Lynn Canyon...

"The person who lives life fully, glowing with life's energy, is the person who lives a successful life." -Daisaku Ikeda

The day after my little skate ski adventure I could feel all that I had done to my muscles. Come to think of it, make that the evening of my skate ski adventure I could feel it...

I was out with some friends enjoying a feast of sushi - no surprise there! After the allotted two hour limit of staying there, we were kindly asked to pay up. (Fear not, we made the most of the all you can eat in 2 hours guidelines!!) After dinner I tried to stand and realized this activity was going to be a) a challenge and 2) painful. And it wasn't because I ate my weight in sushi either! I was actually walking worse than my friend John, who was there and who was recovering from knee surgery! I even let him go down the stairs, to get out of the restaurant first as I figured I'd hold him up. Sheesh.

It was very apparant that my muscles were not used to doing activities like P90X or skate skiing. How terribly sad!

So when I woke up and realized there was the distinct possibility I'd need someone to help me out of bed, I decided I needed to do something to get my legs moving and hopefully flushing out some of the guck that was causing the pain. What better activity than walking!

At that point crawling was more what I wanted to do, but the challenge of walking beckoned so I asked my Moeder (mom) if she wanted to accompany me to Lynn Canyon.

I have been wanting to go to Lynn Canyon for the longest time. Even in the summer when I was out visiting. Don't know why - was just being pulled there - so I had to go. Unfortunately I never made it out, till now.

My Moeder took me to this area when I was a wee one. First you cross a suspension bridge - which has always been a bit of a nemesis to me. Then there are trails you can take that either bring you to some falls if you turn right, or a pool of glacier water if you turn left. When I was a kid we'd head to the glacier pool for a dip when it was hot out. One only really needed to dip a toe in to be refreshed because the water was that cold! It was also the most beautiful green colour and crystal clear.

Today we wouldn't be swimming in the pool, but walking to it under the protection of trees that stood as tall as the eye could see. If there was any question about the Lower Mainland of BC being a rain forest - one only needed to visit this area to realize it was true. Everything is green, green, green. I LOVE IT!

I managed to make it over the suspension bridge quite well. My technique is to look down at the bridge deck and not anywhere that I can see how high up we were and how much it would hurt to fall on the rocks and river below. Eeep. Luckily there was no one jumping up and down to make the bridge do a Galloping Gerdy move. I would have had to plow past them!

It actually didn't take to long to trek to the pool of water where the cliffs are. I spent most of the walk chatting with Moeder and taking deep breaths because it smelt so wonderful in there. I looked up at where people used to cliff jump, but it's grown over now. So I'm not sure if anyone still does that. It's rather tricky as there is a heck of a current that will pull you under, not to mention several rocks jutting out at rather inconvenient locations. Needless to say, there have been a few to lose their lives while trying to gain a spot in the Darwin awards.

After milling about there for a bit, I decided we should hike up the stairs nearby and see what's there. The stairs weren't installed when I was a kid, but I guess they wanted to make sure people stayed on one path rather than plodding along willy nilly. Not to mention it's rather steep so the stairs are quite handy.

After taking the first few steps I realized this might not be the best idea as my legs were complaining. As always, I ignored their complaints and kept going up, and up, and up. Not sure how many steps there were in this set of stairs, but I counted the second set, which were shorter, and there were 80 steps. So I figured we climbed at least 180 steps. Not too shabby I think!

There was more wilderness at the top that we walked through. We weren't really sure where we were going but managed to find our way back down to the bridge on a loop trail. No stairs on the way down either. Just before the entrance to the bridge we saw a wee doggie (with a very attractive raincoat, I might add) making a break for it - AWAY from the bridge. Seems I'm not the only one with a bit of trepidation! They finally got the little dog on the bridge and he and I pretty much raced along side each other to get to the other side. Thing is I didn't have a leash on me holding me back so I was able to beat him. Suckah!

After our walk we headed to a new little cafe they have in the park area. There is also an ecological building and learning centre too. I figured we deserved to have a treat so we got two hot cocoa's with chocolate drizzle and mini marshmellows. Very yummy. A good thing they were so good as the two of them cost a total of $9. I managed not to say 'Seriously???' to the young girl who robbed me. I mean, took my money.

My legs felt a bit better after the walk. The main point though was I had a great day with me Moeder and loved every minute of walking in the woods.

Some of the day in photos...

Photo 1: The Bridge...yipes....

Photos 2, 3 and 4: Everything is so GREEN!

Photo 5: Me Moeder with her fuzzy ear muffs!

Photo 6: A snippet of the river that runs through here.

Photos 7 and 8: The pool...check out the colour of that water!

Photo 9: This was the short section of stairs...

Photo 10: Looking down...gulp!

Photo 10: The reward! Yum.

Peace out my wonderful friends!