Meandering through the wintery days...

Well, well... what do we have to show for some three weeks of the new year?

I could, perhaps, start with the most recent: astronomy! Last night the moon and mars were dutifully aligned and about 2 degrees apart from our earthly position. I tried, ever so hard, to get a good shot of this but the trifecta of cold-snow covering everything-freezing cold did not allow for this. However, I did get a few naked-hand shots of the pair. They are both blurry, of course, but the effect is not lost.

Now I go back a few days (perchance a week or two) and dip into the skiing photo's - with a brief Bohemian Waxwing interruption. Our first night ski adventure was not at all overly welcoming as the cold became more of a burden than a delight, and the snow conditions (I am thinking also because of the cold) were not he greatest. So, add up two inexperienced skiers, complete darkness, unknown trails and trail conditions, and you have a martini-like mix of good experience and bad taste. It was fun, evident by our smiles, but it was more of a challenge. However, being out again in the dark I must admit that it is now preferred - being about in the dark and snowy wonderland of the northern conifers, guided only by fleeting moonlight, and following vistas of sessile constellations...it is a most wonderful experience. What a way to end a workday.

Above: Me, cold.

Below: More congregations of the Bohemian's.

Above: Crystal skiing so fast that even our camera couldnt keep up (or, more likely, the shutter speed was too slow!)

Below: Fancy feet of ski-tastic desire.

And then, it flooded. Much earlier in the year, to be correct it was last year, the Nechako river froze, jammed and flooded. It has been a political blight on our fair town up here in the north, and a reservoir of pain, damage and anger has been festering ever since. Everyone is blaming everyone, but the fact remains that this is nature, businesses and homes developed on a floodplain, and the mix therein eventually came to fruit - the river flooded its floodplain. There is no succinct amend to this disaster but to wait, it seems, until the spring thaw.

We took a drive to see the river recently, and have these pics to show for it.

Im standing on a berm that was built to keep the water off the roadway (the road only access a refinery and two mills). to my left is the river proper - covered with ice.

Another view of the river itself. The mill you see across the river has been shut down for over 2 months now I believe. There is a hectic effort by workers to keep the ice and water away from it, but nature has, and will, and will always, win over human desires. As it should.

That's the view from our latitude - happy wintery days!