Paulette

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!

Don’t let me book your vacation. You may end up with time left but no room to stay in.

We are taking a ski trip with friends at the end of February. Back in September I booked our flights using our Aeroplan points. Ronnie & Pauline and Steve & Alison were to stay an extra night/day to visit friends in Kelowna but we were only staying for the week. Our accommodations are set for arrival on Saturday & leaving on Saturday.

Fast forward to now. I’m updating my calendar when I notice the trip is not there. I add it using the dates on my “file everything for the trip envelope”. Hmmm, the date puts it to Sunday. That can’t be correct. I check my tickets and sure enough I booked us for the same time period as the others who are staying over an extra night with friends.

Well it’s too late to change the flight now so Dave surfs a bit and finds us a nice room in Kelowna. Ends up Ronnie & Pauline aren’t staying with friends after all so they book a room too.

What to do with an extra day in Kelowna? We are going to check out some wineries. Seems it all worked out for the best.

My brother Guy (a.k.a. Roger), his wife Melanie and their beautiful little girl Faith live in Texas. They come back to Ottawa regularly to visit. We finally paid them a visit. We arrived in time to spend Guy’s birthday with him.

Here we are at their house. We had a nice dinner and a great cake. All that was missing was a Senators game. Oh right, they did play but we won’t talk about why we didn’t get to see it.

I took this picture of Faith. She wasn’t feeling well at the time but she sure didn’t show it. Isn’t she just the cutest?