Oh Canada

We landed in Vancouver and were warmly welcomed by the McFarlane's. Just before we walked out the door Mike commented that there was only a 40% chance of rain... Great! and yet as we walked out the sprinkles started to fall. It looked to be a regular rainy day! But Mother Nature was kind to us and as we rode around Stanley Park the sun came out and even the clouds parted to see the peaks in the distance.
 

Riding around Stanley Park

Sara Modelling

Next was the perfect dry champagne powdered peaks of Big White. The conditions were boarding (haha get it?!) on close to perfect. We were spoilt with snow falling on 3 out of our 6 days totaling an impressive 25 cm. Scott managed not to break any bones avoiding fallen logs as he went off track and Sara even got some air as she stacked it head over tail. Our ski in - ski out was awesome allowing us to be on the slopes a few minutes after waking up and also to pop in and defrost at lunchtime. In our kitchenette we got busy and cooked up a storm... We even baked a cake! Scott couldn't resist another serving of buffalo wings at the bargain price of 35c each!! Big White was incredible... Boarding on powder is like floating down the mountain and falling into piles of feathers. Super cool!!

Rad Snowboarder...

We celebrated Aussie Day with the McFarlane clan and enjoyed a scrumptuous meal and some good Canadian Beer!!! Then with high hopes of another super week of boarding we whisked ourselves to Whistler Blackcomb mountain.

From the bottom of the gondola the mountains are a maze of literally hundreds of runs. Run by run we started to tick them off. The conditions are good (Sara's standards are very high post Big White), a thick icy base layered the slopes and we were very lucky to have 12 cm falling 1 day out of the 6. Blackcomb was by fair our favorite mountain. The village is much big than Big White - people are out and about all hours of the day with plenty of cosy cafes to relax in, tasty restaurants (we even treated ourselves to a nice meal) and plenty of shops!!

 Setting Sun on Whistler

 Whistler Valley

Blackcomb Mountain

Happy Couple...

 Beautiful, Perfect, Powdery Big White

 This is why it is called Big White!

French Canada

Montreal in a few words: beautiful, unique and bloody freezing!! We had a fun day exploring and practicing our quite pathetic French (there is alot of room for improvement - merci can only get you so far!!) With temps of -15'C (not including the wind chill!!) the thermals made an introduction and any exposed skin meant instant numbness. Now Sara has seen what a real snowfall in a city looks like, as 5 inches fell on our last night... Brrrrrrr!!

Notre Dame, Montreal

Montreal Skyline

We made a beeline north for a short trip to Quebec City. Wow! An absolutely stunning part if the world!! Well worth the detour (thanks for the recommendation Nan & Pa and Shaz). We explored the quaint little city and were awed by it's stunning surroundings and spectacular architecture and history. We came across a Harry Potter old skool library with it's own slightly old and quite odd librarian. It had books from the 1500's in its collection!! As you would all know food is a big part of this trip so of course we managed to squeeze in a few French Canada specialities... Sara thought the Poutine was tamer than what she expected and will request extra cheese curd and gravy when we next indulge. Also snuck in some tasty crepes and had our own fondue party, which included three courses of cheese, Chinese and chocolate; and ultimately resulted in us both collapsing in a food coma back in our room.  

 Sara indulging in some tasty crepes

 Scott salivating over fondue

 Beautiful Quebec City

 Ancient Library (ex-Prison)

 Quebec Fortifications

Picture Perfect Quebec

Then a back to New York so we could start our narly snowboard adventures!!