22 Days to go...

So the countdown continues.  After about six days of fighting with bad weather and trying to adapt to sleeping in an altitude tent, I was on my last bit of rest before I leave.  Three days of fishing in BC on the St. Mary’s River just outside Kimberly.  A short trip, too short, that requires me to stealth in and out of Calgary without telling most people I was there.  A nice evening with my inlaws for brother-in-law Fraser’s birthday, then off to BC.  A stop to see the Croasdale’s in Columbia Lake, then onto Kimberly.

Fraser’s birthday was really fun.  I came straight off the plane from Frankfurt and was 

off to    Heritage Park for an eveing on the Moyie.  As I didn’t grow up in Calgary, the Moyie was new to me.  Complete with Jazz Band, food and cash bar, we cruised the expanse of the Glenmore Reservoir for 2 hours.  I was so thankful for the cool fresh air of the Calgary summer evening, that was all that was keeping me awake.  Funny thing was, about 15 minutes into the evening, this old friend of mine walks up the stairs, Matt Coffey.  Sorry for the aside...  Matt and l lived together in residence about 20 years ago, 2nd Floor, Rundle Hall at the University of Calgary.  We sort of kept in touch, random meetings in Calgary for a few years, then nothing.  About a year ago, I was going to meet Kathryn and her office for dinner in the west end.  Given the time I had, I either went to the restaurant about ten minutes early and had a drink, or went to her office and walked over with the gang.  Three quarters of the way through my Gin and Tonic, Matt walks through the door.  He ended up joining us for dinner and we had a good catch up.  Random meetings with old friends are great.  

One of the highlights of the evening was winning the trivia contest.  Twenty random questions about the Moyie, history, and maritime knowledge, the Abbott family + me was 14/20, enough for a tour of the wheel house.  Most of the passengers looked at each other quizzically as we changed course randomly and the ships horn was sounded.  A few minutes later, my proud mother-in-law Carol, descended the stairs from her stint as pilot with a wide grin on her face.

Next we were off to see Ken and Anne at Columbia Lake.  Ken has been a friend and mentor to me for the last ten years or so, starting when I was a keen graduate student.  but more interesting is that he’s always been a keen climber and outdoorsman.  He is also an  avid collector of old books.  Scanning his collection, I found a nice little book on Climbing and Mountaineering written in 1956, three years after Sir Edmund Hilary summitted Everest.  Complete with a chapter on ski-mountaineering, I am tempted to mix up his recipe for wax which contains:  Stockholm Tar, Resin and a Gramaphone Record.  Ken was kind enough to give me “The Alps as seen by the Poets”, a collection of various works about mountains published in 1912.  Sad that it was such a short visit.  

The three days of fishing on the St. Mary's was great, the weather was a bit tough with some thunderstorms but still, fishing is always a great was to spend a day.  Mike and Brian, our fishing guides, were fantastic as always.  Brian was so good, he even managed to catch the biggest fish.  Sean made the trip up from Seattle, always great to see him.  Morgan and Lisa came out from Vancouver as well, first time for them fly-fishing which is always fun.  Lisa went home with a bit of a war-wound, she hit herself in the face with a fly, then nearly pierced her ear.

So not much about mountain climbing today but I figure there’s lots more of that to come...  I'm sitting here in Chamonix, staring at Mt. Blanc on a beautiful morning.  Probably worth the trip in the next couple of days.