October 8th

1pm: The spectacular trestle railway bridge at Lethbridge, Alberta : I had to make the 3 hour drive down to Lethbridge for work today. It was another gorgeous Fall day & actually pretty hot down here in the South (25C at least). Lethbridge is a nice town,  maybe a bit windy/dusty for my liking but surrounded by lush countryside, with the pass that leads you into Southern BC a 150kms to the west. Still a good drive & with a stop off in bustling Okotoks on my way back, a long day.

October 2nd

11am: We made the most of a glorious Canmore Fall morning by heading down to the park by the river. The kids threw stones into the Bow River & then Charlie decided to start running in the shallow water lapping the beach - of course within minutes he fell in & was completely soaked - thus curtailing the trip. It was good fun though & very funny.

September 25th

4pm: We enjoyed a day out in Calgary today, fabulous sunny weather at last. After lunch in Kensington, at a really nice Vietnamese (what else in YYC) restaurant - we made our way over to Inglewood. Inglewood is a developing neighbourhood with funky little arty shops & a Harley Davidson dealership where a glamour photo shoot was going on in the parking lot where we had left our car. It involved gleaming bikes &  a scantily dressed young lady! The kids were a bit bemused by it all..........not something you see every day.

August 13th

4pm: Cape Perpetua, Oregon After spending a lovely morning on the beach discovering mussels, starfish & numerous crabs with the kids we headed up into the mountains to get some scenic eye candy. This is the lookout station (from WW2 I believe, where they kept a look out for enemy shipping & aircraft). You can see US101 snaking it's way round the coast & the blue Pacific. Quite stunning, although keeping the kids from nose diving over the walls & down the cliff meant it wasn't quite as relaxing as it might have been.

August 11th

2pm: McMinnVille, Oregon We headed down from Oregon to the coast today, stopping off for a short while at the aviation museum in McMinnville. The cost to get in the museum was astronomical, so instead we wandered around in the heat outside - there was plenty to see. Rusting old planes, tanks & the likes. Tabby was intrigued with the whole concept of war. "Why do people want to kill each other?" &other such questions. Life & the world through the eyes of a 5 year old is very innocent. It was a depressing place, looking at these enormously expensive, killing machines now rusting away in the heat & humidity. Tabby's question is hard to answer.....

August 10th

1pm: Portland, Oregon; Only 3 days in Portland & so much to explore, here is a little pod of food trucks on the trendy Alberta Street. We are just about to eat the most amazing Venezuelan dishes from the truck in the background - arepas (corn breads) with black beans, chorizo & other goodness. The kids loved their food, but we would have been happy eating from any of the trucks in this pod. All over the city there is amazing food to be had, the night before we feasted on the best pizza I have eaten outside of Italy (Apizza Scholls) & later this day we ate $10 worth of fresh Mexican tacos from another hole in the wall. Finished the day off with a cable car ride & a walk up to the park that overlooks the city - better pictures were taken for sure but this sums up one of my favourite things about this city.

August 8th

2pm: I-84, just east of Arlington, OR A longer drive today down to Portland, we headed through Spokane & then down through the high, desert plains of Eastern Washington. We crossed the Columbia River at Kennewick & then followed it's course all the way into Portland through the scenic, but traffic clogged Colombia Gorge. The kids behaved impeccably on what was a long, hot & dusty drive. I love the countryside, in all it's barren, arid glory. The stop off above gave us a chance to look at this great river.

August 7th

8pm: Liberty Lake, WA Well a long drive down from Canmore to Liberty Lake, a little community just outside Spokane. It was of course much, much warmer down here than up there. The drive itself took us through the Kootenay region of British Columbia, and over the border into Idaho. The Idaho section was interesting, real redneck, hillbilly country in parts - the area we drove through is home to the remnants of the Aryan Nation. Not hard to imagine them holed up in the tumbledown shacks that you see from the highway. Anyway we reached Liberty Lake, had a really nice dinner & then took the kids to the lake itself, where they had a blast playing in the sand on a staggeringly beautiful evening!

July 28th

10pm: It wasn't easy getting a shot of Niagara Falls, first the darkness of the surroundings & the constant colour changes projected by the lights onto the water. Secondly the immense crowds of people there for a free firework show. It was a depressing place, ugly, rampant commercialisation of the very worst kind. You are even forced to walk through a horribly, tacky mall to get near the falls. I hated it so much. I am sure when the falls were discovered they were an amazing sight in their natural surroundings, now they are almost a secondary diversion to the casinos, Hortons, MacDonalds, Burger Kings & worse littered all around them & the tack vendors trying to sell glowsticks, beads, photographs etc etc. Horrible!

July 24th

2pm: After a week of inactivity I needed to get out & about, we walked from our house to the downtown - hot again & the flora in full bloom. This is by the little bridge over the creek in the park on the south side of the Bow River, actually after 5 years I have no idea what this park is called - you can see the snowless peaks of Mount Rundle in the background!! We ate at our favourite Thai bus and then meandered slowly back - an invigorating walk.

July 17th

11am: Shingles!I was right, the reactivation of the dormant chickenpox virus...strange, supposed to be a disease in the elderly but the doctor said stress, fatigue or just generally being run down can cause it to resurface. I had the symptoms looking back, especially the intense pain in my back & legs. Luckily I acted quickly & they gave me anti-virals drugs today which should help diminish the effects & duration of the illness. It is not contagious thankfully. We popped out in the morning to the local Kelowna Farmers Market _ i need to eat lots of fruit, Vitamin C is a major nutrient in combating the disease. Charlie liked the fruit at the market, here, as per usual he is wearing some of it. Another boiling hot day, evident in his flushed, sweaty complexion.

July 15th

11pm: The pain is still there, just as bad - doctor says it is a pulled muscle, I am not so sure - he prescribed a muscle relaxant, it helps me sleep. Still had to work in the heat all day though. Crap picture but photography was not uppermost in my mind today - this is the view from the hotel window, Orchard Mall & Highway 97 in Kelowna - lovely.

July 14th

7pm: Another pain ridden day. my back & legs are on fire. Still had to work though, 6 hours on my feet did not help. I just about had it in me to pull over & capture an otherwise beautiful (and steamingly hot) day. This is the view towards Coldstream ,just south of Vernon BC. The water is Kalamalka Lake.

July 2nd

11.59pm. A busy work day, but a sunny one - as evidenced by the bright light shining from the solar powered garden lamps!!

June 26th

4.30pm. I had hoped that this was the summit of Highway 533 between Nanton & our Chain Lake camp destination, sadly I was very wrong. This was about 7 hours into Day One's ride (The Ride to Conquer Cancer event), I am estimating about 95km into the 115km stage. Very hot, thirsty & tired at this stage - my bike was playing up, the front brake rubbing against the wheel making it an even more arduous ride. However I made it in the end!! The early part of the dat between Spruce Meadows & Nanton was easy enough, predominantly flat & I made good time up the Nanton break, but then this hill of doom kicked in. I dismounted a couple of times, but otherwise completed the whole 220km over two days without stopping, other than the scheduled breaks.

June 20th

2pm: On the old Highway between Canmore & Exshaw, a 65km bike ride in the heat - one of the things I love about cycling is the freedom to stop & take photos, or just observe. A few minutes after this view of the Three Sisters was taken I stopped & watched an eagle hunting in the tall grass by the roadside. It was a big ride though & I didn't hydrate properly, wasn't feeling too good by the end of it - lesson learned.

May 18th

4pm: The weather is on the change, after about a week of sun & heat - the rain is moving in & you could see it, falling in great swathes to the west of ( a still blisteringly hot) Calgary. I got this shot by driving up a little farm track on my way home from work on Highway 22, not too far from Bragg Creek - the temperature plummeted about 10 degrees upon entering the rain, and then shot up again as I got to Canmore, nestled in the sunny mountains that can be seen far off in the distance.

May 15th

2pm: Just finished digging my vegetable garden patch, OK its not the most exciting photo out there but I love growing herbs & vegetables & this little patch of freshly dug, composted soil will bear a decent amount of veggies & herbs over the next 3-4 months. Lettuce, onions, arugula, maybe even some spuds - depends on what takes my eye at the garden centre. Tabby & Charlie collected the worms that were getting exposed by me turning over the soil - they had never seen them before, poor worms I caught Charlie stretching one out like a rubber band. Finished today with a really nice barbecue a few houses down with Ian & Monica, a young couple who come up for the weekends from Calgary - they have two boys the same age as Tabby & Charlie. Even though Charlie ended up in a full on fight with their youngest boy over a tennis ball or something, it was fun.

May 13th

3.00pm. On a country road just north of Edmonton, an old truck gently rusts in a farmer's field. All over Alberta you can see in the backroads, the rusting carcasses of cars, trucks & farm machinery. I don't mind them, they add a touch of the past to a landscape which is often spoiled by the garish new. I was making a long, hot 4 hour drive back home from Edmonton to Canmore.

April 20th

4pm: Looking down Wilson Way past our house & up to the magnificent Ha Ling peak & Mount Rundle - what a scorcher of a day, 25C & not a cloud in the sky. I had to go to Calgary for work, I don't think Calgary was as warm as Canmore. Nicky tells me the kids spent most of the day outside - lucky them!