Adventures: B.C.
I think I'm a little early for my monthly check-in but I've been super busy lately so before my memory fails me I figured I'd better get it all down on paper - or email as the case may be. Let's see... where did I last leave you? Right - just before the Canada Day long weekend. How was yours by the way - see any good fireworks? I was disappointed that I didn't.
I spent Canada's birthday at a cool outdoor venue in the city listening to great Canadian musical talent. A few up and comers, and then the big guns: Thornley and Billy Talent. Thornley blew me away with every member playing exceptionally and sounding sooo good. Billy Talent had a fun-filled set as well; I was mixing it up in the pit. The rest of the long weekend involved me going to various beaches including Wreck (nude) Beach which provided some high quality people-watching!
After a weekend of concert watching and lounging on beaches the next weekend I decided to "step-up" the physical activity. So Saturday I climbed Grouse Mountain which is 853m of elevation gain in a mere 2900m climb. Forty-four minutes later I was at the top of a mountain in North Vancouver looking out over the entire city on a clear afternoon. Spectacular. I ran over to check out the grizzly bears then took the gondola back down to the bottom because I was due at the Canada cup of beer. Located in the outdoor Thunderbird stadium at UBC were 30 beer vendors with hundreds of kegs of samples. We made our way through the throngs of beer-bellied, mostly-mustached men, sampling at least one beer from nearly each of the brewers. Some tasty local beers were enjoyed that afternoon and it was a great time though the alcohol and sunshine sure did take a lot out of me. That's okay its not like I had promised to go on a 23 kilometre hike the next morning at 6 or anything...
Wait. That's exactly what I had done. And being a man of my word I begrudgingly hauled myself out of bed at 6am to meet up with the Triumf hiking group. We drove up to a spot just before Whistler and started heading up the hill. I've got to admit the first 3 hours and 7km of the hike up the mountain were not too enjoyable. However once we reached the top and rested while having some lunch my outlook changed (food cures all). The views were gorgeous and the lakes we came across were fairly amazing. So fairly amazing in fact, that I couldn't pass up the opportunity to toss my body off the dock and plunge into the ~55 degree water. Refreshing may not be as good a word as numbing to describe the feeling. The hike progressed along the mountain and eventually wound its way back down. The long, slow, painful start of the day was all worthwhile to enjoy the fantastic views and lakes at the top of Garibaldi Mountain.
The past weekend was physically taxing and so I decided to tone it down the next weekend by going white-water rafting. Myself, a buddy named Carl, and four (thankfully skinny) Irish girls packed ourselves into Carl's tiny little Isuzu hatchback and trekked out to Chilliwack. It being the girls' first time (I'm an expert having gone once 4 years ago) we decided to take the easier of the two rivers but this did not mean less excitement. The trip started out well, and besides the shrieks in my ears, I was loving sitting in the front and crashing through the rocks and waves. We then stopped off to walk underneath a 6m (20') tall waterfall that crashed down, penetrating both the life jacket and wetsuit I was wearing to sting my back. Carrying on the with the trip our guide, Pip- the kiwi, told us about a large rock named "Death Fang" and then proceeded to guide us straight into it. As i grasped for the rope and attempted to haul my body up to the top of the raft and out of the water that was swelling around me, I was overwhelmed by the tremendous strength of the river and in a split-second "decision" (really the river made the choice for me) I let go of the rope, kicked my foot free of its hold, and allowed the surging water to drag me down the river. Staying rather calm (considering) I held my breath as I got pulled through the rest of the short rapid and then my head popped up in a calmer area. Having forgotten all of the safety training we had gone through just 30 minutes prior, I picked up two loose paddles, then realized that was pointless, I let them go and decided I'd better get myself out of the water. Looking ahead in the river I saw one raft from our fleet and then looked back and saw another. Figuring it would be better to swim against the current and let the raft catch me that's what I did. Reaching the raft I was hauled over the side. It was exhilarating and I'm glad that it happened to me; I would have been jealous had it been another raft that flipped. The girls on the other hand were not so impressed. They were all stranded at the top of Fang Rock with no way of getting off. Eventually they each in turn worked up the courage to slip off the edge of the rock and follow a similar path to the one I had taken, except theirs ended with grabbing a rope tossed from shore and being pulled in to shore for the rescue. At least back at the campfire we had a story to tell! After that, the girls weren't up for too much adventure on Sunday, so we traded in the plans to go to the water park for chilling on Chilliwack Lake's beaches.
Monday I visited the much over-hyped Capilano Suspension bridge tourist attraction. A walk across a suspension bridge and through a series of hanging walkways through the forest would hardly have made my $20 worthwhile and so I was glad connections had got me in sans charge.
Yesterday I attended the annual travelling punk fest affectionately known as "Warped". Joining all the studded belts, mohawks and patched denim jackets, I enjoyed my afternoon and evening skanking it up in the pit with fellow punk music aficionados (and impressionable 13 year old boys and girls).
That brings you up to date. For the future I've got some dinner plans, some camping plans, some centurion plans and some Seattle plans in the works. We'll see what comes to fruition and you can read all about it in my next email, scratch that, blog entry.
Ah yes! My big news. I've found myself gainful employment for the fall semester. Here it is: To try and trump the beautiful summer I've spent surrounded by mountains and oceans in Vancouver, British Columbia I'm going to pass my fall and early winter in the superb mining town of Sudbury, Ontario! Woo hoo! Just kidding, I'm actually very much looking forward to this term. I've got some friends at Laurentian University and will only be about a 4 hour drive from home so the living conditions should be decent. I'm working with the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory where I will be dividing my time between 2000m below ground level and the surface. While deep within an old mine I will be operating scientific machinery and water pumps, as well as working with detectors to make observations of tiny little sub-atomic particles of nearly no mass (~0.2eV). My time at the surface will be focused mostly on research - the project is wrapping up and we need to produce the most precise data as possible. By offering a solid mix of hands-on experience and research I feel it will help to build my skill set and allows me to venture into the real-life physics world.
I spent Canada's birthday at a cool outdoor venue in the city listening to great Canadian musical talent. A few up and comers, and then the big guns: Thornley and Billy Talent. Thornley blew me away with every member playing exceptionally and sounding sooo good. Billy Talent had a fun-filled set as well; I was mixing it up in the pit. The rest of the long weekend involved me going to various beaches including Wreck (nude) Beach which provided some high quality people-watching!
After a weekend of concert watching and lounging on beaches the next weekend I decided to "step-up" the physical activity. So Saturday I climbed Grouse Mountain which is 853m of elevation gain in a mere 2900m climb. Forty-four minutes later I was at the top of a mountain in North Vancouver looking out over the entire city on a clear afternoon. Spectacular. I ran over to check out the grizzly bears then took the gondola back down to the bottom because I was due at the Canada cup of beer. Located in the outdoor Thunderbird stadium at UBC were 30 beer vendors with hundreds of kegs of samples. We made our way through the throngs of beer-bellied, mostly-mustached men, sampling at least one beer from nearly each of the brewers. Some tasty local beers were enjoyed that afternoon and it was a great time though the alcohol and sunshine sure did take a lot out of me. That's okay its not like I had promised to go on a 23 kilometre hike the next morning at 6 or anything...
Wait. That's exactly what I had done. And being a man of my word I begrudgingly hauled myself out of bed at 6am to meet up with the Triumf hiking group. We drove up to a spot just before Whistler and started heading up the hill. I've got to admit the first 3 hours and 7km of the hike up the mountain were not too enjoyable. However once we reached the top and rested while having some lunch my outlook changed (food cures all). The views were gorgeous and the lakes we came across were fairly amazing. So fairly amazing in fact, that I couldn't pass up the opportunity to toss my body off the dock and plunge into the ~55 degree water. Refreshing may not be as good a word as numbing to describe the feeling. The hike progressed along the mountain and eventually wound its way back down. The long, slow, painful start of the day was all worthwhile to enjoy the fantastic views and lakes at the top of Garibaldi Mountain.
The past weekend was physically taxing and so I decided to tone it down the next weekend by going white-water rafting. Myself, a buddy named Carl, and four (thankfully skinny) Irish girls packed ourselves into Carl's tiny little Isuzu hatchback and trekked out to Chilliwack. It being the girls' first time (I'm an expert having gone once 4 years ago) we decided to take the easier of the two rivers but this did not mean less excitement. The trip started out well, and besides the shrieks in my ears, I was loving sitting in the front and crashing through the rocks and waves. We then stopped off to walk underneath a 6m (20') tall waterfall that crashed down, penetrating both the life jacket and wetsuit I was wearing to sting my back. Carrying on the with the trip our guide, Pip- the kiwi, told us about a large rock named "Death Fang" and then proceeded to guide us straight into it. As i grasped for the rope and attempted to haul my body up to the top of the raft and out of the water that was swelling around me, I was overwhelmed by the tremendous strength of the river and in a split-second "decision" (really the river made the choice for me) I let go of the rope, kicked my foot free of its hold, and allowed the surging water to drag me down the river. Staying rather calm (considering) I held my breath as I got pulled through the rest of the short rapid and then my head popped up in a calmer area. Having forgotten all of the safety training we had gone through just 30 minutes prior, I picked up two loose paddles, then realized that was pointless, I let them go and decided I'd better get myself out of the water. Looking ahead in the river I saw one raft from our fleet and then looked back and saw another. Figuring it would be better to swim against the current and let the raft catch me that's what I did. Reaching the raft I was hauled over the side. It was exhilarating and I'm glad that it happened to me; I would have been jealous had it been another raft that flipped. The girls on the other hand were not so impressed. They were all stranded at the top of Fang Rock with no way of getting off. Eventually they each in turn worked up the courage to slip off the edge of the rock and follow a similar path to the one I had taken, except theirs ended with grabbing a rope tossed from shore and being pulled in to shore for the rescue. At least back at the campfire we had a story to tell! After that, the girls weren't up for too much adventure on Sunday, so we traded in the plans to go to the water park for chilling on Chilliwack Lake's beaches.
Monday I visited the much over-hyped Capilano Suspension bridge tourist attraction. A walk across a suspension bridge and through a series of hanging walkways through the forest would hardly have made my $20 worthwhile and so I was glad connections had got me in sans charge.
Yesterday I attended the annual travelling punk fest affectionately known as "Warped". Joining all the studded belts, mohawks and patched denim jackets, I enjoyed my afternoon and evening skanking it up in the pit with fellow punk music aficionados (and impressionable 13 year old boys and girls).
That brings you up to date. For the future I've got some dinner plans, some camping plans, some centurion plans and some Seattle plans in the works. We'll see what comes to fruition and you can read all about it in my next email, scratch that, blog entry.
Ah yes! My big news. I've found myself gainful employment for the fall semester. Here it is: To try and trump the beautiful summer I've spent surrounded by mountains and oceans in Vancouver, British Columbia I'm going to pass my fall and early winter in the superb mining town of Sudbury, Ontario! Woo hoo! Just kidding, I'm actually very much looking forward to this term. I've got some friends at Laurentian University and will only be about a 4 hour drive from home so the living conditions should be decent. I'm working with the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory where I will be dividing my time between 2000m below ground level and the surface. While deep within an old mine I will be operating scientific machinery and water pumps, as well as working with detectors to make observations of tiny little sub-atomic particles of nearly no mass (~0.2eV). My time at the surface will be focused mostly on research - the project is wrapping up and we need to produce the most precise data as possible. By offering a solid mix of hands-on experience and research I feel it will help to build my skill set and allows me to venture into the real-life physics world.
posted by Stefan Andrushenko at
6:47 PM
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