I remember thinking, back at the beginning of Winter, is it EVER going to snow? Should have kept that thought to myself! Now I am sure that this Winter has not had an inordinate amount of snow; Luke and I are just a couple of …Hillbilly Newbs! There, I said it, John! (My brother-in-law reckons that Luke and I are now Hillbillies. The politically correct term, dear John, is Homesteaders!) I mean even if we were still in the Fraser Valley we would still be knee deep in snow, right? And up here in the mountains there is bound to be heaps more snow, right? We are, afterall, sitting at 1,321 m above sea level and I can tell you that the proof is in how long it takes to boil a jug of water!!! Or a quarter of a jug of water because I do want that cup of herbal tea TODAY!
True to higher elevations we have had what I would consider a fair amount of snow and all future years will be measured next to this one: “Oh, there hasn’t been much snow this year, we only had to shovel ourselves out the door 3 times!” Both Luke and I have shovelled and shovelled snow! Usually the both of us get stuck into it, each taking a section but wouldn’t you know it? It snowed Sunday night which meant a butt-load of shovelling on Monday. Well, Luke was excused from snow removal duties because he had to work! I set out after breakfast and got down to the business of moving all that snow. No worries, I like a challenge and besides, I’ll power through my 10,000 Steps in no time at all!!! Ah, but you see, I know NOT to power through; I know that slow and steady wins the race so I plodded along, setting myself lil goals along the way: “I won’t collapse, dead, until the long driveway portion is done; that way Luke will easily be able to get to the truck to go for help.” Had I have collapsed from the exertion of moving all that snow I can tell you that you would now be planning my Celebration of Life as there is no way in the world that Luke would have been able to do a dang thing. Another reason to always keep in mind, slow and steady wins the race! Oh, and wouldn’t you know it? I left my Fitbit charging in the loungeroom!!! Oh well, I know I did a gazillion and a half steps! And I have the aching muscles to prove it!
Oh, right. I ought to let you in on what “laying tracks” means. If you follow me on Facebook you know I say it often enough! So the deal is, after each and every snow fall one must hop into ones truck and “lay tracks”; simply drive to the end of the lane, along Casselman Road and hope and pray that someone else has laid tracks on Chilko Lake FSR!!! I’ll tell you that with each snow fall the drive got a lil bit tougher. Now I KNOW that you need to add weight to the back of the truck but I was slow to actually get Luke to act on my knowledge. Two snow falls ago we finally loaded big boulders into tubs that sat right over the rear tires. And it helped! But after Sunday night’s snow fall? Wouldn’t even know that we had the extra weight in there! It was a messy drive with too much sliding around and that is in 4Low, 1st gear! I actually didn’t think we were going to make it back and I was thinking about all the things I didn’t grab before we left: gun, ammo, headlight, another layer of clothes, water, water dish for dogs, snowboots for dogs and, well, the patience of a saint. Really, I need only have had the last thing in that list because Luke handled that rough drive like a pro! Wait, you did say you were from Australia, right? And you have had heaps of XP driving in this white stuff, right? Right? Because I can tell you, I …well… I haven’t had to drive much in the snow and therefore I actually kinda suck at it!
When we went to William’s Lake to sign all the papers and stuff for the purchase of the Earthship Luke and I did a HUGE amount of shopping! You think my Norwex bill was big? ($900) I won’t even tell you how much we spent! Luke went a lil crazy in the sports store; he bought just about every kind of winter sport equipment available! I have been eternally grateful for the snowshoes! We use them almost everyday! A great purchase. He bought us each cross country skis even though neither one of us has ever been cross country skiing and truth be told? I haven’t even strapped mine on yet! Luke did but got no where fast. S’all good, I don’t have a lot of spare time for cross country skiing as I am far too busy shovelling snow! And cooking food that either freezes or goes soft in my very confusing refrigeration system. (That is definitely going to get sorted out this Spring/Summer/Fall even if I have to do it myself!) Good thing I am pretty decent and cooking and easily turn a food disaster into something quite tasty. Whoops, off topic! And finally, Luke bought us each a pair of ice skates! You may or may not have heard that Luke and Sammy went through the ice when we tried to walk up Casselman Creek? We haven’t really ventured out onto the ice since then. Was that New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day? Anyway, it has been a few days and it has been COLD these past handful of days and I thought for sure our Brittany Creek has now got to be frozen freakin’ solid and will easily stand up to a bit of rooky ice skating. To that end, after my morning chores in the house I manned myself with a snow shovel, donned my snowshoes and headed down to the creek determined to clear a lil skating patch for us. I’m getting to be quiet decent at shovelling snow so I was happily going about my business, Bear and Sam having accompanied me, were off in the bushes on the far side of the creek, and I was just in the zone. Then all of a sudden…. C R A C K !!! Not an actual crack in the ice just a loud protestation from the frozen creek! You can bet I replied with a screech of my own; loud enough that Luke poked his head out of the Earthship to see if I was alright? And good thing I was still standing on solid …ice? packed snow? ground? Who knows? Because had I have actually gone through the ice? Once again, there is no way he could have helped! I am fairly confident that the creek is not very deep but it probably has that icky, mucky bottom that I loathe and THAT is what would have killed me! Touching that! Blech! Just thinking about it is making me squeamish!
I have to tell you, after having been …. smothered under thick, heavy blankets of cloud and snow for what seems like forever, we were so excited to see the sun today! And yea, maybe the mercury has stayed below -16C all day but it has been an absolutely glorious day! The thermal mass of the Earthship basked under the long-reaching rays of warmth radiating from the sun. And so as our friend the Sun goes down today we are lounging comfortably in 20C warmth whilst outside it is now getting colder, -18C. And our batts are sitting at 99%!!!! Oh, the power I am going to burn tomorrow! The laundry hamper is overflowing and there is a layer of dust that removes to be moved by a Norwex dusting wand. And tomorrow morning when I wake up long before the day, I am going to turn on a light! And read a real book and not my iPad! Yay. In the slideshow you will see a dark photo with a few pokes of light…that’s how all of my days start if the batts are low. And it is ever so tiresome now. I am going to revel in light in the a.m.!
Thank you, thank you, thank you, Mr. Sun for coming out to play today!
And it wouldn’t be a post from me unless I ended with slideshow, right?
https://youtu.be/b6A2lnmb09M