Through My Lens: Mount Rundle
Regular readers of this blog know how beautiful I think Vancouver is and how blessed I feel that I get to live in one of the most beautiful cities in the world.
But there is something about Alberta that always takes my breath away. This photo shows why. I took this shot of Mount Rundle in Banff National Park last weekend.
Through My Lens: Water Lily
I took this photo of a water lily last weekend while walking around Stanley Park’s Beaver Lake with some friends.
As beautiful as they are, water lilies are threatening the lake’s biodiversity. Beaver Lake is slowing filling in with sediment, thanks in no small part to the fast-growing invasive species. Plans to dredge the lake are in the works.
Through My Lens: Cheakamus Lake
Today’s photo is of another lake, but this one is much closer to home. I hiked out to Cheakamus Lake just this afternoon. It’s located in Garibaldi Provincial Park, just outside of Whistler.
What a view.
Through My Lens: Lake Louise
I would hazard a guess that Lake Louise is the most visited ― and most photographed ― lake in all of Canada. Because it’s so popular, the crowds can be, well, a bit overwhelming.
Crowds or no crowds, this view always takes my breath away.
Dry Island Buffalo Jump
Speaking of cruising the Alberta countryside, there is one drive that my dad and I took a couple of summers ago that I enjoyed immensely. We drove about 100 kilometres southeast from Red Deer to Dry Island Buffalo Jump.
Dry Island is a small badlands area straddling the Red Deer River.
The small plateau in the centre of the badlands is Dry Island.
Buffalo jumps are natural cliff formations that First Nations hunters used to help them kill buffalo. The hunters up above would drive the animals over the cliff to the hunters waiting below.
The other neat-to-know fact about Dry Island is that it was the site of an important paleontological discovery: that of part of the Eotriceratops xerinsularis. (And if you memorize the spelling of the names of all the dinosaurs discovered in Alberta, you are a long ways to winning your next spelling bee.)
Through My Lens: Granaries
I was catching up with my cousin’s wife the other day by email, and she told me that she and her husband (my cousin) are enjoying their topless Friday evenings.
Nope ― it’s not what it sounds like.
They’re cruising the Alberta countryside in their red convertible.
I was jealous. But not of the red convertible.
I was jealous because there is nothing quite as beautiful as the Alberta countryside in the summertime.
Team USA
There are an awful lot of Americans wandering around town this weekend.
How do I know they’re Americans?
Well, they are wearing a lot of Stars and Stripes. On their T-shirts. On their caps. Even on their footwear. That American flag is everywhere. And if they aren’t sporting a flag on their clothing, they’re dressed in red, white, and blue.
Why so many more American tourists in town than is usual for a July 4 holiday weekend?
It likely had to do with a certain soccer match that Vancouver hosted today at BC Place.
Yup, it’s a World Cup summer once again. Congratulations, USA!
To commemorate the victory of Team USA, here’s a photo of the biggest American flag I have ever seen. I photographed this one hanging on the building that houses the New York Stock Exchange on my last visit to New York.
West End Farmers Market
I know summer has well and truly arrived when the West End Farmers Market returns.
As it did today.
And it’ll be here, every Saturday, until the end of October.
Oh joy, oh bliss. Shopping at your local farmers market is the best way to maintain a 100-mile diet.
Besides the West End Farmers Market where I shop (located alongside Nelson Park), Vancouver has six other summer markets. (There are also two winter markets.) You can buy fresh produce, cheese, baked goods, meat, poultry, and fish, and artisan products such as olives or fruit jams or soap. Vancouverites spend $8 million a year at their farmers markets and support 265 local farmers and artisans in doing so.
The best part? Everything tastes like summer. Truly.
Go on. What are you waiting for?
Through My Lens: Lunch Break
It’s that time of year.
What time of year?
It’s the time of year when we Canadians maximize every second of our short summers by spending as much time as possible outdoors.
Did you know that studies have shown workers are more satisfied with their jobs if they eat their lunch sitting on a park bench instead of in a café or (shudder) at their desks?
This chap is Lunchbox Joe. He’s enjoying his break in Edmonton’s Sir Winston Churchill Square.
Get outside, people!
There and Back Again 