick up a liter of whole milk.
She comes home and reports that there is no whole milk to be had. The store had none. That sounds strange to me but then sometimes stores do run out. The next time I am out I pick up some whole milk.
“That’s whole milk? It says 3.25%?”
“Yes that’s whole milk. There’s 2%, then whole milk 3.25%, then table cream at 10% or 15%, whipping cream at 35% etc.”
“Oh, I didn’t know that was whole milk. They had tons of that at the store.”
We had a good laugh. I’m not sure what she expected the carton to show.
So the recipe for yogurt making is simple: milk and starter.
Pour the milk into a pan and warm it up to 180F. Let it cool to 100F then put the starter in a bowl and blend a little warm milk into it. Add the starter to the milk.
Pour all of this through a sieve into the yogurt maker. Turn it on and leave it for 24 hours.
Presto, you have a container full of fresh plain yogurt.
I’ve been having mine with fresh or frozen fruit and a dab of honey.
Sharon, a co-worker and friend of mine is in hospital today undergoing surgery for uterine cancer. We all are wishing her a speedy recovery.
She is a fun lady that I met at work when I joined the early morning workout group about 1 1/2 years ago. There’s a core group of people that show up for the class 2 morning a week before going to our desks.
Sharon is the one to keep us all in check. She is funny and full of barbs. I can barely stop from yawning at that time of day.
Our thoughts are with her. We are all hoping for good news.
Good luck Sharon!
