Angela turned 16 this year and on the 29th we were waiting at the Driver’s Centre in Brampton for her to take her G1 test. She passed with a perfect score which she was sure to tell Gillian.
Rick Mercer Report
We headed downtown today (sans Gillian) to see the taping of the Rick Mercer Report. We went to park at the Yorkdale subway, only to find they had torn down the parkade. Here is where we use to park all the time.
These are the doors we use to always walk through to take the overhead bridge to the parking area. The TTC website says it is closed until Fall 2015. I also heard they are enlarging the mall.
As always we enjoyed Rick Mercer.
Here we are with Rick Mercer.
Rick signing his autograph on our tickets.
Happy Birthday G-ma and G-pa!
We had Grandma and Grandpa out for dinner and to have cake for their birthdays.
ROPSSA Champs (again!)
Angela’s Junior Mixed curling team won their final game today to defend their title from a year ago. This season Angela played vice rocks and has really improved from last year. Congratulations Angela!
Curling Playoffs
I was able to get to Angela’s semi-final game today. Her and her teammates did a good job and have moved on to the finals for the second year in a row.
Her team waiting waiting for the other team to throw their final stone.
Down East
Work had me down in Nova Scotia this past week. We took a detour through Lunenburg on the way to Bridgewater.
Even in the drab days of winter the brightly painted buildings make it a nice place to visit.
The only downside in winter is there is hardly anything open, including restaurants.
There was quite a bit of snow in the park.
Family Day Snowshoeing
We were all home for Family Day. Gillian was on her Reading Week and I had taken the day off for once. We headed out to Mountsberg Conservation Area near Campbellville for some snowshoeing. Here is Angela making a snow angela.
And Claudia.
The girls showing off their footwear.
Despite it being Family Day, the trails were not packed.
Claudia tired of wearing her snowshoes on her feet and switched to her hands.
It was a great day weather wise.
Gillian breaking trail.
This is the area where the girls use to do their year-end camp when they were in Girl Guides.
Afterwards we checked out the display with the Birds of Prey.
A bald eagle.
Ice Road Trucker
For 10 months of the year, the only way to access our site is by plane from Yellowknife. Given the time of year we were going in, the option of the ice road was possible. The road into the site opened at the end of January. The NT Power Corp flight schedules would only get us in, to get out we would have had to charter our own plane out. Going in by road made more sense if we could swing it. There were two of us from Toronto and one of our NT Environment colleague’s from Yellowknife. It is about a 4 hour drive from Yellowknife.
We crossed the first big lake (Marian Lake) and traveling at a speed of ~50-70km/hr it took an hour. The roads on the “ice” are wide and smooth for the most part.
The portages between the lakes are another story, just paths cut through the bush. The worse part was probably the small stretch of road going into the Snare Rapids hydro facility. It was extremely rough.
Snare Rapids, NT
I was in Snare Rapids, Northwest Territories for a week. The site is located about 140 km north of Yellowknife. With the ice road open, we were able to drive in to the site. The closest town is Wha Ti, which is only accessible by vehicle when the ice road is open.
There was a lot of ice fog created from the hydro-electric dam. It made for a nice coating of ice on the trees.
Despite it being north of 62 degrees N, there was still sun in mid-February.
You can see the cloud of ice fog that is rising over the Snare River. The dam’s capacity is 8 MW.
We had a rental truck from Yellowknife.
The one morning the temperature was at -38 degrees C.
The power corp has a full-time chef in camp, the second night this was our dinner, Alaskan king crab legs and steak.
The runway at the airport.
Back in Yellowknife.
Here I am outside the City of Yellowknife City Hall building.
Around city hall.
Buffalo Airways is located at the Yellowknife airport (YZF), home of the Ice Pilots television program.
Running Out Of Room
Where are you putting your snow? We are running out of room.
