July 6, 2017

With so many amazing places on our doorstep here in Vancouver we regularly take the weekend to head out of the city and into the beautiful mountains and do some hiking.  A few weeks ago we headed to Whistler with our Aussie Eaton Arrowsmith friends to do the Joffre Lake hike.

This hike is an hour further north of Whistler past Pemberton and turned out to be a jewell definitely worth visiting!  The 10km round trip was filled with some of the most beautiful scenery!  Yes lots of uphill but nothing a regular semi fit person couldn’t handle.  We had 17 in our group – 1 dad, 6 mums and 10 kids aged from 16 to 8.

There are three lakes to visit on the walk – one near the car park at the start of the climb and two lakes near the top!  Incredible blue water, beautiful water falls and a glacier at the top!  Fabulous in every way.  By the time we were back to our car our iPhones told us we had done 20,000 steps and climbed 98 floors!  

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July 4, 2017

Last weekend we took a day trip up to Whistler to see the amazing snow walls that are still standing on top of the mountain.  After a bumper winter season these incredible snow walls show just how much snow actually fell.  We are now in the middle of summer and some has melted but the height is still staggering.  

I have to admit Whistler in summer is almost better than Whistler in winter – there is so much to do and see and the place is buzzing!  We took the Whistler Gondola up the mountain to the roundhouse and then hiked Pika’s traverse to get to the snow walls.  After our hike we then took the Peak to Peak Gondola across to Blackcombe Mountain and before heading back down to the village.  While on our chairlift down we even saw a little black bear playing in the forrest below!  Amazing stuff – feeling very blessed to be living in this incredible country with so much beauty all around.

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Summer is in full swing here in beautiful Vancouver and the extreme change in daylight hours is not the only noticeable thing happening (mid winter we are lucky to have 8 hours with the sun up and currently we have 17 hours of daylight).   I have been out retracing my steps so I could capture the summer version of my favourite winter shots!  From white to green it is just stunning. Here they are summer -v- winter!  Both equally beautiful in their own way!

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The last two are taken in Whistler.  Hard to believe that this first shot is the same place and was in fact the venue for the 2010 winter Olympic downhill ski events!Sweet Style-0040Sweet Style-7502