CHAINING UP !

24th November
These past couple of weeks we had been back and forth through the Rockies delivering and reloading in Vancouver.  Everytime we came through the Rockies they looked different either due to the weather or time of day.  We had forgotten how beautiful Lake Shuswap was, driving alongside and down through Salmon Arm had the best views ever from dawn to dusk.  I knew this route so well i did'nt even pick up the map, every village, town, rest area and truck stop, dave still followed his sat nav though!   The Coquihalla mountain was set in a range, i'd mentioned it before, it was pretty special.  The Coquihalla highway ran from Kamloops to Hope. We'd watched a canadian tv program about a Mr Davis who patrolled the Coquihalla highway with his team of men with breakdown trucks.  He was so specialized he could lift a full size rig out of a ditch upright and intact. The programme was along the same lines as Ice Road Truckers, it was fascinating to watch but unfortunately we hav'nt been able to get the dvd.  Last saturday we set of back across for delivery in Calgary.  We left Hope at 5.30am.  We had had heavy snow in the night and upon reaching the Coquihalla highway we were waved into the chain up area with other trucks.  It was dark and cold.  Dave had never chained up before even when he was here in winter last time.  It was warm clothes on and torch in hand we joined the others trying to make sense of these massive heavy chains. It was'nt as bad as we'd thought, we managed to get the chains on and locked into position. The chains went on 2 wheels, the drive axels and were locked with a key.  We drove on at 30ml/hr.  Over the summit the road cleared so we were able to stop and take them off, of course this was so much easier. There was snow, ice and fog and it was quite scary going through the avalanche areas, we had all that to come!  One trip took us back towards Jasper, to Edmonton, the roads through the Rockies here were like an ice rink, not much had been gritted and dave concentrated on keeping the truck on the road. Of course the scenery was amazing, snow laden fir trees, frozen lakes and waterfalls, with mountains tops shimmering in the sunshine, it more than made up for the slow journey.  Nearly at Jasper i took some photos off Mount Fitzwilliam looming up infront of us. Upon reaching Edmonton the snow and fog was even thicker.  We waited until the next day to get a load back to Calgary and the snow never let up.  We were going away again this weekend to Canmore, staying in the Rocky Mountain Inn, dave now had a pair of snow boots too!      

SKI LODGE, CANMORE AND BANFF

CANMORE AND BANFF

Saturday 2nd November
We dropped truck in yard early and picked up car.  We could'nt believe the weather, we'd had heavy snow overnite and it was still snowing.  We were off to The Rockies for the weekend and were worried due to the conditions if it was safe to drive there.  Dave started cautiously, there was'nt much traffic around and the roads were very icy. The car had four wheel drive and some of the roads had been gritted.  We made our way to Kananaskis Country, into the village, not much there so we went onto the ski lodge, obviously up hill! this was were the action was, people milling around with skis and snowboards, it was the first weekend the lodge was open, lucky! and they had the snow!  we sorted out some packages for the kids and had a mooch around, there was a cafereria, shop and lockers if needed.  We stayed in the carpark for a while and let maddy play in the snow.  We went on into Canmore, about 15 minutes further on.  It was a picture! very quaint, lots of different shops, with the snow it looked like Austria, wooden buildings and fir trees outside.  Two big supermarkets aswell, Safeways and Sobeys of which Jamie Oliver has been advertising just like Sainsburys at home.  So this would be our nearest town when we were staying at Deer Lodge, Bragg Creek.  We did'nt get to walk round Canmore as it was still snowing quite hard, we did pop into one shop "Snowy Owl Dog Tours"  we took maddy in with us, it was full of dog clothes and equipment for Husky dog sledging.  We bought maddy a new warm coat, red and white fleece with reindeers on, very festive!  We found out prices etc for our trip with the Huskies.  We then went looking for our hotel, not far from town we found the Canmore Rocky Mountain Inn, it was everything we needed, ground floor so we could just let maddy out and a large wood fire, very cozy.  Maddy had great fun in the snow, by the morning it was at least 10inches deep and came upto the top of my snow boots. After breakfast we set of for Banff.  It had stopped snowing so after driving through the town we parked up to explore.  We were near a large park with a river and band stand, also two museums.  The town had a long main street with so many interesting shops and places to eat.  We were so looking forward to bringing the kids here. I took some photos trying to capture the essence of the place.  All in all it had been a good couple of days.          

KANSAS CITY

Wednesday 23rd October
 We picked up trailer for Calgary at 4pm, it meant working until about 10, but hopefully we would get a job back down south.  Even though it was sunny it was so cold. We left Saskatoonon on H7, we had a couple of hours of light left.

Monday 28th
The last few days we'd had another trip to Columbus, Nebraska.  Now it was Kansas City, a place called Marshall.  We travelled down past Omaha on I29.

Tuesday 29th
We passed through Kansas City but could'nt see much due to heavy rain.  They seemed to like their fireworks down here, everywhere along the interstate were warehouses and supermarkets selling them with hugh adverts on the billboards.  It was only two days to haloween and it was constantly on the radio, it was such a big thing here, loads of stuff in the shops and everyone talking about their costumes, mainly the adults!Walmart had huge pumpkins for sale outside, you could only fit one in a trolley! The trailer was loaded in the afternoon with pork, we made our way back up on I29.

Wednesday 30th
Two days of rain, on our right near St Joseph we could see an electric storm, it was still dark and the lightening lit up the sky every second.  We did'nt see much of Kansas City again, thick fog all the way up I29 to Fargo.  Snow on the ground just past Watertown.  Amongst the traffic a huge deer jumped over the central reservation and ran infront of our truck, then just started grazing! We fueled up at Fargo and then headed into North Dakota on I94 as far as Jamestown.

Thursday 31st
At last the sun, we had'nt seen it for a while, the last two days had been a blur of rain, fog and headlights.  The last stretch up through North Dakota on H281 towards the border at Portal, Saskaatchewan. Hundreds of geese were sat resting in the fields.  Some of the lakes had started to freeze.  At Carrington we turned onto H52 towards Minot where we would refuel. The delivery was in Calgary early tomorrow morning.  We were then going to the Rockies for a couple of days, staying in Canmore and visiting Banff. We were going to suss out the activities for the kids in january ie Skiing, dog sledging and snowmobiles.