Being one with Nature

A little while back while my friend Alex was visiting Alberta, we decided to go on a little hike. I've already done the whole Banff, Lake Louise, and Johston's Canyon thing in the past, so this time I wanted to see some new sights. I bought this hiking

g book while I was still in Ontario. It was full of a bunch of hikes, scenic drives and scenic bike routes. Alex and I both like to hike so we decided to choose a "demanding" 3 -4 hour hike. Our first adventure was to hike Agnes Trail.

Agnes Trail is located by the Chateau Lake Louise. It's a rather steep hike and you gain an elevation of up to 1260 ft. While hiking up that trail it was neat to see the sudden change in climate. It went from no snow, to a bit with ice, to HUGE patches of ice, to frozen lakes to skate on with little mini avalanches in the distance! Like I said, kinda neat!

As we walked a little further up, we met a family which told us that a partial bit of the trail was closed for the season...but we decided to continue to hike it anyways. You know, just to see how far we could go. I guess this was our half-way point. Look at how blue Lake Louise looks!


Along the trail we passed Mirror Lake which was completely frozen and we saw people skating there. As well, I can never resist the temptation to take silly photos. This is me trying to get a photo of me jumping in the air off this stump. Instead it looks like I'm doing kung fu. Meh, why not?


















Walk a little higher and we finally get to Lake Agnes. From there we saw a mini frozen waterfall which I assume helps trickle water into Lake Louise or a near-by creek of some sort. Being as adventurous as we are, we walked into the middle of the waterfall, being careful to step on stable rocks, and took this magnificent photo. In the distance, if you really squint, you can see the Chateau Lake Louise. Look how high we are!










The majority of Lake Agnes was frozen. But trust me the photo doesn't really do a good job in capturing it's grandeur.



















Alex was a champ and decided to brave the icy trail and hike up the BeeHive. Although, at the time we didn't know he was hiking up that path. Glad he didn't die. But he did get some amazing shots of the view from the top.











This is definitely going to be a hike I will do in the summer. I want those awesome aerial pictures!

Final Thought: Whenever you get a chance to take a silly photo. Do it!

Attempting to Survive

So I've been here for a while now...It's quite the battle with mother nature to survive here.

First off, there's the bitter cold (see previous post for example temperature) and then there's the dryness. Unlike Toronto, this place is not situated around a lake providing ample amounts of humidity. Instead, every morning I wake up to this burning dryness in my nose, a post nasal drip due to the thickened viscosity of my mucus, and sadly a sore throat which follows. Now this is EVERY morning I'm talking about. It gets worse, there was something wrong with my heater a while back so I was even freezing at night. The cold kept me up to a point where every night I had a space heater on, and I was using one of those instant heat packs to warm me up. This is on top of wearing socks, sweatpants, a sweater, and a scarf to bed. Luckily I fixed that heating issue already.

Now back to that dryness. So Every night I use a Netipot to hydrate my nose, nasal gel, gargle with salt water, and have a humidifier on FULL BLAST. All in all, that does nothing... I still wake up with a sore throat, post nasal drip, and nose bleeds or remnants of one. For the rest of my day, I pretty much spend it dry coughing and attempting to loosen the phlegm that is stuck to the back of my throat. Attractive...isn't it?

The only thing that keeps me alive is that hot shower in the morning where I can get the most humidity.

Final Thought: If you're coming to Calgary...make note you will feel like you're living in a dehydrator and you're slowly but surely drying up.

The Deep Freeze

Okay... So the weather in Calgary is not the best. Calling it "cold" is an understatement.

Yesterday Calgary was reported as the 2nd coldest place ON EARTH!
article: http://www.calgarysun.com/news/alberta/2010/11/23/16282731.html

Whose number one? The Arctic Circle.

So yeah unfortunately there's no such thing as "Cold-Days" as there were "Snow-Days" when we were kids. So I did have to hull my butt into work. Everyday I've been wearing THICK leggings under my jeans and bundling in layers to keep myself warm. I look like a giant puff. I'm not the most attractively dressed person out there...but I'm warm.

Unbelievable site of the day: I saw some University girls being stupid and only wearing a sweatshirt and a scarf. No snow boots, No gloves, No hat. It's -40*C out!!! Why... why are you NOT wearing a decent winter jacket?!?! She definitely didn't look poor as she listened to her iPOD shivering.

Thought of the day: If you can afford an iPOD you can afford a decent winter jacket. Or pawn it for money to get a decent winter jacket.

Change of Topics and Theme Posts

So...since I'm no longer a Sci-FOC and I have this blog to work with, I'm going to shift gears and change the theme of this blog from Science Orientation to blog about my Calgary days (aka "My Cow-gary Days")












For those who don't know, I've accepted a position out in Calgary, AB away from my home in Ontario. That's right... I'm in the land of mountains, oil, cows and horses (see picture). My job is a a Research Assistant position with the University of Calgary. It's based on a one year contract so for those going, "OMG is this permanent? Have you moved there forever?" ha ha - NO. Once again it's a year contract. Who knows where I'll be a year from now. Maybe on the beaches of California? Or possibly back in my room in Ontario.

Regardless, this post will commence the transformation!