Canada Vacation - Edmonton, Nelson and Calgary

During the last week of August Tim and I ventured back to Canada for what felt like a well earned week long vacation. The project that I was on at work since coming to Chicago had just finished and I was definitely in need of a break. In classic Anne and Tim vacation style, it involved lots of flying, good friends and hanging out with family. But this time it was Tim's!

We spent the first weekend in Edmonton, attending one of Tim's university friend's weddings. Theres a pretty large group of them that have been friends since collage and still meet up at each others weddings. They're a nice crowd and have been pretty friendly to me as the newcomer to the bunch. Some of them I've met a few times now and so that made it easier :-S. It was a lovely wedding and it was nice wandering round Edmonton seeing all the places that Tim used to hang out and work in during University and for a year or two afterwards. It was also blissfully cold in comparison to the boiling Chicago summer that we had been having.

Next stop was Nelson, which is in British Colombia where Tim's sister and parents are now living. To get there we had to fly Edmonton to Vancouver (which looks lovely must actually go there one time...), and then take a little plane to Castlegar which is in the heart of the southern BC Canadian Rockies. Tim's parents picked us up and then took us back to his sister Kim's gorgeous house. Kim and her Yorkshire husband Wes moved to Nelson from Alberta and picked an amazing spot. They have done their house up themselves (helps that Wes is an electrician) from what sounded like a dump initially, and now have a 3 story house with a wrap around deck, and a self contained basement that Tim's folks now live in. Tim's mum has done an amazing job on the garden which has a massive veg patch and loads of fruit trees, which, as this is serious bear country, get ravaged every night, much to their annoyance.

The house is located just up and across the road from the West Arm of the Kootenay Lake, a huge freshwater lake that runs down the middle of this part of the Rockies. They have an enviously slow paced, outdoorsy life. You can't help but be relaxed the minute that you get there. I could of quite happily stayed. Tim and I spent most of the week lying in the hammock on the deck, enjoying the sun and reading books. Fantastically self indulgent. We also ventured into Nelson itself to see the Farmer's Market, which turned into marvelling at how Nelson seems to have an awful lot of Hippies per square inch, possibly only challenged by Glastonbury Festival. As there have been lots of bears this summer Tim and I were too chicken to go out hiking, which would of been fun, but actually relaxing, and admittedly napping for an hour or two every day, seemed like a pretty good alternative. We also managed to go Kayaking one morning too. It was super hot while we were there so we dragged ourselves out of bed early enough that it was still cool. It was pretty windy and the lake was pretty choppy, I loved it, made me think I was at sea, Tim, not so much!

Tim's Mum also mothered us well, it was lovely to have some "mum cooking". It was really great getting to see Tim's family. He hasn't seen them much for a few years so it was good to just hang out. Wes and I had a lovely time bantering over the north/south English divide, and Kim and I are frighteningly similar despite the 12 or so years between us. It was just what we both needed.

Next stop was Calgary for the final weekend. I desperately wanted to catch up with old friends there on our way home. We had a pub night in my honour (hurrah!), organised by the awesome Miss Patricia, and a great turnout, it was amazing to see you all, I miss you all very much. It felt like a long long time ago that I lived there, despite the fact that it's only been 9 months. Lot's of life changes in that time I guess! Talking of which we had a great time catching up with the newly Canadianified JJ and his gorgeous fiancee Sara, seeing their new pad, eating at the Farm and catching up with Sara's little critters. Also the soon to be parents Jason and Andree (they had their gorgeous little boy just a few days after we left).

A lovely week away and great to see so many friends.

Punk Rock Bingo - The BEST night out in Calgary.

Tuesday nights at the Ship & Anchor, 17th Ave, Calgary from 8pm

Punk Rock Bingo - the best night out in Calgary for sure and something that I feel the rest of the world should start adopting. Perhaps I will bring the sensation to Chicago....

What is Punk Rock Bingo I hear you say?

Well, it used to take place on a Tuesday night at Broken City run by a guy called Steve.... Steve then left and took Punk Rock Bingo with him the the Ship & Anchor on 17th Ave. Punk Rock Bingo (or PRB) still continues at Broken City but it isn't as good without Steve. (sorry new guy but it's true)

It's kind of like normal bingo but instead of Grannies and the retired, it's mostly a young, "alternative" crowd. Instead of silence and ultimate concentration, it's yelling, boisterous and the odd swear word. Instead of winning $10 at the bingo hall, there is a random selection of prizes ranging from ice skates, to board games, to tattoo sessions, to wrestling masks, that Steve runs around town blagging from local stores and the odd flea market. Instead of tea, it's beer and wings. What's not to love?

Started by JJ, there's a crowd of us that would go regularly. A nice early week break in the evening. I and some of my fellow ladies, seem to get possessed and turn from quiet, well behaved young ladies, into screaming, yelling hooligans (in a good way), for a couple of hours. It's brilliant.

You have 3 rounds per Bingo, ending in Blackout Bingo (getting the whole card), there is also the Kite Round, and the X round, all with associated hand signals that will earn you a beer if you are the first to do it. The bingo is also interspersed with random rounds of Rock, Paper, Scissors, head banging competitions, and the odd trivia round. This is where I finally won a prize. The question was "Where were the last winter Olympics held?", pretty sure that I knocked a table over and maybe elbowed someone in the face in my haste to get to the stage with my answer. My reward? A guy in the crowd had donated a AssOlympic calendar that he had created for charity, consisting of him doing various Olympic sports, ass naked. WIN.

Brilliant night out and well worth going to. Below are some other blog entries from my fellow PRB goers.

Andree Lau's Blog - http://ugonnaeatthat.com/2009/04/17/calgary-wing-night-punk-rock-bingo/

John Johnston's Blog - http://ateabutnoe.com/?p=227

Suzi Edward's Blog - http://binkysilhouette.blogspot.com/2009/05/punk-rock-bingo.html

World Cup Downhill, Lake Louise, 28th November 2009

Last year I went to one of the World Cup downhill skiing runs and had a brilliant time. So I managed to persuade Tim to come with me for a weekend in the mountains this year. It was the first time we'd attempted to go skiing together, so I was quite nervous and excited!

It was US Thanksgiving weekend so I had the luxury of having Tim in Calgary for 5 whole days. It was a particularly wet snowy evening when we set off, seemed that Calgary was caught unawares so the roads hadn't been treated and were particularly treacherous. It took us a massive 2 hours to get to COP, a trip that normally takes 20 mins, at which point I drove up the on ramp to get onto the Trans Canada highway which goes to Banff, as I drove up the sheet of ice that was supposed to be a road, everyone started sliding backwards including me, most scared ever been, thankfully having a Canadian sitting next to me who knows what to do helped, and as everyone else was stuck too, they all got out and helped push each one of us up the road. Some crazy stupid drivers out there.

Thankfully the snow hadn't fallen past the outskirts of Calgary and the road to Banff was completely dry. We made it to our hotel and I was defiantly thinking that I had deserved a bottle of wine.

We made reservations at The Bison, on Bear St in Banff. We had had brunch there when we met up with Tim's sister in the summer and were really impressed and also had heard rave reviews from some of our friends, so were looking forward to having dinner there.
The atmosphere was nice and there are some interesting things on the menu, we had an unusual bottle of wine called Boom Boom! (admittedly we picked it purely because of the name) accompanied by a meat and cheese platter full of bison meat, duck, venison and wild boar. Yum. Highly recommend it to anyone wanting a nice meal in Banff, slightly elevated tourist prices but worth it I reckon.

The next day we headed to Lake Louise, we got Tim all geared up for his first ski in 15 years or something. I always love the atmosphere at the races. It's free to go and watch so if you don't want to ski and just watch the racing in the finish area that's perfectly acceptable. They have free hot cider and cookies and a marshmallow roasting fire pits. They also give out wee cow bells, meaning that all the racers get a rapturous reception as they cross the finish line. A great positive energy, and it's fun spotting all the "famous" racers ;-)

We then went for a bit of a ski, and credit to Tim he was pretty receptive to his ski instructing girlfriend trying to help him. heehee.

Opening Day at Sunshine Village!

This Wednesday was a public holiday in Canada for Remembrance Day, so we had the day off work. The very clever marketing people at Sunshine Village (a ski hill about an hour and a half from Calgary) decided that they should open for the season on this very day....

I made a call out to my ThoughtWorking friends to see who would take up this mid week escape to the mountains, and the four of us embarked on our first ski trip of the year.

Since the first blast of snow in September we've had pretty much no snow in Calgary, yet in the Rockies, an hour up the road it has been a very different story. Tonnes of the stuff. More than I have ever seen for so early in the season. So we were all VERY excited. I've never been a normal visitor on opening day of a ski hill, wasn't sure what to expect but we figured that we weren't going to be the only ones who thought that heading up there yesterday was a good idea. One good run was all going to make it worthwhile we decided.

With our expectations set (thank goodness), we left Calgary at 7.30am ish. As we got further into the mountains it started to snow lightly, and by the time we were 5kms from the turn off to Sunshine they were big fat flakes. And then we hit our first of many line ups of the day. Sunshine has had a very respectable 40 cms in the last 3 days alone. They had to re-sand the road so we all queued up to get up the access road, then crawled on up the access road. One good run and it'll all be worthwhile....

Good job that I had the company I did in the car. Never a dull (or quiet) moment with that lot. As we were nudging up the road a whole herd of mountain goats decided that they wanted to hang out on the road, causing at least some entertainment for us all. About half way along the road, we noticed that people were starting to come back down in the opposite direction, and grinning a lot. Odd. After another 20 mins we reached some parking attendants who told to go back down and park on the road, all the car parks were already full. Honestly have never seen it as busy.

By the time we had kitted up and walked all the way up to road, driven by our need for that one good run, it was 11am. All was forgotten as we headed up the gondola and got some runs in. Such good conditions for so early, gorgeous powder, and a great atmosphere with everyone just ecstatic about being back on the snow.

Our two last runs mad the whole day. The most fun I have had skiing in a long time. Not a care in the world. Now who do I h ave to talk to to get every Wednesday off to go skiing?!

JJ's Last Week in Canada

My good friend JJ headed back to the UK last week. So lot's of what I got up to in October were leaving events!

We headed out to the mountains with another couple of ThoughtWorkers and went out past Lake Lousie to the Bow Valley Lookout. Another of those 'awesome views for no effort' places. Quick walk up from the car park and you get to a ledge that looks out over this gorgeous view:

Even though it was a rainy miserable day it somehow made the mountains all mystical and awesome.

We then went a bit further on up the road towards Jasper to Mistaya Canyon. A really cool little place, where the river has cut down deep into the rock and left a sliver of a canyon. We hung out there for quite a while, just nice watch the water roaring through the rocks.

Another brilliant thing we did was go skiing at Canada Olympic Park after work one day. The season hasn't quite started yet but COP is open. It's a outdoor little slope on the outskirts of Calgary. They have mostly man made snow but its still snow, and they do night skiing too. It was brilliant to get back on skis for the first time this year. JJ had packed his ski stuff already so was skiing in jeans. HA.

It's pretty surreal skiing on the only peice of snow that you can see and practically in a housing estate.But it's brilliant having somewhere to ski so close. Might keep trying to head up there before the slopes open this weekend.

Last up was the Last Night of the Poms. JJ had a house cooling party for us all, a brilliant night and this is us at the end.

ThoughtWorks Canada Away Day 2009

So bear with me while I post lots of things that I got up to in October...

A lot of October revolved around giving my friend JJ a good send off as he heads back to the UK with ThoughtWorks. Sorely missed.

First up...... ThoughtWorks Canada Away Day 2009

My first Away Day. Was brilliant fun!

The idea of an away day is that, as a company we are all pretty disparate. All on different client sites its often hard to "regroup", catch up with everyone and share ideas. So there is a day when we all go off site, give presentations to each other, get company updates, and generally catch up :-)

We went out to a ranch in Kananaskis Country out towards Banff. As predicted when we started planning the away day back in July, the first snow of the winter arrived just in time for the away day. It was actually really good fun to be surrounded in the snow, for a lot of people traveling this was the first time they had really seen that much snow, and it's always fun to watch their reactions. It wouldn't be the Canada away day if there wasn't ten tonne of snow!

We all had a great day, with all sorts of interesting topics for the presentations from sales skills, to cucumber testing to social responsibility and of course not without a hour long Roy Rant from our fearless leader Roy.

We also got some great TW swagger, in the shape of nice hoodies seen below.

Continuing along the Lighthouse Route in Nova Scotia

Continued from here

We left Lunenburg the next morning and continued along the Lighthouse Route. This is the road that winds along the coast as opposed to the highway, all along the south shore of Nova Scotia. We joined the route at Lunenburg that day and followed it to Halifax, stopping at Mahone Bay, Chester, Queensland Beach and Peggy's Cove.

The route is a great one to drive, winding coastal roads, almost always with the sea within view to one side. As the route takes you though lots of little towns and villages it's really easy to just stop and get out whenever there’s something that takes your fancy.

Not far from Lunenburg is Mahone Bay, a pretty little town set at the end of a small inlet. Lots of yachts were all moored up in the bay. We carried on to Chester. The guy that ran the B&B that we were staying in had suggested we stopped there, so thought it might be a good stop for a late morning pit stop. He was of course right. I really liked Chester. It’s a very picturesque, clean, idyllic little town. (almost stepford wives but not quite!) The houses were all perfectly painted and the place just seemed super relaxed. There’s a yacht club which I can imagine gets pretty busy in the high summer season, and a nice headland which you can walk around. We came across the Kiwi Cafe, and boy am I glad that we did. I immediately felt at home, from my days in New Zealand. The cafe is bright and cheery, with super friendly staff and a great atmosphere. I sampled a Nanaimo bar and a fresh lemonade and Tim had an espresso, apparently so good it was in his top three best espresso's ever, so that’s saying something! They had some yummy looking things on the menu too, all beautifully fresh and organic. Highly recommend stopping there.

After feeling refueled we headed back onto the road and came across Queensland Beach, in Hubbard’s Cove. Gorgeous white sandy long stretch of beach grabbed our attention and made us stop for a walk.  We had a lovely time playing in the sea and wandering along the beach. Some crazy souls were even brave enough to get out into the water!

Our penultimate stop of the day was Peggy's Cove. We had made sure we had the whole afternoon there to check this infamous place out. Peggy's Cove is a tiny settlement of about 50 people, a small fishing community and its main attraction is the lighthouse set on top of the rocky outcrop sticking out into the Atlantic Sea. It s a pretty busy little place, there were a couple of tourist buses there whilst we were, but it wasn't too bad, I wouldn't imagine it’s that fun during the main summer season. There are a few houses, most of which are gift shops or art galleries. There’s the main gift shop, post office and restaurant up next to the lighthouse. Tim and I got a hearty feast to take out from there of actually reasonable fish and chips, and a lobster roll (the main staple of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick it would seem!) sat ourselves down on the rocks and had ourselves a lovely afternoon chilling out. There was a pesky giant seagull that seemed intent on stealing my chips but I was having none of it. It is quite a special place, I really felt happy there. We had been blessed by beautiful sunshine for our whole trip, but just as we sat there on the rocks some clouds came rolling in off the sea which made from some quite cool photos.

We ended our trip to the Maritimes with a night in Halifax and then Moncton. Which was pretty odd for me as my younger brother had done his initial pilot training in Moncton a couple of years back. Small world. And possibly one of the only airports that I know where you can buy live lobsters to take home with you….

Cupcake Challenge - Crave vs. Buttercream

I love a good cupcake as much as the next girl.
So when I moved to Calgary I was overjoyed to discover Crave , the ultimate cupcake shop on 17th Ave SW. (They also have a shop in Kensington)
They sell normal sized cupcakes, mini cupcakes (my fave!) and also cookies too. You have a choice of a chocolate or vanilla base and then a multitude of toppings, my favorites being Va Va Vanilla and The Princess on vanilla cake. I prefer the mini ones, the large ones seem just too indulgent, but the mini ones seem to have just the rate ratio of topping to cake, in a handy two bites. The mini ones also handily fit into my cupcake holder that Crave also sell.
Recently a rival cupcake shop has opened on 17th Ave, Buttercream. I thought I would take it upon myself to find out which was better and would I be converted.

On Saturday I hit up Crave first, getting my two favorite minis, they had been freshly baked not long before, and they put them in a box for me (which irritatingly was too big for them so they fell over in my bag and go squished, hence the less than elegant photos below!). I then went on down to Buttercream, They had lots of the big ones left but not many minis. When I asked the lady for just one vanilla one she went hunting out the back and found me one.

I must of looked like a lunatic carrying my precious cupcakes in my hands down 17th Ave, but I found a park to sit down in to conduct my experiment. First I had to put my squashed ones back together. I tried the Buttercream one first, the sponge was nice and light, the topping was also quite light, still tasty though. The crave one again had a light sponge, slightly crisp too, the topping is pretty rich and you can definitely taste the butter cream. Both pretty damn nice.

In conclusion, although the Buttercream cupcake was a bit lighter, if like me, you treat yourself to a single cupcake every now and again, if you're gonna do it, do it properly, and go for the most indulgent taste of the two and that would my old friend Crave! Yay!

So Crave still holds me for now, and next time I must remember not to try my cupcake challenge for breakfast....

Ferry to Digby and lovely Lunenburg

Next stop - Nova Scotia!

On Monday we left our lovely luxurious room in the Rossmount, jumped into our hire car (which I discovered had xm satellite radio, so that I could listen to my favorite BBC Radio One. Hurrah!), and drove back up the coast to St John where we caught the ferry that crosses the Bay of Fundy and goes to Nova Scotia, stopping in Digby.The ferry took just over 3 hours to do the crossing. Tim and I found a nice spot at the back of the ferry shielded from the wind outside and settled there, apart from the hour where I whopped his ass at Uno and he whopped mine at Mastermind. Grr.
Dibgy was holding a motorbike festival just before we arrived so as we went onto the ferry its seemed like a never ending line of bikes came off.

We had to charge across the middle of Nova Scotia to reach Lunenburg where we were staying for the night. I always entertained me on our trip just how many places have the same name as places I know in the UK. I'm guessing given where Nova Scotia is, people from the UK sailed across the Atlantic, landed in Nova Scotia and thought "hmmm why name it something different lets just name this place after my town". As a result I drop past Bridgewater, Truro, Alderney, Londonderry, Chester, Bedford and Dartmouth just to name a few.

It was nice to be driving on roads that have curves and corners again, although not sure Tim was as impressed as I was. Next time I shall take a wee sports car.
We arrived in Lunenburg in the late afternoon. We stayed in a lovely B&B, The Alcion, a large white house on a corner in the more residential part of Lunenburg. We found it a bit weird staying in a B&B, chatting to a bunch of people over breakfast isn't always my idea of fun when I've just woken up, but the breakfast was lovely. The room was gorgeous too, we were in the Dragonfly room, light and airy, and with a lovely bathroom with a hydrotherapy bathtub.

Once we'd dropped off our stuff at the B&B we walked into the main part of the town just in time for sunset over the dock. It's definitely a fishing and boat making town, so I felt right at home! There's an idyllic seafront, there's the harbour level and the rest of the main part of the town is set on a steep hill over looking the harbour. The houses are all painted different colours and seafood is definitely the main item on the menus. It was labour day so we were a bit worried no where would be open, but fear not we found a couple of places. Tim had his first lobster of the trip, and I had some tasty fishcakes. The lobster eating kept me pretty entertained throughout the meal anyways.I really like Lunenburg, it seemed so relaxed and chilled out. The town was really pretty, lots of tree lined avenues in the residential areas. Next time will spend at least two days there.

St Andrews and the Lau/Sallis Wedding

Last week I used the event of Andree and Jason's wedding in New Brunswick as a damn good excuse for a week off and a chance to visit the east coast of Canada. Tim and I visited New Brunswick and Nova Scotia and then to Chicago for the weekend where we caught up with my friend from Uni, Danielle, who was travelling round the states for the summer.

I was super excited to be on the coast again and couldn't wait to see how different the opposite side of Canada is. I'll break up our trip over a few posts.

Tim and I flew to Toronto to meet each other and then caught a flight out to Moncton, NB. We drove the 3 hours or so in the dark down to St Andrews ready for the wedding the next day. Was weird driving all the way without being able to see much of the landscape around us, especially seeing as we know that the sea was just there... It was a beautiful night, a full moon and clear skies. Was great being able to see all those stars again.

The wedding venue that they chose was the Rossmount Inn in St Andrews-by-the-sea. A beauftiful house turned hotel set up on a hillside looking out over the bay. Most of the guests from the wedding were staying at the Rossmount too. The food there on a normal day is supposed to be sublime, although we didn't get a chance to sample it this time. Next time!

St Andrews in a little town on the Bay of Fundy. It's pretty touristy, thankfully we were there towards the end of the season so it wasn't too busy. The town is made up of wodden houses of all different colours and shapes. Theres a nice little pier with fishing boats tied up to it too.

Saturday brought Andree and Jason's wedding. It was honestly the most beautiful wedding I have been too. The day was relaxed and laid back and seriously seriously enjoyable. We were blessed with a beautiful cloudless blue sky, and it was lovely warm day. Andree and Jason had obviously planned the day so well that it seemed effortless. The ceremony was out on the pool deck of the hotel, a record 8 mins of some beautiful vows and my two friends were declared husband and wife. Swiftly followed was champagne and lots of lovely canapes out on the pool deck, Oysters, Goats cheese tarts, salmon, raspberry refreshers and more...

The programming language themed table plan was also a lovely touch. Definitly an 'in' joke. Andree had picked out some lovely options for the dinner, Tim had a pretty damn tasty Lamb dish and I went for the yummy fish. On our tables Andree had left us some really thoughtful party favours. Some how she had managed to find a picture of each of us and Andree or Jason, and put them into photo frames. Such a lovely idea. I was honoured to be part of their day, and they both looked radiant and so meant for each other. Yay.

We spent the rest of the weekend in St Andrews too. The post wedding brunch the next day was pretty fun, more food than any of us could ever manage (even Andree's Dad!), and great wrap up from the day before. Tim and I then took a boat trip to go whale watching. It was brilliant to get out on the ocean again, miss being on a boat. (ironically my brother was sailing with my Dad and stepmum at the time too). We went with Quoddy Link Marine, it was refreshing to see that they were really concerned with letting the whales be whales, they didn't want to crowd the whales like all the other boats were so we went off in search of some more whales. And that we did, we saw quite a few of the massive Finback whales, and also a whole load of seals sat on a rock that gets covered by the massive tides in the Bay of Fundy.

That night saw us having a chilled out evening with those left around from the wedding party.