Trippin'

Well as you can see, Gord's cabin was anything but hell, even though there was no swimming to be had. (the weeds daunted even me, and besides, it was too cold.) We took off last Sunday as early as we could but not early enough, due in part to my crashing hangover. We'd been out late at Rime to see Jon's friend Rodney play at Rime and I got carried away with the red wine because our friend Sean was visiting from the Sunshine Coast. (Not that I'm blaming him for my drinking- that was all my fault.) Here is a nice moody picture of Rodney:

When we finally set off it was with a very excited Lotte, who settled down in the backseat and was basically a dream dog to travel with the whole 4 hours or so. I love traveling in BC- every highway is an adventure and since I don't drive, I get to gawk out the window the entire time. Gord's cabin is on Tunkwa Lake, which is just north of a tiny town named Logan Lake. Nothing good to say about LL except it has a prolific Marmot population. Looks like a small town where something ba-a-a-d happened years ago and they're still picking up the pieces. No heart to it, only marmots.
Anyway, Tunkwa is considerably nicer, although ringed with brown trees from the pine beetles. Gord's cabin is basic but comfy, and a good time was had by all, except for a few minutes when I took a scary 10-foot fall off a pulley Gord had built for his nephews and gave my head and elbow a good bang. I had technicolour bruising on my elbow that is still fading nearly a week later. We had roaring fires in the fire pit, gorgeous walks through fields and several Yahtzee tournaments. It was so fun to watch Lotte, such a city dog, get to know the great outdoors. She seemed to enjoy herself, although she is very clingy. Still, her mother recently died and her owner is away so it's not surprising, really. Here she is, posing in the tall grass and here are some spooky calves we met by the side of the road.

We only had 2 days up there and then we had to drive away because I had another road trip on Thursday- all the way to Williams Lake and back in less than 48 hours! That's well over 1000 km. Zeellia was playing a concert up there- part of a weekly concert-in-the-park series they do in the summer. We were a quartet: Russell, me, Carmen and Beverly so I had to do triple duty- more singing, more playing... I practiced for hours last week getting ready. This is what the countryside looks like most of the way up- it always reminds me of a model railroad set: you have your river, your train tracks, some scrubby sage bushes and a few scattered buildings every so often. I love this highway and very seldom get to drive it so it was a treat. I was an idiot and left my camera at the motel during the concert, but here is a picture of Russell practicing his euphonium before the show:
It went well (only an hour long at that) but of course I made mistakes because I had a lot of new material to know and I wish we'd had another couple nights of shows because it would've sounded great after a few more shows. However we had lots of fun traveling together- makes me look forward to future touring...

This is a bit of a catch-up entry 'cause I've been so busy lately so I'll stop for now. I'm still dog-sitting and Jimmy doesn't have internet (gasp) at his place, so I have to sneak home and update when I can. Illuminares is on tonight at Trout Lake so J & I will get the dog later and go check it out- if I get any good shots I'll post 'em here soon. Ta-ta.