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29.01.2008
Skiing and Skating
I know I told you I would be writting about how have I changed so far in the next post. However, we did two interesting things on this weekend and I feel like writting about them first.
We went to Forks two times – it's a place in Downtown where you can go skating on the river. It is said that they have the longest skating trail in Canada (don't ask me how long, i have no clue), but I was told today that Ottawa also claims they have the longest trail. I guess it might be interesting what will happen next. However, if they want to make the trail longer here, it's just the matter of going further with the machine that makes it.
As I said before one can go skating on the river there. The path is about 3 meters wide and there are lots of cracks in the ice, so one have to be careful not to kiss the ice too much. When you are skating, you sometimes here the ice cracking. It's kind of scary, especially for those who has skated on ice rings only before. It's so cool that you can simply keep going and there is virtually no need to turn round. We skated there before midnight and it had amazing atmosphare. It was pretty dark with light coming from the windows of the building in the city and almost no one there – just we and the ice.
The second thing was skiing in Birdshill provincial park which is about half an hour drive from Winnipeg. The park offers both classic and skating skiing trails , but the classic ones are a lot longer. There are basically two loops – 14 km and 4km. The trails interesect several times and they both lead to the "hill" with wooden view-tower. The terrain is not completely flat there, but the elevations have no more than 4 meter in height. There is also space for snow mobiles. In fact, my Canadian friend says that more Canadians snow mobiles than skies. In the summer, you can go swimming, cycling or just walking there. The entrance is for free (you just have to be an owner of a year pass for bucks which allows you to go to any public park you want). Nearly the whole park is a forrest, mostly oaks, but the trees are not high and there is also lots of undergrowth.
The temperatures during the weekend were way above normal – it was around -5. My friend from Brazil says that we paid to see the winter with lots of snow and temperatures around -50. However, it hasn't snowed for a month and it's kind of warm. In addition, we haven't seen any northern lights yet. Therefore, he says they should give us our money back :)
UPDATE: There was a snow storm yesterday, the windchill is now -44 and we got about 2 cm of new snow.
The atmosphare here is now pretty crazy – lots of students are coming home in the next couple of days, so we're trying to spend as much time together as possible. One feelscloser to each other and it's amazing how fast one can make new friends. It looks as thought everybody is unconsciously aware of the fact we might not seen each other anymore. One realizes that there isn't much time left.
For those who are leaving: It was so interesting to meet you, great to spend time together and I hope to see you soon again. Maybe in September at the Oktober Fest in Germany! Cya guys! Have fun!
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