AUGUST ADVENTURES

The month of AUGUST started with us stocking up the RV for a 12 day round trip to the coastal city of Vancouver, which is one of the larger cities in the province of British Columbia. Along the way we stopped at Penticton until we reached Vancouver for a 5 day stopover. In Vancouver we did a bit of sightseeing and on the last day Mr Cooke competed in a triathlon event which was part of the World Police and Fire Fighters Games. These games are held every 4 years in different parts of the world. This year it was in Vancouver. These games are like the Olympic games where athletes and teams (who work in the police or fire departments) from different countries compete against each other. Some other sports that were played at these games included ice hockey, swimming, track and field events and boxing. After this trip we headed back home becasue Mr Cooke had to finally start work (14th of August). On Mr Cookes next 6 days off we stocked up the RV again and headed across to one of the major towns in the Rockies, Jasper, which is only 3 hours from home. On the 4th last day in August we again stocked up the RV this time for a 4 week holiday which saw us head back to Penticton, before heading way up into the north western parts of Canada and into Alaska.



Here we are at the fantastic spray park at Skaha Lake, Penticton. We could have spent hours here as it's a HUGE area with different "fountains" and other fun water sprayers and squirters. It reminded us a little bit of the water park in Caloundra but a lot bigger and with a lot more wet activities.

There are lots of float planes in Vancouver Harbour, which is more like an airport for these float planes. In this picture you can see one in the air, getting ready for a landing and the other one on the water was getting ready to take off. Float planes are used a lot around here to go to places where roads cannot go due to very mountainous areas or lots of snow in winter. They are used to get locals, as well as tourists, in and out of these remote places.

North Vancouver is in the background.

This is the Skyride we took to get to the top of Grouse Mountain in North Vancouver. It was about a 15 minute ride to the top. On the Skyride you get great views of North Vancouver as well as the city of Vancouver which is on the southern side of the harbour.

A Zip line tour is one of the tourist activities you can do on top the the mountain. You sit in a harness and move around the mountains and the canyons from platform to platform. You can go as fast as 80kms in some sections. We didn't have enough time that day to do it, although it looked like a lot of fun.

The 30 minute Lumberjack Show on the top of the mountain is another tourist activity where two lumberjacks saw, climb and hack their way to see who is the best lumberjack. Lumberjacks were men who cut down trees in forested areas with axes and hand saws before the invention of chainsaws and other modern logging equipment. Watching these guys in action reminded us of the wood chopping demonstrations at the Nambour Show.

The 120 year old Capilano Suspension Bridge is also in the North Vancouver area. It is a 137m long "wobbly" bridge suspended about 70m above the Capilano River. For more information and to view an interesting and informative video click on the following YouTube video:
http://www.vancouversnorthshore.com/whattodo/capilano-suspension-bridge.htm

The Treetops Walk is set on one side of the Capilano Suspension Bridge in amongst a rainforest. The walk goes through the Douglas Fir trees where you are 30m above the ground. There are 7 suspension bridges and lots of observation platforms. You feel a little bit like Tarzan up there.

Our first (and hopefully not our last) ice hockey game. Ice hockey is very popular in Canada - even more popular than our League games. Ice hockey is not usually played in August (which is the Canadian summer) but it was part of the World Police and Fire Fighters Games.

A Zamboni machine is used regularly to add a coat of water over the ice. The water goes into the cracks, chips and dents left from ice skates to smooth it out and make it flat and safe for skating. The Zamboni is used at all ice skating rinks not just for ice hockey games but also for general skating. I heard that the roller skating rink at Caloundra is being converted to an ice skating rink for the summer months. I wonder if they will have a Zamboni machine there?

From the top of Whistler Mountain looking down onto Whistler Village. The stone "statue" you can see is the symbol of the 2010 Winter Olympic Games which are being held in Vancouver and Whistler in February next year. Whistler is about 1 hour from Vancouver. The stone statue is called an Inukshuk. An Inukshuk is a man-made stone landmark that was used by the Inuit peoples who lived north of the Arctic Circle where, being in such harsh weather conditions and in the area known as the tundra region, there are very few natural landmarks.

A gondola used to transport people between Whistler Mountain and Backcomb Mountain for hiking and sightseeing trips in the summer and skiing in the winter. This one has a glass bottom.

A sign about Mt Terry Fox and the Terry Fox Trail which were named after a 19 year old Canadian cancer patient who raised funds for cancer research by running across Canada. Unfortunately he didn't make it all theway across, but the Terry Fox fun runs across the world are held in his honour and still raise funds for cancer research.

A cloudy view of Mount Robson, the highest mountain in the Canadian Rockies at 3,950m.

The beautiful sunflowers on our block. We call this large sunflower patch "Sunflower Valley" - I'm sure Bob the Builder would be happy.

We have adopted the Wierstras (they are the family we exchanged with) grandfather and we call him Grandpa Edgar. This photo shows Aiden and Grandpa Edgar tending to the veggie patch (picking potatoes - they grow under the gound) on our block that Grandpa Edgar had planted. We also picked green beans, white beans, pasnip and snow peas. All very healthy and yummy. We never once had to water the veggie garden here because it's not very hot (not even in summer) and they get the water they need from the rain (which doesn't happen all that often). The summers (which are during the months of June, July and August) here in Edmonton are usually around 25 degree C and fairly dry, not like in Australia where it can get very hot and very sticky and gardens need to be watered all the time.

Here is a parade of some very interesting old and fancy cars that we went to. It was held in Spruce Grove which is one of the towns near our house.

This is one of the many great playgrounds that we've discovered in Canada.This one is a new one that has opened up in Spruce Grove. It is huge, has rubber matting all over the ground and it has some interesting play equipment that we haven't seen in playgrounds in Australia before. There are lots of climbing walls - rock climbing is a very popular summer activity with adults here in Canada.

Look at this great shopping trolley we found in Home Depot. Home Depot is a huge hardware store just like our Bunnings. There are similar shopping trolleys in other stores like Safeway grocery store (which is like our Coles or Woolies). I haven't seen shopping trolleys like this in Australia before, have any of you?

Pyramid Lake with Pyramid mountain in the background, near Jasper in the Rocky Mountains. Like I said before, there are lots of large lakes in Canada and in the summer a lot of people like to go kayaking or canoeing.

A beautiful elk (like a reindeer, but bigger) casually having afternoon tea by the side of the road near Pyramid Lake. It didn't worry about all the tourists parked on the side of the road taking pictures of it.

This is what a bear trap looks like. If bears become too dangerous they are trapped and taken away. This one was parked at the entrance of the camp ground we stayed at near the town of Jasper.

A trip into Edmonton saw us pay a visit to Mr Cookes ("Fireman Sam") workplace. This is Fire Hall number 19. They call them "halls" not "stations" like we do in Australia. Edmonton is a large city, like Brisbane, and has about 25 Fire Halls. Mr Cooke gets moved around to all the different Fire Halls in Edmonton. The Canadian fire trucks are a lot biggger than the Australian ones.

One of our favourite things to do on the block is have a ride on the ride on mower but, like I said before, because it dosen't rain much here that means the grass dosen't grow quickly so therefore we don't have to mow the grass very often.

Here we are, at the end of the month, back at Penticton at the Lake Skaha Beach Spray Park having lots of fun again. I told you before it was HUGE. This spray jet is of the monster that is supposed to be living in the Lake. Luckily we didn't spot him.

This is the Lake Skaha Beach. Look at the cool water slide that goes straight into the water. There are about 3 of these along the 2 km shoreline. They call it a "beach", but there are no waves, because it's a lake. You can still build awesome sand castles and make huge holes in the sand just like you can at any beach.

The reason we travelled to Penticton this second time was that Mr Cooke was competing in the Canadian Ironman Triathlon. That takes ALL day so we kept ourselves occupied by visiting the Loco Landing theme park. It's like Aussie World but a lot, lot smaller. Here we are on the bumper boats which were great fun because they also had a water squirter at the front so you could squirt the people in the other bumper boats.

Also at Loco Landing - like the one at Mooloolaba Beach.

The reason we travelled 12 hours to Penticton was so Mr Cooke could compete in the Ironman Triathlon. Aiden giving Mr Cooke a High 5 for energy. This picture was taken at the other end of town at Lake Okanagan.

The day after the Triathlon we took Mr Cooke to Loco Landing to unwind and relax. We again went on those fantastic bumper boats as well as the go-carts. This go-cart track wasn't as long as the one we have at Landsborough, but it was still lots of fun.

The town of Penticton has two lakes on either side of it and the lakes are connected by the Okanagan River Chanel. The 3 hour float down the chanel is a popular thing to do in Penticton. Here we are getting ready to start the float but, because it was getting late that day, we only went half way still fun and we saw lots of ducks.