Devauld.ca

Part I: here
Part II: here

Saturday was forcasting some nice weather, but there wasn't a sign of it in Calgary. Furthermore, being the nut bag I can sometimes be, I agreed to a 'Crazy Canuck' camping trip for Easter Weekend. For the first camping trip in of the year, we decided on a nice'n easy car camping trip out at Lundbreck Falls. We started out of town about mid day. We were socked in, but as we drove further south cracks in the cloud cover could be spotted. When we finally reached our destination, the sky was dominated by blue and a few lazy clouds couldn't do anything to stop the sun.

We set up camp, and then went on a couple of missions to get some firewood, before settling down for some dinner. It was a nice evening, and we stoked up the fire to fight off the evening chills. Jeremy and Jen were great company, although I have never seen anyone burn wood at the rate that they do.

After the sun went down, Jen pulled out The Camp Cooker and started making grill cheese sandwiches. I have never before had a campfire cooked cheese sandwich before, but it was delicious. I know that I will find one of these bad boys before heading out on my next car camping adventure. We had our fill of cheese and bread and before long, we were long into the night. We crept into our layers of protection from the cold for the night, and fell asleep.

The morning started with some sort of a goose fight on the opposite side of the river. I was the last to drag my lazy self out of the tent and was greeted by a nice cup of coffee. We lazed about the river for the morning, and we generally put off the tear down of our camp. The day was determined to be amazing as the sun shone down on us, and the sky remained blue. I got so much sun I even got a sunburn. A great deal of time was spent taking photographs before packing up and heading out to Frank's Slide for a little sight seeing. The giant rocks are pretty neat, but it only takes a couple minutes to reach the 'Yup, it's a bunch of rocks' point and we climbed back into the car and enjoyed a nice, windows down, drive back to Calgary. It was the perfect ending to a crazy weekend.

Could it be that we've already finished the first of these 'quarter' things that the financial world is so wrapped up in? It seems like it was just last night that the New Year was knocking at the door. Keeping my head down, and focused on my many tasks has allowed Father Time to slip things past me that would regularly demand more attention. I know that it always seems that I'm complaining about not having enough time to do the things that I want, but very rarely is justification provided. Thus, wanted or not, here are the things that need to get done in the next two weeks:

• Build a router table
• Have soil delivered and construct a raised garden bed
• Fix the NW gate
• Fix ImageMagick on my MacBook
• Attend the last few Roughnecks games
• Give a presentation at CPS
• Level out the yard and re-seed it
• Help Pete build his Wine Rack
• Go car camping at Crow's Nest Pass
• Take photographs of a house
• Play Craps with fake money

Not bad for fourteen days, eh?. Throw in a little sleep, some time to eat and the time spent earning my keep, and I've pretty much plugged up the next two weeks.

I had a wonderful wander through my Flickr photo stream to find the perfect candidate for the Sky challenge from Photo Friday. This was taken out at Sibbald lake and northern star is somewhere just out of frame in the upper left. Across the lake is the private camp that cast wonderful lights on the lake

It sure was nice to be in the wilderness. A plan that had been in the works for a couple of weeks finally came together and Sonja and I spent a weekend out at Ribbon Lake.

It was a rocky start. We never left as early as I had hoped, due mainly in part to TMUTS' leaving most of his earthly posessions in a car sized pile of garbage in the back alley. I spent some time using a reciprocating saw to cut his junk to a managable size and pack it away in my car. It was well into the afternoon by the time we headed out of town. Once we arrived at the Visitor Center, they surprised us with rate increases and a $24 pass to camp in the backcountry.

I decided that along with items to make me more comfortable through the night that I would also bring along a sizable chunk of camera equipment. My burden came to a humbling 41 lbs, and Sonja's share tipped the scale over 31 lbs. We finished the 13km trek over six hours, which mainly in part to the various stops to indulge my camera fetish, and us ducking under trees to avoid the sprinkling rain. We tackled the cliff hurdle at the end of the voyage and managed to have camp set up before the sun was done in the sky.

We met a surprising large group of people at the lake, the majority there to celebrate a 58th birthday. We cooked our food, and joined in the conversation, before retiring for the night.

Waking in the morning was a bit of an adventure because most of my body didn't work. Well, at least not in the way to which I've become accustomed. It did not take long, however, for the engine to get fired up and all the kinks worked out. It became quickly apparent that the effort expended was worth it. The view was breathtaking and the sound of silence was everything I wanted it to be. Getting away from the intersection of Bermuda Dr and Beddington Boulevard to a perch at the end of a valley was exactly what I needed to slow things down for a while.

We made much better time going back to the parking lot. Moving downhill advantage was over come by a beautiful blue sky with puffy clouds and my 2Gb memory card. Losing my burden once and a while to crouch by waterfalls and climb over rocks to get a nice viewpoint stretched our return to about 5 hours.

Upon returning to Calgary I didn't entertain any such thoughts as: "I need to get outside", or "I need to do something." Eat a nice meal and retire early made for a well deserved end to a perfect weekend.