This is me and Trish having supper. Don't worry there's a better picture of Trish at the end. This is taken in the evening so you can't see the incredible view that she has of Hudson Bay Mountain out her windows. I would just sit and eat my breakfast and stare out the window at the beauty.
PS A lot of my pictures of this trip won't be fabulous as I am using my timer on the camera and taking it by just setting it on a shelf or railing.
This is that great view that I was talking about of what Trish sees out her house. It snowed almost every day that I was there so there was quite a bit of cloud cover. You can just make out the mountain on this day. Notice the tree in her yard. It not only has food for the birds but she has left apples hanging on the tree for the moose. Yes, believe it or not the moose come right through her yard. I didn't see any this time but my aunt saw a huge moose in her adult complex.
The Snow Queen
In the morning I would go to the Bulkley Lodge where my uncle lives now. I was very impressed with the kindness and care of the workers there. We would play crib and talk. The first day I won the crib game but then the next day he won ALL the games and even skunked me on one game. I'm sure I'll never live that one down. We laughed and had a great time.
One of the days we went out for the morning.
We went out for tea and coffee at the "Aspen"
We went for a drive and I saw my old junior high school - Chandler Park. It's not used any more.
And then we met a group from the lodge at the Hudson Bay for a lunch out. Uncle Bill and I are at the very end of the table. 
On one of the afternoons on my way to my Auntie Marg's the clouds cleared and the mountain showed herself. Isn't she beautiful. Now, I have to tell you that Smithers doesn't just have one mountain to see. There are mountain ranges all the way around the valley. Spectacular is really the only word to use. The awesomeness of the mountain reflects God's glory and majesty so well. Seeing the mountain brought back memories of hours of looking at the mountain. It's no wonder that I marvel at the beauty of mountains when I grew up surrounded by them.
In the afternoons after a short rest I would go and visit with Auntie Marg. We would have our tea and visit. It was delightful.
Here she is knitting me a couple of dish cloths. Not that I love doing dishes but I will always have pleasant thoughts of you, Auntie Marg when I do the dishes with the cloths. Love you.
On Saturday evening Trish and I were at Auntie Marg's for supper and a visit.
On Saturday afternoon I went out to Telkwa to visit a friend, Connie, from Elementary School that I have kept in contact with all these years. Telkwa is about 10 - 15 min out of Smithers. I grew up in Telkwa.
Here, Connie and I are standing at the "Eddy". The Bulkley River flows through Telkwa and at this point forms an eddy where I'd often go to sit by the river. It was a beautiful place - very contemplative. As you can see in the background is the majestic Hudson Bay Mountain.
Here I'm looking from the eddy up the river to where the Telkwa river joins the Bulkley. A train bridge crosses the Telkwa River - you can barely make it out at the end of the picture.
Here's another view
The Eddy again.
Then Connie and I went for a little car tour through the town area. It all seemed so close and small now. And yet when I was a kid it seemed a long ways from one end of town to the other. So we crossed the bridge over the Bulkley and drove down the Coalmine Road and met a train at the crossing. Just hearing the train brought back memories of being down by the rivers where they join and being tempted to walk across the train bridge. I wasn't brave the day my friends and I talked about it and later that day a man was killed on the train bridge. People would cross the bridge to go fishing on the island. So...I never did cross the bridge. Now, apparently, there is a footpath on the bridge so it is safer to cross.
This is my old elementary school. Telkwa Elementary. Connie and I talked about our favourite teachers. We both agreed our grade 7 teacher was one of our favourites. But I had many happy memories from that school. Like how our Grade 5 teacher, Mr. Challen taught us gymnastics and I did gymnastics from morning to night. When we travelled to Terrace for a competition that was the Olympics of my life.
This is house that my Dad built after we had lived in Telkwa a while. If you will notice there is a little hill to the right of the house. Well...that's the hill that I broke my leg on - yup - spiral break. My bindings didn't come off and my leg twisted something fierce. And remember me telling you that Telkwa was only 10 mintues from Smithers - well when you have a broken leg let me tell you that every bump and jolt along that 10 min feels like hours to get to the hospital. And then I had to wait for an hour or so until the technicians and doctors arrived at the hospital to set it. Oh....stories.
And if you look just above the roof of the house there are houses on the hill - well, there weren't houses there when I grew up there. There was only a couple of houses. Telkwa has really grown.
This is the hill behind our place where we would tobogan - Tower Hill. We also would go toboganning on Dangerous Hill, which was at the end of the lane. It was very steep. It is now blocked off from traffic - I imagine because it was so steep.
This is the church that Dad pastored. It's not a church anymore. I remembered it so much bigger. The first part on the left (the first window) was where we lived. And then the next two big windows were the church auditorium. And then the rectangle part at the end was a foyer, nursery, and two bathrooms, and then upstairs was a big open room for banquets, crusaders etc. Downstairs were Sunday School classrooms. Now, the thing that I don't understand is how on earth we all fit in there every Sunday. We had well over 70 people for Sunday School every Sunday and even some Sunday we broke a record and had over 100. Where did we put them all - look how small it was. But I do remember that it was fun.
The church was just across the street from our house.
This is a picture of the Catholic Church. It was beside our church. Father Hetric was always very nice to me but he would scold me if I started down the hill with no hands on my handle bars of my bike....
...because it was always a goal of mine to ride down this hill with no hands, cross the highway, turn the corner by the river, cross the bridge, cross the train tracks and ride down Coalmine Road. I kept trying but never made it all the way to Prices' house with no hands.
