Grouse Mountain

Last week we flew from Geneva to Vancouver for a little bit of R & R before meeting up with Emily in Mountain View after their holiday in Spain. I'd been to Vancouver several times and liked the city, but Dot had never been there and was willing to give it a go. Moreover, we had a mutual friend, Laura Bryce, who used to live in Armidale but had returned 5 years ago to live in Vancouver, and we wanted to meet up with her. However beautiful the city and its surrounds, the weather in Vancouver can be awful and it was not good during much of our stay, with maximum temperatures in the 13 - 16C range and lots of drizzling rain among the scudding clouds which hung low over the surrounding mountains.

The last day of our visit was billed by the forecasters as the best of the lot and we decided to chance our arm on Grouse Mountain which broods over the harbour to the north of the city centre. In essence, Grouse Mountain is a replica of the Swiss ski resorts we had just visited, with cable cars, ski lifts, a 'chalet', walking trails and other snow oriented paraphernalia. Vancouver is lucky to have these facilities so close to the city centre. However, the weather on Grouse Mountain did not live up to the forecasters' expectations, although the city itself was bathed in sunlight! We also had a good opportunity to see some of the local wild-life.

The view from the gondola car as we soared over the mountain was beautiful as this picture shows,

but as we rode up through the gathering mist,

we emerged into a freezing world of snow and ice. Yet the altitude was only about 1500m, whereas the snow-line in Switzerland was a full 1000m higher. And the ambient temperatures in the Swiss snow-fields were also much higher - I felt really cold on Grouse Mountain, perhaps because of the clinging mist.

Still, Grouse Mountain had a lot to recommend it. There were lots of wood carvings like those show here of three dudes playing a variety of sports.

And we managed to meet some local wild-life like this grizzly bear and the wolf show asleep in the grass.

We took a ride on the poorly patronised chairlift, which would have been brilliant on a clear day.

And there was a wonderful wood chopping display in which two dudes competed in a variety of events - cutting timber, racing up tree trunks, carving wood, and the log-rolling  shown here! This was great fun, especially as the participants were likely to fall in the water and duly did much to my sadistic pleasure!

AS