Week 11

Day 71:
Slept in a bit and then headed out for some more window shopping - mostly for a CD player that can handle some of the rough roads I enjoy driving on. I also caught the movie Enemy of the State. Tim and I went to the Keg for dinner (keep the tradition alive!) and took a drive up Knox Mountain for a nice view of the city at night. Upon returning, I was surfing the T.V. channels and came across the latest Babylon 5 movie, The River of Souls. It was quite interesting.

Day 72:
Tried to get up early but instead got on the road around 10:00am on the way to Silver Star Mountain for some skiing. The access road is nice and twisty up the side of the mountain and the chalet area was quite quiet and confusing. After stopping at a few places I finally found someone who would sell me a lift ticket and I was off to the slopes. The mountain has a nice selection of runs off of the one working chairlift so I wasn't bored.

After heading back to Tim's for dinner, we went out to the church for some cards and then out to see the movie The Waterboy. It was worth the $5 for a Tues., but not much more.

Day 73:
Fighting off a cold and sore throat, I headed back to the mountain for some more punishment. The top of the lift was shrouded in fog but you could still ski fairly comfortably until it started to clear up a third of the way down the hill. I met a few locals on the lift and did a few runs with them, even though I wasn't quite up to their level of skiing. Spent the rest of the day working on my technique.
After a weary drive back to Kelowna, I enjoyed the final Babylon 5 episode. I took the time to catch up on the episodes I haven't seen by reading some of the episode synopsises on the Web at www.midwinter.com/lurker. All in all, I've only missed a handful of episodes and 1 of the movies over the years that the series has aired.

Day 74:
Today, the cold won and I stayed in. I woke up at 4:45am because I could barely breathe so I took a shower, which helped the sinuses and my aching head. The local ski hill, Big White opened, but I decided to wait a day to attack it.
When I did wake up later in the morning, I took the time to follow thru on my earlier window shopping and buy a CD player with anti-shock capabilities. I found a nice, inexpensive JVC model at a local store called a & b sound - recommended to me by someone from the local radio station, Silk FM. It has a 10-second buffer, so I hope that will be enough for all those logging roads to come.
Tim and I rented a few movies and watched the Big Lebowski. Not exactly what I had expected, but very funny!

Day 75:
Feeling a bit better, with a full night's rest, I headed out to Big White for some more vertical. Unfortunately, one of the resort's nicknames is Big White Out which it lived up to far too well. The fog/clounds at the top were so thick that you could barely see the chair ahead of you on the ride up or much of the trail in front of you on the way down. Most of the time, I was inching my way down - hardly any skiing at all. I kept at it though and found a second lift off to the side of the mountain where the fog was a bit thinner, but not thin enough to enjoy a clear view of the trail for more than 25-30 feet.
A finally gave up around 2pm and headed back to Tim's. We went out to Swiss Chalet and watched our other rental, He Got Game. Another interesting movie.

Day 76:
Took another opportunity to sleep in until 10:30am. Tim had mentioned a local trail earlier in the week, so we ventured off.
In the first half of this century, there was a need for a railway through the Okanagan, so someone built one. In the 60's, it was no longer needed, so it was abandoned. In the 90's it's surface was graded and it's trestles fortified and it became the Kettle Valley Railway trail. The section we undertook circled the Myra Canyon, with some great views of the trestles across the

valley and of the city below. Once we had hiked around to those far trestles the clouds/fog had moved in and we couldn't see much of where we had been. Once we returned to the trailhead, the fog had lifted, of course. Good to see that Murphy hasn't lost his power.
We ended up travelling 5.5km along the trail over 12 trestles and then returning. We even had the opportunity of following a bear's tracks as he had chosen to walk along the trail a few days before when the snow was fresh. His tracks remained because the snow had frozen soon after, leaving a thin layer of ice over everything.
The access road to the trail was a converted logging road and, although it was nice and bumpy, I forgot to bring my new CD player along to evaluate its performance.
One of Tim's friends was having a birthday party so we attended empty handed and enjoyed the food and some cards. Afterwards, we stopped at another friend's place to admire some recent home decor improvements.

Day 77:
Another Sunday at Trinity Baptist and a little more planning for the next week. I contacted my Aunt Linda and cousin Shari in Kamloops and plan to visit on Mon and Tues.
More NFL and more surfing rounded out my afternoon along with the Simpsons and X-Files - which had to be a 2-parter, since I have no idea where I'm going to be for the second part!!
We headed out to a coffee house from the church and I finished off my evening packing and updating ye old web site.