On Ski Doo

The last two Sundays we have been out 'on ski doo', which means we rode our snow mobile along some of the gorgeous trails around here.  Last Sunday warmed up to 6 below so it was perfect weather for it whereas today was minus 30 so we were a lot colder with the wind chill on top.  It seems that the colder it gets, the more beautiful the day appears so today the visibility was absolutely perfect.  For both rides we wore thermals, fleeces and then our snow mobile suits.  After that we put on balaclavas, fur boots, mitts and our helmets, it's so toasty warm getting dressed inside but as soon as you are on the ski doo you realise how essential all the gear is.  Our snow mobile has heated hand and feet warmers which are also essential items.

We rode along the Ironstone Trail, one of the many trails maintained by the White Wolf Snowmobile club. While sitting on the back I thought, this is what it's all about, it's beautiful!! I felt as though I was really experiencing the best that Lab City has to offer.  It had snowed the night before so the pine trees were laden with snow and often made arches over the trail.  I sometimes found it difficult to see where to ride as everything is just so white.  Half way along the trail we stopped at a cabin, the stove was burning and it was lovely and warm inside.  We saw some other friends and chatted over coffee before setting out on the return leg of the trail.

Today on the way home we stopped in at Tim Horton's for a coffee, parked our snow mobiles at the side and went in with all of our gear on!  I said to Steve "I would never do this at home!" but here it is normal to see riders stop for coffee dressed in their snow mobile riding gear.

Kristy and Steve at the Fraggle Rock cabin



The scenery along the trail

Coffee at Tim's



Happy chilly Valentine's Day

I tend to think of Valentine's Day as something that teenagers or new couples celebrate.  Here it is celebrated mostly by young children.  Cooper has been making Valentine decorations for the past week at Wee College including a specially decorated box to bring all of his Valentine's Day cards home in.  Wee College sent home a list of all the children's names in each class as well as a request not to personalise gifts as this would make it difficult for the teachers to distribute all of the gifts.  A friend in Montreal also gave me a heads up that Valentine's Day was big here too so I was appropriately prepared for today.  On the weekend Cooper and I made gifts for all twelve kids in his class, this was a small box of Dora/Diego loveheart chocolates, a pencil and a Handy Manny valentine card.

Cooper was so excited about his Valentine's Day party today, he wore his red skivvy and red shoes and took his bag of gifts and a fruit platter.  It did seem extra cold this morning but it was a gorgeous sunny day.  The fact that Steve's car wouldn't start this morning (he had to get someone to give him a jump start) didn't ring any alarm bells or the fact that the sign in the town playground said -37deg C so we drove to Wee College as normal.  We got to the car park and it was empty!  I called a friend and she told me that school was cancelled because it was -40 without windchill!!  It did seem cold but it didn't seem that bad, instead we went to Tim Horton's for a donut.  Happy Valentine's Day.

A traditional Newfie supper

This Sunday we tasted a traditional Newfoundland supper at Randy & Karen's place.  We ate roast moose, rabbit and pork as well, this is a slight variation on the traditional Jiggs dinner.

Randy had caught the rabbit, not sure about the moose and the pork leg was from his home town on the island (i.e. Newfoundland island).  I have eaten rabbit before, but this rabbit had a very strong flavour and I couldn't eat too much of it, maybe because it was wild rabbit(?) The moose was very tasty, it reminded me of lamb actually, but maybe it just looked like lamb rather than tasting like lamb.  Cooper kept asking for more meat so he obviously liked the moose!  Steve said the pork was very nice too.

The vegetables are cooked in a very big pot of boiling water on the stove.  Salt meat is added to the pot for flavour along with whole potatoes, whole carrots, half a cabbage, turnips and turnip tops (these are the greens). Pease pudding and bread pudding are also boiled in muslin bags in the pot.  Newfies love their gravy so a whole saucepan of gravy is made from the meat drippings and is generously poured over the whole meal.

As some people know, I eat and enjoy most foods so I went back for seconds (and thirds).  The pease pudding was especially good and the bread and onion pudding with gravy reminded me of eating stuffing, which I love.  To accompany the Newfie supper I made my first ever pavlova!  Karen, who lived in Australia for a few years, requested the 'desert made from egg whites'.  What a feast!

It's really getting cold now

I understand the weather a bit better now.  It's like when I moved to Queensland, I was used to Melbourne drizzle so when I saw it rain I would excitedly exclaim "it's raining!", the response from my work colleagues, in their Queensland drawl, was "that's not rain".  Apparently it was not heavy enough to be called rain, rain happened in summer, in the wet season.

Well, the same thing has happened here.  Everytime we say "it's cold today" we get responses like "you haven't seen cold yet", "wait until it's 50 below", "oh, we are having such a mild winter" etc etc.  It's strange though because I seem to be a whole lot less prepared for the weather than the Labradorians I see out and about, they are kitted out in massive jackets, mits, beanies, balaclavas while I still try and dress as light as I possibly can for that quick dash into Walmart.  I must admit that my fur boots are an essential item but a fleece jacket is normally OK for the 10m walk from the car to the Wee College doors. 

I have had comments though, "put on a jacket will you, you're Australian" or "OMG he's only wearing crocs!", it's all in good fun and for me it's more out of laziness, I find it too difficult to get the kids in the car, strap them in, look over my shoulder to reverse out the driveway with a massive jacket and gloves on, it really does restrict your ability to twist (or even move) in the car.

Anyway, these past two weeks were actually cold.  When I say I understand the weather better now, I have realised that the 50 below they refer to is normally with wind chill.  I kept looking at my phone or our temperature guage out the back window and seeing -20 or -30, maybe even -34 so I thought that the comments I was getting were right, it's just not that cold yet.  Then school was cancelled a few times due to cold weather, I checked it out on The Weather Network and I saw that there was a windchill warning.  For example, today is a lovely day, it's sunny and looks like you could just go outside with a t-shirt and shorts on, however the weather report at 8am was -28 but -41 with windchill!! Yesterday was -50degC with windchill.  Yes, it's getting cold now....