The Orsum saga continues.
06.04.2012 - 03.05.2012
-1 °C
Only 3 more days of the Lake Louise season. Even though we just had another 20cms of snow in the last 2 days. However, I did hear exciting news today, that they have decided to open for a bonus weekend. So technically, I have another 6 days to get my 180 grab and 360. There is still crazy amounts of snow considering they are closing! Nothing like the old Ruapehu season where you have to download on the lift to get to the bottom, after your 5 days on the hill, just paying off your season pass. I have done 45 days this season, and that only started in January. As I mentioned before though, it’s not the snow disappears it’s the people that do. Oh, and the bears come out. Haven’t seen one yet, but there have been lots of videos of them round the place. The ski hill has set up their bear fence to stop the bears coming down to the village. Although from all accounts, it’s sort of a token effort, the bears still get out and scare the pinic’ers.
And the picnic-ers have definitely arrived; tour buses of Asians are starting to arrive. Apparently this is nothing, Summer is crazy full of tour buses. It’s the change of seasons at the moment though, so it’s a bit lacking for things to do for the tourists. In Winter, Lake Louise has snowboard and ski, cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, skateing, ice-climbing, back country touring and the ability to generally look at the beautiful scenery. In Summer, you can hike, tramp, camp, hire bikes, climb, play tennis, baseball, watch the wildlife and generally look at the beautiful scenery. However in Spring (which is usually one of the nicest times of year in a lot of places) there is a slushy hill to ride, roads to walk on (this may seem like an odd thing, but they are finally not covered in snow, ice or puddles), sporadic snowstorms and hotch-potch scared barren landscape to look at.
I still love it. There is nothing like the Rocky Mountains with a blue sky behind it.
We spent some time in Jasper recently, and unfortunately there wasn’t super blue sky, but it was a pretty amazing drive down the Icefields Parkway. This road, between Lake Louise and Jasper, is one of the 10 top cycle tours you can do in the world. I can see why… apart from the sore arse part of course. The scenery is spectacular. It stretches 232km through the heart of the Canadian Rocky Mountain Parks World Heritage Site, and through 2 National Parks. If any cyclist out there has the incline to do it, I can definitely recommend. It offers access to a vast wilderness of pristine mountain lakes, ancient glaciers and broad sweeping valleys.
Iain was there for work, so I went for a wander round the Lakes at the Jasper Park Lodge. There are some perks to Iain having a big kid job – sweet accommodation wherever we go basically. And at the moment, most of its for work related tasks, so its free. Then in the afternoon we went up to the Marmot Basin, which is Jaspers ski field. We met up with a couple of kiwi’s who are both working over here, Eve used to work at Wilson’s and Lou, her friend, who is now based in Invermere. We had a very fun day riding the park and hitting Marmot’s features cause the snow was a bit rubbish to do anything else, but it was fun to hang out in the sun and play in the slush.
So at the end of the season, we didn’t manage to make Whistler – I know people are letting out a gasp in horror. But when you have Louise in your back yard, for free basically, it’s hard to tear yourself away. Louise used to be considered biggest standalone mountain resort in Canada. Whistler-Blackcomb joined in 1997 and is now considered ‘one’ mountain resort because of its Peak-2-Peak gondola, so it now holds the record for largest skiable area in North America. But we still claim Lake Louise is the largest standalone. So anyway, history lesson over, no Whistler for us, but I guess all the more reason to come back to Canada. We may get to their mountain bike park though, now that we have the bikes for it. And yes Tim, specifically now that I have bike that the bolts are not going to fall out of them before I get to the bottom of the hill.
So this season Iain and I have got to Silverstar, Marmot, Revelstoke, Sunshine and Louise. Kicking Horse was a comedy of errors and we never made it, even though we tried, and Big White, Fernie and Red Mountain were just a bit far with no wheels. Great season, my knees are tired and need a break. Here in Louise we have had the biggest snowfall since records began! So can’t complain, it was a great year for us to choose to come.
So I know the reason most of you have come to the blog is to find out what’s going on. I think I have stretched it out enough.
Well after 30 months, I finally have no stitches in my finger. Yeah I’ve had a little spot on the inside of my finger, and then this morning a little blue piece of thread finally came out. I saved it on my dresser. Oh that’s not the story you wanted to know? Oh well, its true anyway.
So we decided seen as Iain has got such a good job here and we are still technically saving money, that we should just stay a little longer. Since we arrived in January, people have said to us on a regular basis that Winter is nice, but Summer is amazing. And our thought was, “well if the Winter we just experienced, was only considered ‘nice’, Summer must be incredible, and its worth sticking around for it, before we get to old, hagged and caught up in real-life to enjoy it”. So after a number of discussions with career managers, (thanks Mike you are a star ☺) and the travel agents (boo, Flight centre you are less of a star, more like a black hole, if we are going to stick with the astronomical references) we decided to stay for the Summer season too. So to celebrate, we brought bikes. Although Iain has a sweet ‘big kid’ job, my job has more than enough perks. Our bikes cost about $800 NZD each, (although you can’t get Devinci bikes in NZ), and I got them for both of us for about $800 NZD. Buy one bike get another one free! Haha, love it.
Anyway, back to what I was saying. So as of a couple of days ago, Iain and I will now be pushing out our year-long honeymoon, to an 18month honeymoon… with the possibility of a second ski season somewhere in Europe. But that is still undecided. Basically what is happening, from our end is that we will stay in Lake Louise until the end of the Summer season, probably October and then travel back to Vancouver to then fly to Montreal. Grab a car and travel all around the East coast of Canada and the States. Fly out of Montreal and then head to the ‘Motherland’. Although this is all dependant on Flight Centre pulling their finger out and actually providing a smidgen of support, I friggen paid enough for it. Apparently we are currently being ‘supported’ by the manager. I’m not sure what she’s managing, apart from my anger. But, she will get to enjoy a stern conversation with Iain tonight, and then probably a more effective angry conversation with me after Iain finishes discussing cupcakes and lollipops with her.
Posted by kayles 03.05.2012 18:35 Archived in Canada Comments (1)





