August...

HI!!!!
I'm having a hard time getting this onto the computer so if you are reading this it means I haven't thrown my landlord's ghetto computer out of the window!!

Last week I went to a massive Roots and Blues festival in a random town - Salmon Arm, about 5 hours drive...we just finished the work on the campground so i managed to scam a day off...there were 6 stages and like 60 artists...during the day you cruise around and listen to heaps of different music and at night the big acts are playing...lots of dancing and good times...Michael Franti and Spearhead were AMAZING they played on Fri night so it wasnt too busy, we were right at the front! On Sat was Xavier Rudd, wow that guy was totally awesome, he can play like 7 different imstruments - he was playing the didg and drums or guitar and singing....(apart from the Aussie accent, ewww. Sorry Aussies, but you learn to strongly dislike Aussies if you live in Canada for long enough!)...and so far that was the last of the 35degree days:(

The girls dancing in the last of the daylight...

The crew...

This weekend we climbed the big-ass peak that overlooks Banff- Mt Rundle. From the top it is the coolest view ever, it drops off a massive cliff, like 1500m all the way to the valley floor, when you are standing (well, lying down actually because you feel like you are going to get sucked into the abyss) you can see EVERYTHING! Pretty cool. Then it started snowing! (yeah snow) The walk up was STEEP! We went with the boys from work, all of us had a pretty big night before so I cant really believe we made it all 1500m up!! The summit is 2900+ meters- so big climb you actually climb from the valley floor!

Did I mention that it was steep? But, what about my hangover??

The view of the Abyss from the top. I was scared for my life taking this photo! You prob can't tell but the green trees are 1000m below us...

Woooooh!!

Well, days are getting shorter, nights are darker...winter is on the way (hell yeah) though i think we'll have a few miserable days at work in the -20's before i get to ski though!!

HI sorry long time no write! We have done quite a bit of stuff....after the Stampede we decided to take a road trip out to Vancouver to drop Em and Joe off - and also catch up with Cam, Parker and Lauren (HELL yeah) one night of drunken madness in Cam's house (which used to be McIvors-sick-there was a hidden staircase!) also the most rediculous house any of us have ever seen. There were 8 bathrooms with showers! and the hot tub had LIGHTS that you can change colour!! Ah, well being the west coast it pissed down the entire time we were there, but it was a nice change from the month of 30+ temps in Banff...Whistler is another story - WOW. I thought it would be a touristy shit hole, but it was amazing! It was so green (the rain...) and pretty! And there are lakes....and sick as montain biking....and a good town (expensive!!!) The crankworks (mass bike fest) was on, the slopestyle is the one you see on TV, pretty much in the centre of town - massive - everyone was covered in dirt! The coolest thing is in Whistler you can go into the shops covered in dirt....!Cam took us out to see the dogs for the dog sledding company he works for...these are pretty new puppies: they are named after all the Harry Potter characters...OK kinda creepy - they have blue blue eyes! I guess it's part of one of the breeds they have in them, creepy though...sooo cute!

Anyway, recently Reubs and I have been working out in a campground in Field, BC (in the middle of nowhere really) redoing this campground - there are 60 sites, it is beautiful out there - not a bad place to be working! We took 60 picnic tables outta the ground, planed, sanded, painted and put them back!Oh what a shit job...

Well the sickest part was the boss shouted us a round of paintball cos we have been working real hard: the landscaping crew against the lawnmowere (man, we got our asses handed to us!) I dont know what it's like in NZ, but here there were like 10 diff courses, you play capture the flag. We played in the woods, and another one with big forts, and another in a field with tires and old school busses...you can play till your credit card maxes out on paintballs. SICK! There were free hot-dogs too!! except it was about 35deg, no wind, and you gotta wear this massive heavy black camo suit (i wore body armour too) and a full-face helmet...soooooooo hot!

(I still have a massive bruise on my arm) The boys also decided that head shots count...I scream like a girl....
The landscaping crew pre-shattering defeat. (Spot reuben, ha ha!)

Emerald Lake, pretty close to where we work. I am officially a crap fisher-woman. I would rather drink wine and eat the fish....

A Moose!! Ha ha look at it, looking at it makes you laugh because it is so ugly (sorry moose) So this guy (massive by the way, like taller than a big ass horse) just strolls through us while we are fishing!! They are tasty though....

On a more random note: I finally got the underwater pictures off Joe from Thailand. Here are some cool fish!

CALGARY STAMPEDE

HI!!

Just pulled in the door from a hectic weekend in Calgary where we went to the Calgary Stampede the "greatest outdoor show on earth"...It started off feeling pretty lucky, i made a sign for hitch-hiking and fortunatley we got picked up in 5 mins!!! Record breaking! And they dropped us off right at the hotel!! Nice!

We met up with Joe and Em-actually it was classic, we got to the front desk and asked if Joe Wilson had checked in, the dude said yes - Stephanie Wilson (so we naturally assumed Joe put it on Mummy's credit card...) walk in there, I'm using the bathroom, and Reubs is like KAt, do you recognise any of this stuff? And I'm like no-not really?? We are just about to drink a cold beer we have assumed Joe has left on ice for us.....Turns out it is the WRONG ROOM, we are sifting through other people's gear......hmmmm, beat a hasty exit from that scene before we could get busted! Funny start to the weekend. Tragically Joe had just had the van towed, costing a bunch of cash they didnt have, bad story...

We beat it to the Chuckwagon racing where they do a bunch of random stuff, chuck stuff in the wagon, race around poles, one dude leaps onto another horse...??They race around the track...it is super super gnarly, tragically horses die every year....Then afterwards they have this amazng broadway kinda show-with EVERYTHING, singing, dancing, tap dancing (sick) these dudes that climb up these ribbons by wrapping them around their bodies and spin through the sky...backflipping motorbikes...and the best fireworks i have seen in ages. it was really amazing...

Had a few expensive beers, a bit of a late one...train runs right to the hotel door!! Next day checked out the RODEO!!! Sweet so hardcore!! Here are some pics.

The bare-back bull riding...

Honestly I don't know how they do it...the coolest thing is the cowboys that round up the raging bull at the end and get it off the stage. Sometimes they have to lassoo them!!

There are heaps of different rodeo events, it was really cool to see them all. In this one the dude has to chase a calf, lassoo it and tie it's legs together once it is on the ground. When I say calf I mean a big one with little horns and suuff (steer??) Yeah and the dudes were doing it in like 7 seconds!! It was incredible!! There was one Kiwi dude, we cheered really loudly for him!

The grounds themselves are really cool, it's kinda like a massive (kiwi's) A&P show with all types of rides and games, wow it is HOT though man, it hasnt got below 30 deg all week... anyway ended up having a pretty random but MASSIVE night and now I have to go to bed, cos I think I'll be lifting heaps of heavy stuff tomorrow!
The team in the stand, (drinking illegally sumggled in rum slushies!!)

Summer life in Banff

Well fiNally i moved into my new house, and even went back to lake louise and got all my stuff, so now i have more than one pair of pants to wear, although still no shorts and it was 32deg today damn hot. had a bit of a mare this week, should have known it would go downhill when the element caught on fire at 6am when i was making a cupp of tea...I was working in a garden in Canmore when i got atung by a bee/wasp and ended up in hospital, as soon as i got there people were freaking out and attached me to all this beeping equipment, face mask full of steaming stuff and all, i was trying to tell poeple not to worry so much but apparantly i was quite baD....anyway at home now feeling shitty, but now aware that i am apparantly pretty damn allergic to bees!!

O n a better note i had monday off (paid!!) cos it was a long weekend canada day...

Look at Reub's hair. The Angel Reuben!!

We bunped into a friend and he told us there were fish in this lake but unfortunatley we didn't have rods but DAMN the fish were everywhere we could see them swimming around and jumping outta the water.....

We camped right by this lake
Sweet waterfall on the way up. The trail starts in Johnston's Canyon (mssive tourist area) then goes up the valley behind it. The first like 4kms are concrete!!
There are lots of bears out at the momentt. Most people carry bells to warn them you are coming (gayest thing EVER) and some people even have bearspray - its like concentrated pepper spray - on their belts. Lame and expensive!! of course reubs and i had neither, we didnt even see one bear!! You have to hang your packs up in trees at night 4m off the ground. You cant even have lip balm or tooothpaste in your tent cos the bear will smell it and want to eat it!! (They don't have possums!!)

Yeah!!! My new camera takes photos underwater. I am now a half-out-half-in photo geek. Cool though ay? Shame you can't see the juicy delidious Spearhead Trout in this one...

REUBEN'S B-DAY WEEKEND

HI!!

So I guess you all know by now Reubs and I have broken up, I'll leave it at that...we are still hanging out and we'll keep in touch....

The mountains around Jasper where we work....


This week i have been doing some cool stuff, we got to drive the bobcat 4WD through the bushes-i had to drive in with a bucket load of cobble-stones-it was gnarly. Cool. I also had to do some dumb stuff - reubs and i mixed 3 10 hour days of concrete by hand in a wheel barrow- most of you will know how gay that is but hey, we did it for 3 whole huge days!! but we made some sweet stairs!! We even had to hike in the water!! But the driving the bobcat made up for it!

Reubs' birthday weekend was cool, we went to the Kootenays-a big area in BC with lakes everywhere, we went fishing yesterday, lost heaps of lures, didnt catch anything, went swimming heaps, was 32deg in the shade way way too hot for me!! Went downhill biking for the like 2nd time yesterday in Golden, holy shit it was gnarly, borrowed a buddies bike that was awesome so had a great time, everyone was in full face helmets and pads and stuff!! It was super gnarly (well maybe not but i thought it was!!) And man it was HOT!! another 30plus day!! Made me wanna buy a bike and take up a new sport!

Fishing in the Kootenay Lake


Reubs was feeling lucky cos he saw 6 bears on his birthday - including the tiniest baby bear anyone had ever seen, the Canadians recon it was only a few weeks old! We drove past them and the baby bear climbed up the tree like it was a cat! It was amazing!!
The mama bear is taller than Reubs when it stands on it's back legs, when she is standing like this it is at least up to your waist, the little baby is about the size of a fatty cat or small dog! oooh...

Our buddie caught a fish for lunch-a Bull Trout, pretty big, fed 6 of us, yummmmm...

OK well good to talk to yo all

keep commeting!!

xx KAT (and Reubs)
I am officially retarded. I guess once you put a picture on here you can't take it off ay? Ok well, here's me (sideways) rallying through the National Park in a Bobcat. And my cobblestones!

Spring!!

Hi well, first summer in pretty much ever...before my degree anyway...Got a sweet job landscaping for a company based outta Banff...the boss is totally rad which is awesome, one of the best bosses i have worked for...we are living in a tailer in Jasper at the moment, which is ok, we are getting paid $40 a day just to stay up there, which is good cos there is nothing to spend it on, and I'm not paying rent anywhere at the moment! We are working on doing up a site in the NAtional Park, a waterfall, we are building new railings and that sorta stuff, also re-doing the carpark and picnic areas, i get to play with lots of power tools which is fun...long days and good pay and nothing to spend it on (except paying dad back for my flights over here....) good weather summer is nice! Hopefully getting in one more day skiing tomorrow - it's the last day at Sunshine and the "Slush Cup" so costumes, drinking and crazy antics, then back up to Jasper on Tuesday (it's a long weekend here.) The end of the season was a crazy crazy time of drinking, skiing, BBQing, drinking, working hard, drinking and partying...and some rain which sucked!





So might be moving to Banff soon, it will be nice to live in a town with a supermarket and night-clubs - though Banff is some CRAZY tourist destination and i think it's a gong show all summer long. Went out the other night and there was some possibly Kiwi band doing Fat Freddies covers! It's great to be back in civilization!! So don't expect to hear too much, hopefully going on some road-trips to America soon if work permits!!





Here is a photo of the falls where we are working:

PS: Check out the next blog for PHOTOS OF OUR WEEK IN THE MOUNTAINS!

PHOTOS

HI, sorry this took so long...

oooh the peak....yeah, i think i told you but it was so good we had to ski it twice!


Some of the crew lining up in front of one of the lines we skied called "Death Gnar" (named by the guy in front-Marty - his parents own the cabin)

on the way up to the peak...that's the peak in the distance...

Did I mention that it was kinda a long way up?

Shannon and myself standing at the bottom VERY excited!!

Returning home to the cabin (the triangle building!) after another long day...

Aww, flying home...