The Hill Family Saga....: August 2007

Monday, August 20, 2007

Sunday, August 19, 2007

Hello everyone, we are back from our week long vacation to Christina Lake, BC.

We left last Friday right after Adam got home from work, made a stop off to see his sister Kristi (spent the night) and then early Saturday morning drove the rest of the way to Christina Lake. We were camping with the Craigs and the Mercers; all staying at Camp Beverly Hills where Tara knew the new owners.

We had a great time and enjoyed the campground; it was much smaller than we were used to 5 cabins and approx 10 RV sites, but it was nice to be able to get to know a few of our neighbours.

Christina Lake is a very small town right on the lake (they claim it is the warmest tree-lined lake in Canada) – whatever that means – if you ask me anything not glacier fed is warm and when you have temperatures reaching to well over 30 – any lake feel great. (Thankfully we missed the few weeks in July where it was +40!)

We also got a chance to do some day trips. Last summer holidays we were in the Salmon Arm area (lots of wineries) but we were not allowed to go to any since I was not allowed to drink (pregnant); seeing the wine but not being allowed to taste – torture!!
So this year we drove to Osoyoos and visited 2 different wineries.

Jackie – she did great. Since we did not know how well she or we would handle a 7 ½ - 8 hour drive – we decided to break the trip up both ways (this also gave us an opportunity to visit Kristi, Adam’s sister); but she handled the trip quite well, lots of sleeping, but when she is not tired she told us stories and played with her toys.

After we got back from our first trip to Osoyoos (on Monday) I noticed she had cut her second tooth – wow, I had no idea we were that close. We also had the first roll over – she woke up from her fist nap one morning and when I went to get her she was on her tummy – so she rolled over from her back to tummy – so far no signs of it happening again or going from front to back.

Enjoy the photos.

Driving

Brutis got a special treat - a bit of time our of his kennel.

Jackie and Aunt Kristi

Near Fernie

A road side turn out feeding

Brutis driving... actually this was while we were stopped at the road side turn out - he was checking out the train going by and making sure it knew he was there and he was the boss.

Hanging out in the trailer

Playing cards - we had great weather - this was at approx 11pm - notice the shorts and t-shirts.

Adam and Starr

Wineries

Adam and I took 2 days trips to Osoyoos, first time there we visited Inniskillin, second time we visited In’Mip (pronounced Ink-a-Meep). Inniskillin – we thought we would try one of the big wineries (when we had done some wine tours in Niagara we visited Jackson Triggs and loved it. We thought Inniskillin would be similar – we were mistaken. Since the Niagara region produces 200 000 cases and the BC region only produces 40 000 cases a year – the size of their operation reflected that. But we still had a great time and got to sample and purchase some great wine.

Ik’Mip is a Native Indian winery and we got what we were looking for, their facility had been designed to accommodate for tours, they had a wonderful restaurant and a fantastic tasting and retail room. Again – more great wine tasting and purchasing took place.

Inniskillin

We arrived a little late for the tour we wanted to take, but one of theri staff members gave us a one on one tour. It was fantastic.

Nk`Mip

We arrived and took advantage of their restaurant patio - check out the amazing view.

Then we took their wine tour - it was a great one - they took us through, explained about the winery and wine making process.

Mmmm - tasting!

The Barrel Room

The Bear

So I understand that bears live in the mountains, and yes I know that we were camping in the mountains, but I am from Calgary where when we go into Kananaskis, Canmore and Banff, they have signs about bears everywhere. They also have bear proof garbage bins EVERYWHERE. I guess since there were NO signs (and I mean none – I looked for them afterward) and there were no bear proof garbages – I did not even think about bears.

I think this might have been Adam’s line of thinking as well….

Sunday evening (night 2) I go to bed at 12:00 am – Adam follows at 12:40 – ten minutes later 12:50 – he hears someone making a lot of noise in the pop cans that are in the back of the campground truck right by our trailer. Adam is a very light sleeper so he gets upset and decided to go and tell this very inconsiderate person to stop making so much noise rustling around in the pop cans and garbage.

Adam gets out of bed –

Adam - “I am going to kick the S**T out of that guy.”

Jenny – “Be nice.”

Adam throws a shirt on (only underwear no pants) and goes outside. Less than 45 seconds later he comes back into the trailer….

Adam – “Okay, I am not going to kick the S**T out of that guy, because that guys is a BIG F**KING BEAR.”

Jenny – Laughing – I could not help myself – it was pretty funny.

So what happened was a bear came into the campground because he smelt the garbage in the truck, I am guessing the noise Adam made startled him and he decided to abandon his snack – Adam figures he was about 25 feet from the bear – but it was off the truck and starting to walk away towards the trees.

Well – the bear did not come back that night but it did for the next two nights Sheldon (campground owner) started collecting all the garbage in the evening and taking it to the dump each day. Night 2 of the bear – back at the truck looking for more garbage, night 3 – tenters at the campground were cooking smokies over their campfire at approx 8:30 and they spotted the bear about 10-15 feet away watching them – thankfully they had an air horn handy and were able to scare him away. After that we did not see the bear again – but we also never cooked smokies after dark….

Adam said it was a big bear - this was confirmed by others at different sightings - I still say any bear looks big when you are in your underware!

For those of you that are curious - it was a black bear.

This is a picture of the truck and our trailer - yup - that close. The bed at the back is Jackie's

The Beach

We took Jackie down to the beach a few times – it took a little bit to get her used to the water, but once that happened she enjoyed it thoroughly. Thankfully I had purchased a floatie toy before leaving home – it made her lake experience so much better.

This is the "I'm not sure if I like the water" photo

"Okay - I like it"

Family Photos

She loved being in the Turtle – I bought this one specifically because it provided some shade for her once in the water – this allowed for her to be out for as long as we wanted to be out.