It’s remarkable what you can borrow from the Public Library these days: telescopes, yoga mats and even books. This weekend I took home a pair of snow shoes!
Susan and I drove to Strathgartney Provincial Park, a picturesque yet lesser-known tract of meadow and woodland tucked away off the Trans-Canada Highway in the Bonshaw hills.
We were decked out in jackets, gloves and the thickest socks that would fit under our boots. I found a toque that would pull down over my ears while Susan produced the most extraordinary hat known to western civilisation! I had seen it lying on the back seat of my car and assumed it was a baby racoon but once donned and tied, it gave her the appearance of Deputy Dawg, an observation I was happy to share with her.
We slotted into our footwear, buckled up and headed out on a trail which had been groomed just enough to show its course and was solid ice with a surface of light snow. Susan is an expert and owns her own shoes, however I am a novice and found the experience a tad confusing at first. My twenty-five inch shoes seemed to find many ways of tangling with each other yet somehow amid unexpected leaps and stumbles, I managed to remain vertical.
The path ran uphill and down dale through birch woods eventually reaching the northern banks of the West River, frozen but for a small flow in the centre. We followed the river’s course for a while then forged uphill and away.
The trail inclined sharply at times causing us to catch our breath but the spiked shoes kept us sure-footed as gazelles (kinda). When the green siding of the day camps came into view and the distant sound of traffic returned we had been trekking for ninety minutes, time to head home for well-earned potatoes, sprouts, carrots and chicken (well, veg burger for some!)
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