Last Thursday, Tracey, Mackenzie, Edzèa and I hiked out to Cameron Falls. It’s about an hour drive out along the Ingraham Trail (the end of the road). We had fairly good weather. No sunny skies but it was about +5. We made sandwiches from the leftover Thanksgiving turkey which we had at the falls and the girls enjoyed the outing. We both appreciated our husbands a little more as we realized how heavy it is to hike with your child on your body. There was a little bit of ice along the way so we had to be extra careful. We passed an inukshuk sculpture garden that had obviously been created over the summer hiking months. In the picture of all four us, I had set my camera up for self-timer and the inukshuk that we were crouching beside toppled towards us at the moment the picture was taken. (see pics under Froehler Travels if you are interested)

The hike itself isn’t very long. Tracey and I took pictures along the way in the hopes that we’ll be able to do some paintings whenever our children allow us some time!!! Tracey and I are both artists…or we used to be! Once we arrived at the Falls, we were ambushed by whiskey jacks. The girls were fascinated by them. Tracey tried to get Edzèa to look at her to get a photo of us but Edzèa was much too interested in the birds to look at Tracey.

On our way back, we were lucky enough to catch a glimpse of an Arctic Hare that was in the middle of changing it’s colour for the winter. We got one good shot before he/she bolted.

It was a very peaceful afternoon as both of the girls like the outdoors and love to be carried. It was quiet and lovely out there with no one else on the trail. We figured that this would be our last hiking opportunity for the fall as the cold weather is just starting to peek it’s head in. It was actually -4 over the weekend although it warmed up to +8 today.

Edzèa has had a bad cold/fever today which I figured out a couple of hours before going to Infant CPR so her Daddy was able to come home and look after her while Mommy went and took the brief training. We have a free post-natal program that we go to every Monday afternoon that hosts a variety of topics of interest to parents. This week was the Infant CPR. Next week, they are hosting a little Halloween party for us. I will post pics when I have them. I’m off to bed now as I have a feeling it may be a long night with poor little sick child. I broke the bank tonight and bought her a new little aquatic mobile that she loves (Mackenzie has one).  It has worked already as she woke up once already in discomfort. I turned the musical mobile on and she went straight back to sleep after staring at it for a while. It looks like a real aquarium that has water, lights, bubbles, fake fish/seaweed etc. in it and soothing music to lull babies to sleep. It works! G’night.

I’m sitting here this morning in our house sipping on my *special delivery* Starbucks coffee. *Special Delivery* in that we had to travel a very long way to get it. 14 hours each way but it was worth it!! We had to go to a place called Grand Prairie in Alberta *with* our car to get two more computerized keys for it before winter set in. We were down to one key after the local automotive shop took our other one to put into our engine for our remote start. This left us with one key to *never* lose. This didn’t make us feel very comfortable with a baby around so we had to trek all the way to the closest Nissan dealership to get another key. Apparently, we can’t get our keys just made at Canadian Tire. We needed a special computerized key that could only be made *with* our car present.

I learned something new about my husband along the way. Apparently, he does not like driving. This, I did not know. I, on the other hand, love driving so we split the drive accordingly. There is nothing quite like the freedom of *hands-free* after you’ve had a baby. You sit back, listen to good tunes and watch the beautiful fall scenery.

We left Yellowknife at 1:30pm on Friday afternoon and Edzèa was brilliant. She and I had just gone to our song and storytime in Yellowknife and she was very happy. She slept on and off for most of the day. The trip took us longer than normal as she had to be fed every two hours or so.  We are still having beautiful fall weather up here so the drive was fantastic. The leaves have all fallen off of the trees but it’s still a lovely drive. If you look at our Thanksgiving Trip gallery under Froehler Travels, you’ll see some of the shots we got in a small park in Alberta that still had leaves aplenty.

We arrived at about 3:30 am in Grand Prairie which was kind of horrible. Edzèa only slept for another 3 hours and then was ready to wake up so Tim took her and had breakfast to let Mommy sleep. They then went and had our keys made at the Nissan dealership across the street and came back at 10:30 with mission accomplished and ready to drive home. Yuck. I was hoping that I could do a little shopping but realistically, we needed to head home. I only made Tim promise that I could buy a coffee and coffee beans at a Starbucks if they had one. There happened to be one in the local Safeway where we were shopping for our road food.

I really enjoyed our drive home as it reminded me of when my Dad and I had travelled up North over four years ago to my new job and life. We made that trip in August of 2004 and there was greenery all around. I hadn’t seen flora and fauna along that road since then, as the next time Tim and I drove south, it was March and everything was covered with snow. It’s a truly spectacular drive uncovered with snow. As you can see from our pics, there were bison everywhere! I’ve included a photo of the sign for “Indian Cabins” which Dad will remember fondly! or gratefully! It was our lucky stop for gas as we had no idea how strategically you needed to plan for gas when you head North!

We ended up going through Grimshaw which was a spot that Dad and I had motel’ed on the way up. I swore I’d never stay there again but it was about 2am as we drove through and I was getting tired. We forged ahead as I just couldn’t stay there again. It was a dive. Funny how my perceptions have changed though. It didn’t look as bad after all of my time in the North.

On our way home on Saturday, I found myself wanting to take countless photos. It was strange going from such an isolated town to what seemed like massive traffic, stores and people. I notice way more things than I did before I lived in Yellowknife. Tim was getting kind of tired of the constant stops so a lot of the photos taken along the way were taken from inside the car as you’ll see through the cracked windshield.

We saw a pond-full! of Canadian geese heading south. I’d never seen that before! They were really loud. I filmed a clip but haven’t figured out how to include it in this blog yet.

We only made it as far as High Level on Saturday, as Edzèa was not happy being in her car seat for another day long trip so we stopped and stayed overnight in a motel. I have to say that the Super 8 motels are fantastic for service. We woke up and were on the road again at 4:30am the next day in the hopes that Edzèa would sleep for most of the trip home. The Super 8 manager had coffee and breakfast ready for us!

Luckily, she did sleep for the majority of the trip home. As you can see from our photos, we didn’t pass the 60th parallel which is the Alberta/NWT border in the light but we took photos anyways and although Edzèa wasn’t awake, she has been there now!

When we were about 150km south of Yellowknife I had been thinking about why I always see so many bison on the road but I had never seen any caribou. No kidding within two minutes of me thinking that, two caribou appeared on the road up ahead of us. Tim sped the car up and I attempted to get a shot through our sun roof. Apparently, the glare of the sun on my lcd display had me take shots of white rocks. I did not get the caribou shot. I was soooo disappointed! That was the first time I’d ever seen caribou on the road. I’ve seen lynx, moose, bison of course, owls, wolverine, wolves, lots of bear but never caribou!!! Aaahhh!!!

That was near the end of our trip. We stopped briefly at North Arm Park so that I could get some pics. This is the park that I do a field trip with my students each September to do landscape drawing/painting. We spend a day at the park, have a campfire, a picnic and usually an elder accompanies us to do some storytelling.

Once we got home, we got ready quickly and headed out to our friends, Tracey & Markham’s forThanksgiving dinner. Not quite like home but it’s our family away from family.

Enjoy our pics and Happy Thanksgiving!

P.S. Edzèa knows her name now!