Communist dictatorships change their government more often than the province of Alberta does!~ Ben Wiggins, Brit Wit
It was another busy week last week. School was out on Thursday and Friday for the annual Calgary Teachers' Convention. This meant going to some sessions and lectures downtown at the TELUS Convention centre, wandering around some exhibits, pleasant unpressured lunch with colleagues I normally only see for half an hour and, most importantly, having a lie-in. Although not really a holiday as we had to stay in town and attend some sessions, it was a nice relaxing couple of days. I love my job, I do, but I occasionally wonder about the fact that I love NOT doing it even more.
On Friday evening the Brits descended on us. The other two exchangees from the UK, Ben with girlfriend Helen and Dave from Cardiff, came to stay the night before heading off for a weekend frolicking in the mountains. It was nice to relax with people sharing the same sense of humour and to vent a little about the minor gripes we have being a long way from home on unfamiliar cultural territory. Brianna joined us for fajitas and I hope she wasn't too put off by the relentless use of sarcasm and our moaning about Canada. In all honesty there isn't much to moan about; people are lovely here, but it IS TOO COLD, we miss the beer, there are too many big trucks and not enough fair trade coffee. Nuff said, moan over.
On Saturday we got up and convoyed our way to Canmore, the closest town to Calgary in the beautiful Rocky Mountains. Vic and I went with Dave in his car and it was a real treat for us not to have to drive there and back. Upon arrival our first activity was Dog Sledding, or 'Mushing' as the sport is known. We went out with Snowy Owl tours and had a great time. We shared our sled with a guide but lots of our friends got to drive their own teams. Our dogs were super keen to be pulling all the time and it was wonderful to work with them as a pack. They really seemed to be enjoying themselves, so don't worry about them being abused. They were bred and raised for pulling people around, so the worst bits of the day for them are when you pull over for a break. They couldn't wait to get started again! We learned that you don't say 'mush' to start them off, despite what the sport is called, you say "Hike!" A nice calm "whoa!" will slow them down, but you have to use the brake on the back too.
Since we got back lots of Canadians I’ve spoken too have been very curious about the sledding. It's very touristy thing to do, I suppose, so people who have lived here their whole lives never think to get around to it. Well, don't let that stop you! It was great fun, so get out and do it if you get a chance.
The afternoon had been set aside to mooch around Canmore by those running this exchange-club weekend away, a lovely town and worth seeing for all the newly arrived Aussies, but Vic and Dave and I had already seen it and Dave is Mr Sporty and wanted to do something active. I spotted a leaflet for the Nordic Centre, built 20 years ago for the Calgary winter Olympics to host the cross-country Skiing and Biathlon events, so off we went to try our hand (or feet!) at that. It's not often you get to try a sport as a complete novice at a world class Olympic facility, this was a treat. We rented 'Classic' skis for $15 each and set off in the pre made tracks. These skis have a grippy bit in the middle that only moves forward, so if you shuffle your feet backwards and forwards you should end up gliding gracefully forwards. That’s the theory at least. It took us a while to get the rhythm of it all and I found it very difficult to time when to push on my poles, but we were soon whipping along at a good speed, if still not all that gracefully. Cross country skis don't have a metal edge like Alpine skis so even if you step out of the two ruts you go along in and try to brake not much happens. This meant that the downhill bits were quite exhilerating, especially on the intermediate trail we found ourselves on. I'm keen to try it again, because it was a similar effort to jogging but you can go a lot faster. You must use very different muscles than any other sport because I hurt in places I didn't even know I had places for days afterwards. Some of this might have been from the little fall I had; I was going up hill very slowly at the time and lost my balance. The skis are only about an inch wide, very slippy and you're only connected to them at the toe, not the whole foot like on regular skis. All this rather exposed my utter lack of coordination and balance with entirely predictable consequences. All in all I count myself lucky not to have fallen more often.
Anyway, two hours of hot sweaty ski action were more than enough for us beginners so we headed home for a soak in the hot tub at the hotel and a pizza evening with the new Aussies a nice way to end a lovely day. Tomorrow we would be snow-shoeing...
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