A couple of weekends ago Marc and I drove a little past Squamish towards Squamish & Paradise Valley. We found a little dirt road that led towards the river and followed it to the end. There was a small dirt lot with another car or two, so we parked and followed the short path to the beach. It was absolutely great! With so few people there – it was like we had our own beach-front slice of the wilderness to ourselves. The river water was really cold, but the sun was really hot, so we positioned our ‘soccer mom’ chairs so that just our feet were in the water and took in the amazing mountain top views and the sunshine. While I did pack water and snacks, I might have forgotten sunscreen and so we might have got sunburns. Oops.
The following weekend was less adventuresome. I decided to write a paper for a student-paper contest, and as a result, had to lock myself inside for the entire long weekend. In the end, I learned a lot about French sociologist/philosopher Pierre Bourdieu, and ended up submitting the paper on time to the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport. I guess I wasn’t inside the entire weekend, as I did manage to see the Vancouver Celebration of Light fireworks on Sat night (which is a pretty big deal around here). It was buddy Kristyn’s “cake and fireworks” birthday – and it was an awesome break from paper-writing. Note – I don’t have a pic or video of the fireworks, and frankly I think taking photos or videos of fireworks is sort of strange (who wants to watch your 30min video of the fireworks?? If you do happen to like those kinds of things, well then, my apologies to you).
This past weekend however was quite the adventure. Marc had time-off from camp starting on Thursday night, and so our adventures started early Friday morning when we met old friends Katie and Matt who were visiting from Calgary, for breakfast. Leaving from the restaurant we headed past Whistler and Pemberton towards the end of Lillooet Lake. We saw two black bears along the way (yay for wild-life sightings from in the car, as opposed to from the campsite!). We drove hours and hours on a gravel road, most of the time only being able to go 30km/hr, but then we finally arrived at the GREATEST place EVER! It was Sloquet Hot Springs –and it was so neat! It was a bunch of pools each getting cooler as they approach the river...and it was super relaxing. Here’s a video of our explanation, and some photos.
After soaking all night and all morning of the next day, we decided that we were sufficiently prune'ified. We decided to head out and see what other adventures we could find. We explored the area along the drive beside Lillooet Lake (the LONG gravel road) and found a few interesting things:
new school at First Nation's reserve
Cemetery beside the road
We also checked out the Skookumchuck Hot Springs, also known as the St. Agnes Well Hot Springs, and let's just say, we were happy with our choice to go to the other ones! These ones required an entry fee, weren't nearly as natural, and were clothing optional...um, no thanks! We camped at Driftwood Bay were we had a great view of the Lake, and had an easy early morning drive to Joffre Lakes.
View of Lillooet Lake from our campsite at Driftwood Bay
Joffre Lakes Hike was beautiful. Marc had done it once before, but if was brand new for me. It took only 2 hours to get up (and the same to get down), but we ended up eating lunch and exploring at the top for about an additional hour. It's not a terribly hard climb...but it's not a "walk in the park" either..it's strenuous, especially at certain sections when you have to step from boulder to boulder with a cliff at your side. The views however make it all worth it. The colour of these three lakes is spectacular.
a couple videos:
I was thinking that the weekend couldn't get better - but it did. We stopped at the Whister Market for dessert on the way home, to bring to Sunday dinner at friends Susanna and Cho's house. After dinner we went to the Richmond night market where you can get all the knock-offs and hello-kitty products that your heart desires! There are also two rows of food servers - and boy, you sure can find some interesting things. I stuck to an old-favourite (waffle balls), but did reserve awe for those who ate these kinds of things:
For those of you who aren't on facebook - you can still see the full album of this weekend's adventures here:
For now, it's back to reality (oh, and putting away all this camping gear/dirty dishes since Marc had to head to work early this morning).
Are those squid?Look delicious...What amazing during a trip is you do not know where are you going and what you will discover...Hope to make more friends on my-travel-mate.com.
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