November 29, 2006
#Oh Canada#
I became a fully fledged Canadian resident today (pending a medical exam). Hooray!!
Time to organise a immigration party!
Posted by Mark at 10:22 AM | TrackBack
November 24, 2006
Ski day!
Hooray I finally got my pass sorted and spent this morning up on the mountain with Jaret. A few tentative blues soon got things sorted out and I got knee-deep fresh tracks up Spankys Ladder. The ache is beginning to kick in, and a bit of hiking out of the powder from "early-season falls" soon showed me quite how unfit I am.
Get this, ski out to the village in November! Peak chair opens on Whistler tomorrow should my legs be able to take it.
I posted some photos of my snowboard and Montreal in the link up top.
Posted by Mark at 1:10 PM | TrackBack
November 22, 2006
Of Montreal
Woah neglected blog. Ok a 3 week update in several short paragraphs follows, you may pause for breath at any point.
I went to Montreal! The trip down was a nightmare, I found out that it's basically impossible to get to Vancouver airport for 9am using public transport, which is when my flight departed of course. So I decided I would splash out at the Holiday Inn Richmond, travel down the night before on the Greyhound and utilise the hotels shuttle facilities in the morning. Some tool then decided to have an accident on the Sea to Sky highway. This 1-lane super highway (they're working a LOT to widen it for the olympics) is a veritable death trap, even more so in the Winter and it's not unusual for a crash to close the entire road for several hours. Good if it happens early in the day and you want a Vancouverite-free day on the mountain not so if you want to actually travel.
I'm dubious as to the extent of the accident on this occasion but Greyhound decided it would be better if they took us back to Whistler (after getting to Squamish, an hour away) and tried again later. We did that and drove straight through, no sign of any accident, now you see why the scepticism. I got into Vancouver at about 11pm, on Halloween, itself an interesting experience, navigated the public transport system and got to the airport at 1am, it seems Vancouver airport isn't much of a 24-hour sort of place, infact the only flights that go out between 1am and 7am are to Hong Kong so the place is deserted, everything is closed, and it's a pretty depressing place. I managed to grab a couple of hours of drool fueled sleep on a sofa in the freezing cold international departure lounge.
Initial sleepy opinions of Montreal weren't good, rudely greeted by a taxi driver trying to charge us $10 for a 2 minute (awkward to walk) cab ride, and generally the abundance of French people didn't do much to fix things. Anyway, the primary reason for going was all I really needed and after catching up on some sleep and being shown round I started to enjoy things a bit more, so much so I am undecided as to whether I like it more than Vancouver, which is a pretty big thing to say. It has lots of culture, pretty buildings, a fun young vibe, great food and it's literally massive.
While there we went to a couple of shows; Final Fantasy w/ Bell Orchestre and The Album Leaf, both of which were excellent, it bites not seeing any live music at all. Various other events included but were not limited to; eating, shopping, watching the entirity of season one Prison Break, eating, working, lounging around, eating. The highlight was of course the company, I always enjoy hanging out with myself... things continue to go excellently with Robyn, I can spend days on end without getting sick of her, continually be entertained by her quirks and it helps that I can convince her to eat as often as I find the need (which is often).
I partook of the famous Montreal smoked meat sandwich, which I have to say, is terribly overrated. It was good but I honestly expected someone to come and put the greatest meaty delight ever in my mouth *cough* but it was only really comparable to the awesome salt beef bagels from Brick Lane. Again, the poutine was nothing to write home on your blog about but they do know how to make a good breakfast.
All in all the trip was great, spending time with Robyn was as much fun as ever, her housemates were fun, Montreal was above all expectations, I spent an absolute fortune replenishing my tiny wardrobe, ate massive amounts (you may have noticed the several food comments so far in this entry) and generally relaxed. Another 3 weeks of sheer awesome that I'd never of experienced had I not come out here, a move which is continually being looked upon as the greatest idea ever conceived, after giraffes.
A rather familiar tale occured on the way home. Apparently it's impossible to get public transport from an international airport, to a world-renowned ski resort after 8pm. That is, they decided not to run any buses to Whistler after 8pm because of road closures for the aforementioned upgrades (despite the fact that the closures happen betwen 2am and 5am). It is literally the most ridiculous thing ever encountered, after giraffes. Anyway, another dozy night on my favorite homeless, should that be travel-less, sofa in Vancouver was all I needed to put me in a great mood for work the next day. Actually I didn't go to work so it didn't make much difference but still...
Additionally, my Mac came which excited Robyn no end, well, as soon as she realised how awesome it was at least. I'm still in the process of getting everything set up so I can stop using my PC but I must say I absolutely love it. The ability to run Windows helps, there's not limits on the software availability like I thought there would be and it's just so intuitive.
My snowboard is also in my presence. I shall take a few photos and upload them shortly. It's as pretty as a pony even though my bindings don't quite match the colour as well as I'd hoped. Still, I'm going to use the old rock board for a few more weeks while the base builds up.
The house is getting a little more set up. Ron acquired some furniture while I was away and set up a Christmas tree and lights which makes the place seem a lot more homely, I'm slowly getting used to living here which is odd since I've paid 2 rent cheques already! We still need to sort out a bit of stuff but we'll get fully settled sometime in the new year.
Whistler opened last Saturday to a absolutely collosal snowfall, a huge storm hit from Alaska dumping 10 feet on us over the course of 2 weeks, making the snowiest November on record, it's apparently awesome conditions, not that I'd know because I still haven't picked up (note: paid for) my pass. Hopefully I will resolve this minor concern this week and go up at the weekend. Blackcomb opens tomorrow but I'm simply too far behind with work to take any time off at the moment. I'll grab some photos of the lovely piles of snow outside the house sometime too.
It's still snowing...