Christmas Greetings from Yukon

  Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada
Friday, December 19, 2008

Dec/08
I guess this will be our Christmas entry.
We are getting used to the lack of light. It is kind of weird going for a walk at 2:00 pm and having your shadow extend out 50'+. The sun only gets up about 5 degrees above the horizon. Only 13 day to go and the days will be getting longer. The sun is up around 10:00 AM so we don't get it together until 11 to go skiing or into town. We're finding that our area of Wolf Creek although only 10 minutes south of town tends to be 5-10 degrees colder than Whitehorse. This AM (Dec 10) I drove a friend to the airport at 6AM and it was -20 here and when we got to the airport the thermometer on the truck said -10. We appear to be just on the edge of the winds

Cheryl and Cedar

coming down off the mountains from the south. It's not a Chinook wind with the Chinook arch cloud pattern but it does warm up the city. Mt Sima, which is right behind us, has a weather station at the top and the temp is at -7C right now.  We have had cold stretches though. I learned the hard way what I used to inherently know in northern Manitoba, 30yrs ago. Be ready for anything! I didn't plug in the truck one night and it went down to -38.  Even after I plugged it in for 4 hrs the truck wouldn't go. I had to pull the battery, warm it up inside, charge it, re-install it, all at -38, to get it going.( ever tried to turn a 10mm nut with bare hands?) The battery now has an electric battery blanket around it and the truck gets plugged in every night. I also throw a space blanket over the hood and an old duvet. I also bought a 600 amp battery eliminator to help jump start the truck if all else fails.

Hugh and Cedar

 
We now have been skiing for 6 weeks. Looking at the weather down south skiing is just getting underway in Canmore and Winnipeg. The only drawback of this, is that we may be burnt out on skiing by the end of Jan. To combat this we are heading off to Whistler Callaghan Valley in mid Jan to ski and watch the XC World Cup at the site for the 2010 Games. It won't be a change from skiing but a change of venue. We're assuming Jan will be cold up here so getting 'out' may be a good thing. We are taking out Tele gear so will do a day or so of skiing at Whistler Blackcomb. We've rented a Condo for 5 nights.
 

-35C day

After a few weeks of no snow and the snow pack getting thinner, we got new snow. I've been out packing and tracking the ski trails at Mt McIntyre a few more times now. There were 5 of us yesterday, packing the new snow. It was quite a sight, seeing 5 twin tracks staggered out on a trail.  This new snow allowed the club to finally bring out the Pisten Bulley which can pack and groom a trail in one pass.  That means less snow time on the twin tracks for me but better trail grooming. Most of the trails are wide enough for the big machine but we will still be out after a snow storm packing.
We celebrated my birthday with a ski tour right out or back door around the trail we have been packing and ski tracking for the last 6 weeks. A bunch of friends came over and we skied then came back for mulled wine and munchies. It was one of those good ski days where even though it was cold everyone was dressed for it and we had a great ski. The temperature has now dropped with highs in the -20s and lows of -30s. However, today (Dec 15) it was -42 in Canmore so we are sitting up here smugly at -23.
 
 
Our curling is going well. Both our teams are hit and miss in the win column. Some nights we are crap and others we can do no wrong. It's such a mental thing. Our Thurs night league has a lot of good teams. We curled against last years Briar reps for the YT/NWT and actually were in the game. No, we didn't win....We also curled against the Jr women's team that has been to the Cdn Jr Championships. They have a coach that marks every shot they make.  They,'high 5', after every shot and are always communicating back and forth. ( 6,6, T line!, hard for line! HARD for line! Hurry girls HURRY...!)  We just about beat them and lost it in the last end.
We have also been teaching curling in the school program that goes on every day. We've worked with Gr 1 kids and grade 11s. This program acts as a feeder system for the club. There is an after school program on Thursdays and a more advanced program on Saturdays called little Rockers.
 
( if you don't curl ignore the next two paragraph as you may nod off )
Both Cheryl and I have started throwing rocks using a stabilizer instead of our brooms,( the kind Dave Nedohin uses). I find my shoulders are square to the broom and I can actually hit the broom more consistently. I also find I'm more stable while I slide and I can concentrate on my weight. Up here I'd say 30% of the folks use them.  Now, with our new Asham curling shoes we have higher expectations.....LOL!!!
 
We also have started to time our rocks. Cheryl has a stopwatch on her broom handle and I use a regular stopwatch. We time, T to hog for draws only, and it has helped in judging weights. I find I have to adjust for the individual style of delivery though as we all seem to throw rocks differently.
 
After not having gone to a dance other than wedding receptions for many years we went to our second dance in a month called the Senior's Soiree which is a fund raiser for the Hospital fund. The name 'Seniors' gave us pause cause we're not Seniors......yet!
We met at a neighbour's house for drinks and then on to the dance. It was really fun as we had a table of eight and we spent most of the time up on the dance floor doing butterflies and waltzes. It was a fun night and we found we actually knew other people at the dance whom we had met over the summer, so we are starting to feel like we are part of the community.
 
We now have been 'travelling' for over 6 months. It doesn't seem that long and as the year comes to an end, we've been looking back, thinking how lucky we are. We have great friends at home in both MB and AB.
We've lost one friend and one Father this year. That is more than enough incentive to keep travelling and try something new each day.
We've met a lot of great people in the past year and hope this adventure keeps giving us those experiences.
 
Have a great holiday season!  Let us know how things are in your world.