A photo says it all..

Holy Crap!

2009-02-18T15:07:00.000-08:00

I can't believe how bad I am at updating! I am going to get back into the groove of this again, as I really enjoy making this blog. I have many pictures to post and will get to it asap!

My apologizes.

I really am still here...

2008-10-22T12:47:00.000-07:00

Now that I have a new computer, that will not blue screen of death everytime I plug my camera into the USB port, I will get back on my game.

I guarantee photos this week will be posted and that they will continue!!

Slacker...

2008-09-05T09:29:00.001-07:00

Wow I can not believe what a slacker I am at updating this blog... its not like I haven't taken a million photos lately, some that are even post worthy. Perhaps I will get back on the bandwagon and get posting. I promise more of my perspective to come.

Summer at Mt. Baker

2008-07-04T12:38:00.000-07:00

Richard and I headed up to Mt. Baker Ski area on Canada Day to check out the views and play in the snow. We saw a lovely small forest fire on the way just outside of Maple Falls and the smoke did not make photographing the mountains as fun!

Mt. Shuksan - One of the most photographed mountains in the world! I actually seen pictures of this mountain hanging on the walls all over the world!

Mt. Baker ski area does hold the world record for the most snowfall in one season at 1,140 inches (95 feet or almost 20 meters). This is what some of the snowbanks look like in July. Keep in mind Richard is 6'7. Imagine what these snowbanks look like in the middle of winter... It's usually like driving in a tunnel.

More of Mt. Shuksan, you can see the toe of the glacier.

One more jellyfish...

2008-06-05T15:01:00.001-07:00

Tourist In Your Own City Part II

2008-06-02T14:54:00.001-07:00

Richard and I spent Saturday afternoon doing another tour of a few of Vancouver's famous attractions. We went to the Vancouver Aquarium and then finally took a tram ride up to Grouse Mountain. While we have both been up Grouse Mountain alot for snowboarding and skiing during the winter we both had not been up there during the summer, so it was interesting. We watched a log show and checked out the grizzly bears. There is still alot of snow up there, this winter was a crazy one.

Here are some jellyfish we saw, they really seem like amazing creatures.

The Vancouver Aquariums famous paw holding sea otters. They were not holding paws at the time, as this little guy was just too busy sleeping. They are so cute though!

The giant harbour seal is having a good snooze also, if you look closely you can see that his tounge is sticking out a bit, I never noticed until I looked at the picture :)

The only picture I really liked from up on Grouse, although we took alot of the view and whatnot, it was a hazy day and the photos just did not do the view justice. This log show was actually pretty good, had a few laughs from it.

Aloha Yeti!

2008-05-29T18:15:00.000-07:00

I recently snapped some shots of the Yeti wearing some of Hawaiian leis that we were given in Maui. At first he didn't seem to notice he had them on. I think he looks cute.

He does not look as impressed in this shot but his eyes look nice!

Garside's Fruit Farm through the seasons..

2008-05-28T12:39:00.000-07:00

I have collected alot of shots of the farm over the last few years, I thought I may as well share some of them. To give you a bit of background, this is my husbands family farm, it is an Organic fruit orchard located in the Lower Mainland of BC. We grow a variety of apples, pears, plums, hazelnuts and other fruits and vegetables. The apples we grow are considered "heritage varities" and are generally not the type you find in the grocery store. Here is a quick list of the apples we grow: Gravenstein, Crab, Discovery, Prima, Jonagold, Spartan, Gloucester, Bramley, King, Boskoop, and Northern Spy. We also grow two varities of Pears: Bartlett and Anjou, as well as Prune Plums and Hazelnuts. During the summer the fruit is sold off the farm and at a farmers market. In the last few years alot of the farms responsibilities have fallen to Richard and I, which at times has been a bit tough as we were not really given the choice.

Anyway as promised here are the shots through the seasons...

With Spring come the buds on the trees, this season the winter seemed to hang on for so long that the trees are about 5 weeks behind schedule.

Looking down a row of Spartan and King apple trees.

The buttercups are out everywhere.

A shot of the inside of a tulip.

Summer: My MIL picking apples off the tree.

Fall: The leaves have fallen and the weather is looking ominious, looks like winter is on its way...

Fall: The hazelnut grove.

Winter has arrived and the Hazelnut grove has a wonderful dusting of snow throughout.

Tourist in your own city

2008-05-27T12:54:00.000-07:00

Wow it has been so long since I last posted :( I can not believe how tardy I have been, I have lots of photos from the last month, I just need to get my butt in gear to edit them and post them.

Anyway on the May long weekend, we did a few touristy type things in Vancouver, it was alot of fun. We rented a tandem bicycle and rode around the Seawall at Stanley Park, which actually was quite terrifying, as I had no control over where we were going and how fast, all I did was peddle, the other problem was that Richard is so much taller than I, I could see where we were going!! My cousin once said that those tandem bikes are "Divorce on Wheels" I can understand why he says that now! We did not end up crashing or anything but it was still scary and a bit painful when Richard would change gears and the peddles would go flying out from my feet and smash into my shins. We also went up the Harbour Center tour at sunset and looked over the views of Vancouver, it was really beautiful. On our drive back we saw the Chinese Night Market in China Town, so we perused the peoples wares. There was some very tasty food vendors there, I totally recommend it.

View of Canada Place and the North Shore Mountains from the Harbour Center tower.

View of the city scape of Vancouver also from the Harbour Center Tower.

The Chinese Night Market is a very busy place, even late at night!

Colour for me

2008-04-30T14:24:00.000-07:00

I had a little fun taking pictures while doing some makeup the other day!

What you might find underwater???

2008-04-25T15:29:00.000-07:00

My only wish is that these throw away underwater cameras would take better pictures With that being said I guess I should not expect to much from a camera that costs $9.99 or so... After rooting through the 2 camera worth of pictures these were the ones that I felt were the cream of the crop! Keep in mind you are not always sure what you are taking a picture of with these cameras too, I was so sure I snapped a shot of the eel that I saw, well nope I think I snapped a picture of pretty much nothing on that attempt haha.

A few fishies and some coral.

I just really like the bubbles all around Richard in this shot.

Some more coral.

Turtle Town, for some reason this turtle looks grumpy to me, perhaps it was all the grubby children trying to touch him. :)

This shot looks like it is just of the water near the surface, but if you look closely at the bottom of the photo you will see the needle fish! These sneaky fishies were following us around, you could see them under the water, I would pop my head out of the water and wouldn't be able to see them from above, but they were there!

Angel fish

Richard being a goof!

Maui!

2008-04-23T15:00:00.001-07:00

I should sell this shot to West Jet.

Plumeria's.

Richard stealing a coconut off a tree.

Some Wedding shots - this was my cousin's wedding.

A couple of shots of my rings on my lei.

I love Richard in his aviators....

Richard took some shots of me at some of the wedding photo stops.

Haleakala volcano for sunset.

The North Island.

Hanging out at the Beach.

The Road to Hana.

The Fishbowl - a great secret snorkel spot.

La Perouse Bay.

A walk in the park

2008-04-13T19:09:00.000-07:00

Richard and I headed for the park on the first nice day of spring. I snapped a few shots along the way...

Makeup ..

2008-04-08T21:07:00.001-07:00

Yeti's Glamour shots

2008-03-31T20:43:00.001-07:00

Downhill Dummy Race

2008-03-18T12:38:00.000-07:00

The Super Sled 9000 was used again this time for the downhill dummy race at Manning. Our dummy was named HELL-ga! She was very fast and had some great style flying down the course heading for the jump.

Here is a group shot minu Richard..

Here is an attempt at a full group shot... unfortunately Richard couldn't quite get in the picture properly before the timer snapped the shot haha.

A shot of HELL-ga on the Super Sled 9000.

The jump...

HELL-ga as she is launching off the jump!

HELL-ga in mid launch, looking like she is going in for a grab.

HELL-ga making a picture perfect landing and still sledding away.

All the dummies were launched at the same time and HELL-ga blew by them, you can really tell how much faster she went as she had already landed and was flying away when the other dummies were finally going off the jump!

A close up of HELL-ga after the race and getting her first place ribbon.. her head and neck were a little damaged, but all was well after some duct tape.

Finally a good group shot!

Fun In Manning

2008-03-06T14:13:00.000-08:00

We spent last weekend with my brother and sister in law in Manning Park at my families cabin again. We brought out the newly refurbished Super Sled 9000. The Super Sled 9000 worked well until Richard took it down a very steep slope with a jump in it, he broke several peices on it. Then Marc took it down the same slope and broke some more parts on it, Richard is fixing it up again this week!

Jasper learning how to rock climb.

Jasper and I

The Super Sled 9000 back in action - Gayle giving Ricard a good push before the hill.

Marc giving Richard a push, Richard thought it was a fun idea to sled down the hill backwards!

Fun with Cats

2008-02-28T14:15:00.000-08:00

Well I know I keep using the cats as my models, but the cats are so cute how can I resist.

Yeti was so sleepy, I don't think he even noticed the hat on him!

Rossignol enjoyed wearing the party hat from my Dad's 50th Birthday party.

Furry Friends

2008-02-26T12:55:00.001-08:00

My Brother and Sister in-laws doggie, Jasper. He was being so cute, posing for pictures for me with his new duck toy.

Our furry cat Yeti, enjoying being outside with the plants on a rare sunny day here on the Wet Coast.

Strange Happenings

2008-02-15T15:35:00.000-08:00

The other day Richard and I were sitting watching TV and we could smell a very fragrant flowery smell and we couldn't figure out where it was coming from. Eventually we figured out that our Corn Cane plant had flowered. I had no idea that these plants flowered at all, nor did it tell me on the tag. I have had this plant for over three years and it has flourished, but I certainly did not figure on flowers. During the day I hardly notice the smell, as soon as it is dark the flowers are so fragrant we have to open a window as it is so strong!

Here is a shot of our plant.

The stalk of flowers on the plant.

Super Sled 9000

2008-02-13T13:11:00.000-08:00

This weekend we spent in Manning Park at my family cabin doing some sledding and snowboarding with my sister and brother in law. Richard and my brother in law created the Super Sled 9000 out of an old snowboard and a rocking chair. The sled worked really well, we towed it behind the vehicle and it would ride up the snowbanks, we likely had it up to about 50 to 60 km/hr. We did try taking it down the sledding hill at the ski hill but we got kicked out by security!

It's amazing what you can make with some garbage.

My family cabin from the road.

Richard and my brother in law planning their crazy carpeting route.

Jasper - brother and sister in laws pup.

My sister in law crazy carpeting.

Richard on the super sled 9000

A Grey Jay on the deck at the cabin.

What a Beauty Queen... I mean King...

2008-02-08T16:12:00.000-08:00

I was trying to take a shot of some of my tiara's for a friend who may borrow one for her wedding and Yeti would not stop harassing me..... So I plunked the tiara on his head and he just sat there wearing it. :)

Here is another shot in a different tiara...

Big Island of Hawaii

2008-01-28T14:52:00.000-08:00

Well we are back from our trip to the Big Island of Hawaii. Here are some shots I took.

Our interisland flight from Maui to the Big Island we flew through some rough weather and here is a shot of some towering Cumulonimbus clouds.

Punalu'u Black Sand Beach, hanging out with lots of turtles. We saw probably twenty or so turtles here.

Some nice palm trees at the Black sand beach.

A buddhist temple we found, the grounds were beautiful.

Volcanos National Park. Here I am toasting my butt on a steam vent. It was really hot here.

Kilauea Crater steaming. The closer to the crater you got, the worse the sulfuric fumes were. They were particulary bad at the time we were visiting, the USGS website states the fumes were three times as stong as normal. If you were out in it for too long it felt like your lungs and throat were bleeding, but it looked really cool :)

A Nene - State bird of Hawaii.

Some ropey lava.

Petroglyphs in Volcano's National Park.

Turtles swimming in the water.

The saddle road heading towards Mauna Kea. It is very narrow and bumpy but super fun to drive.

Cute shadow of Richard and I.

Acclimatizing on Mauna Kea at about 9,250 ft before we head up to the top.

Snowball fight on Mauna Kea.

One of the observatories at the summit of Mauna Kea.

The summit of Mauna Kea, 13,786 feet. The air is definately thinner up there!

Near sunset the observatories began to open.

A nice shot of the moon and an observatory near sunset.

Sunset shot at the summit.

A beautiful Hibiscus flower.

A shot of Richard and I together (gotta love self timers) at Puuhonua O Honaunau (City of Refuge).

A yummy fruity drink.

A shot of my shadow at Hapuna Beach.

A group shot at the bar that invented Mai Tai's.

Pololu Valley Lookout

Here we are at the bottom of Pololu Valley on the Black Sand Beach. I am watching Richard posing for the photo and laughing to myself as I see a wave coming that is going to soak his bum. hehe

Hahahahahaha, he came in from the water and was soaked.

Looking up the valley.

Oops did we take the rental car offroad????

Richard on a skinning stone. Where ancient Hawaiians would skin people alive for sacrifices.

Yep it seems as though we got our rental cars a little dirty.

A nice rainbow on the horizon.

La'aloa Bay Beach Park, one of the nicest beaches we found in the Kona area. Richard was out swimming and a turtle was swimming around his feet.

A nice palm tree.

Richard enjoying a drink in a Pineapple that we made at our condo.

Sunset on the sad plane ride home.

2008-01-14T12:50:00.000-08:00

Richard and I took a little drive out to Chilliwack Lake to do some checking on some cave gates and to take some pictures and play in the snow. We went to go get a few pictures of this really nice suspension bridge that is on a trail, however we had forgotten that the bridge was wiped out last year in some flooding :( However we still had fun!

Chilliwack River

Jumping off the remnants of the suspension bridge.

A snowman someone had built and we stuck Richard's hat on.

Watching the sunset as we drove home. Shot taken from the car while driving on the freeway.

A week to go till Paradise

2008-01-09T15:28:00.000-08:00

Well in a week Richard and I will be off to the Big Island of Hawaii. It will be my second time to the Big Island and Richard's third time. We have planned this as an anniversary trip and also a fun trip with some friends of ours.

Here are a couple of shots from our Honeymoon last year from the Big Island.

Mt Baker

2007-12-31T13:07:00.000-08:00

We headed up to Mt. Baker this past sunday for some fun in the snow. It was pretty busy and the visibility was poor so we opted to do some avalanche testing and beacon training instead of boarding. Here is a few shots that I like.

A weird little cabin we saw.

A brief moment of almost seeing the sun.

Viva Las Vegas

2007-12-27T13:39:00.000-08:00

Here are a bunch of shots I took in Vegas, mostly of just the hotels there! The weather was bright and sunny but really quite cold and windy.

I stayed at the MGM Grand, it was quite nice.

Just a cool stairway that I liked in the MGM Grand.

NY NY

The Paris Hotel

Bellagio

What am I??

Eye see you!

2007-12-17T12:30:00.000-08:00

I haven't been feeling overly creative lately with my photography, hopefully this picks up when I am done all these scrapbooks I am working on (I think I am using up all my creative juices there). Tommorow I hope to post some shots of my newly renovated foyer.

Happy Birthday

2007-12-13T11:12:00.000-08:00

Today should be a Happy Day, today should be a day of celebrating, and of course drinking copious amounts of alcohol.... Today is what should be our good friend Colin's 29th Birthday, unfortunately he will not be here to celebrate with us. We lost Colin on July 4th of this year, with 5 other Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan. Perhaps we should celebrate as though Colin was here with us today and this weekend, I think if we don't, Colin will be cheezed at us up there in Heaven.

Here is a photo we all like of Colin, shows him full of life! (It's not the greatest quality as it is a scan).

Gingerbread from the past

2007-12-10T12:48:00.000-08:00

In the spirit of the holidays, I thought I would post a few pictures of my past gingerbread houses that Richard and I have made.

The Castle

The castle again, with a view of the moat (and yep there are sharks in the moat)!

The gingerbread log cabin.

Just for fun, Rossignol and our tree from 2006.

A pretty shot of the nut grove in the snow at the family farm.

Oh Christmas Tree!

2007-12-03T12:48:00.000-08:00

We spent our Saturday out cutting down our Christmas tree in Fort Langley and then decorating it and the house.

Picking out the tree, this one is just too small.

This tree is just too big and kinda funny looking...

This tree is perfect, a 7 foot Grand Fir. Richard is excited!

Hauling the tree back to the car!

The tree all decorated.

Our new ornament this year, we picked it up at Disneyworld.

The fireplace decor.

Down the stairs.

The Yeti in the snow.. his natural element.

Caving shots and Cave Hunting shots!

2007-11-30T15:32:00.001-08:00

Well I thought I would post some shots from other caving trips and cave hunting trips.

Cave Hunting:

Caving:

Richard doing a 60 meter free repel into a cave on Vancouver Island. While this photo was not taken by me, it is one of my favorite shots of caving that we have.

I saved the best and the creepiest for last, sometimes you find interesting things in caves.....

Fun in the forest

2007-11-27T13:10:00.000-08:00

We spent Sunday wandering around the forest looking for caves. As odd as it sounds it is quite fun. We are members of a caving club and we try and go out now and then looking for new ones. Unfortunately we didn't find anything too spectacular, mostly just holes that didn't go to far, or they needed some major digging on to see if they went anywhere, which we may come back to another day.

Our friend Adam taking pictures of things.

My husband Richard checking out a hole.. it was a little tight.

Adam in a hole..

Our hole after clearing away loose rocks, we named this the head crusher cave for the sketchy loose rocks hanging above your head.

Trying out some different settings on my camera in this little valley. This is normal.

Black and White

Sepia

A waterfall we found with Adam, it was nice.

Flame

2007-11-23T14:54:00.001-08:00

Since I had gotten a litle behind these last few days in my post, I thought I would also post this shot of a candle I took yesterday.

Fun with my Wii

2007-11-23T14:46:00.000-08:00

We have had tons of fun playing our Nintendo Wii, here are a few shots of Richard playing some of the bowling game in Wii Sports. Now its time to buy a much bigger, fancier tv!

Winter is coming!

2007-11-20T13:43:00.000-08:00

I love winter, I love the snow, the crispness in the air and the cozy feeling you get at home when it is so chilly outside but so toasty in your home. Here are a few shots from last year to get you in the mood to love winter like I do. :)

Winter

2007-11-18T21:31:00.001-08:00

Well after a quick trip up to Whistler yesterday to pick up Richard's brand new custom snowboard, and get our pictures taken for our passes, I am ready for the season to begin. While there we were greeted with the white stuff falling hard in the village.

Cats in Hats..

2007-11-16T13:31:00.000-08:00

Over the last little while we have put our cats in a few outfits for Halloween and they had a little party for their birthday (which mostly consisted of them getting some cat treats and catnip) but they wore hats so it was a party. Call me crazy but it was fun and cute and they are both tolerant of us dressing them up so it makes it even more fun!

The Yeti in his Ladybug hat.

Rossignol-Bear enjoying his birthday party hat.

The Yeti looks partied out.

This is some random dog we saw riding on the back of a motorcycle. He really looked like he enjoyed riding there and posing for photos. Those really are doggles too!

Have you ever went on vacation in one locations, but ended up on the other side of the country?

2007-11-14T19:53:00.000-08:00

I love Disneyworld, so when we did not get on our flight to Maui, we quickly called the Westjet standby hotline to figure out where we could go and Orlando was a pretty good bet for getting there and home without missing our flights. So off we went, saying good bye to our travel companions who did make the Maui flight.

Here are some shots from our quick trip to the Magical Kingdom. On a side note, those "Just Married" pins do have perks at Disney. We thought hey we haven't been married a year yet, we still qualify for the "honeymoon perks"!

Religious skywriting???? Very strange indeed!

We taxied right by the new Airbus A380 in Montreal, that is one big plane!

Honeymoon Favorites

2007-11-06T15:20:00.000-08:00

Here are some shots from our Honeymoon to the Big Island of Hawaii, Bora Bora, and Oah'u, Hawaii..

Big Island of Hawaii:

Akaka Falls

Bora Bora, French Polynesia:

Oah'u:

Lovely Sunday

2007-11-05T15:04:00.000-08:00

Since it was such a lovely Sunday afternoon in Beautiful British Columbia, I thought a photo of Mount Baker would be nice. We snapped this photo while waiting at a stoplight.

Russia....

2007-11-02T13:30:00.000-07:00

In 2002 I travelled to Russia, Finland, Norway and Sweden on a University Field School. I am posting a few of my favorite photos from Russia. They are not my favorite because they are of beautiful photographs, they are my favorite because they remind me why we are recycling and trying to clean up the planet. The area of Russia I travelled to was in the North, above the Arctic Circle to an area called the Kola Penisula, more specifically the town of Murmansk and its neighbouring village areas. This town is a major stop on shipping routes and is heavily polluted due to the amount smelters in the area and not to mention a good portion of the USSR's nuclear submarines that have been sunk in the harbour with their reactors still on board.. This is the only town in the world likely, that has a clock in the square that tells you the time, temperature and radiation at that hour. Sounds like a gorgeous place to visit doesn't it....

Despite the economic, geographic hardships and the serious pollution problems that plagues this region, the people are beautiful. They treated myself and my fellow travellers like family, offering us everything they could.

An interesting side note to this area is how different it would be to the rest of "Modern Russia" meaning in comparison to St. Petersburg and Moscow. This area has not changed since the fall of the Soviet empire. There are still Lenin statues and Hammer and Sickle statues everywhere, in fact this city was still a "closed" city until a few years prior to our arrival.

Without further ado.. here are some photos...

This is a photo of a smelter in the town of Montchegorsk. I am not sure why a barbed wire fence was necessary, no one wants to go to the smelter! In this town we were able to visit a church during Sunday service. I asked one of the professors from Russia where all the men were and his response was that most men work at the smelter here in town and their life expectancy is only into their mid 30's. This town was incredibly polluted, I do believe it is listed as one of the most polluted places on Earth. As you drive closer to the town you notice a "dead zone" no trees and even the soil is dead... Talk about a real eye opener.

I quickly snapped this picture of a worker in the harbour in Murmansk.

Here is a shot of me with one of the Lenin statues we found in town.

2007-11-01T13:13:00.000-07:00