Anyway ...winter has finally left Alberta for the most part and we got to enjoy spring in Peace River. Everything is green: the hills, the trees, the grass. It looked amazing out here ... until the caterpillars came out and ate all the trees.
As I have learned, the evil tent caterpillar infests and eats all the trees in the area, so all the beautiful green trees become brown and bare. I want to spare you the visual horror, so just trust me in knowing that the beautiful green hills seen below are no longer beautiful and green.
This past month I also had the opportunity to go to Jasper for the first time as part of the Crown Retreat. I have never been to Jasper before, in recent memory, and I drove down to see the beautiful wildlife and take in some hiking. I recently started training for a Triathlon in September so Jasper was the perfect playground to run on some trails, bike on some roads and burn off the 5 beers and one steak I had planned to consume every night. Sadly, most nights, it was just the one beer, and no steak.
Some of my favourite moments include hiking down Maligne Canyon, and hiking up Whistler's Mountain, not to be confused with Whistler Mountain in BC. Whistler's Mountain is a 7km hike with an altitude change of around 1000m with a trail taking you from the base to the top and a tram to take you down (and up I suppose). The trail was good for the first half, but I didn't manage to quite escape winter yet, which was evident when the hiking trail I followed for half the ascent disappeared under metres of snow and I was forced to bushwhack and scale a ridge for 2 hours. Also fun fact: Stop hiking alone! It doesn't help you if you get hurt or lost and you tend to go crazy talking to yourself on a deserted mountain trail.
The view up top was spectacular.
Another thing about Jasper is the abundance of wildlife. I saw some caribou, elk and deer.
The elk here are extremely aggressive and they reminded me of the time when I came here, about 20 years ago with my parents. I was sleeping in the car when I woke up, saw an elk, promptly walked up to it, and pet it. I was then knocked unconscious as it kicked me in the back of my head. I guess that explains my animosity towards the elk, and their animosity towards me. They ... remember.
After leaving Jasper I travelled down to Calgary for the Victoria Day Weekend. I passed through the Icefields Parkway stopping at Athabasca Falls and just before the Icefields before making it down to visit my girlfriend, Joyce.
Meanwhile, in Peace River, apparently a rainstorm had struck the town and washed out the highway on Judah Hill, one of the smaller highways to get out of town. That poor highway, I wonder if they'll ever fix it? What's really unfortunate is that the residents who live on the hill have their morning drive extended by 40 minutes, which is incredibly inconvenient.
By the end of the week, I travelled to Vancouver to attend a friend's wedding. It was Joyce's first time there, and as well as eating the requisite sushi that the town had to offer, we biked the Seawall, which is a paved trail along Stanley Park, and hiked the Grouse Grind, which is a 2.9km 800m hike on Grouse Mountain.
The weather cooperated as best it could, and my friends Jeff and Christine got married.
I returned to Peace River tonight to observe that the caterpillars had indeed taken over, and all was lost with the world.
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