The day after Ryan's and Guin's wedding, Colin and I went for a short backpacking trip into the Gwillim Lakes in Valhalla Provincial Park. We spent one night up at the wonderful campsite and on each of the two days we scrambled up to ridges high above, which provided glorious views of the peaks beyond and the deep valleys below. The many lovely lakes provided welcome respite from the hot hot sun. You can see in the last picture the smoke haze from forest fires.

My beautiful son Ryan, and his equally beautiful partner Guin, said "I do" on July 18th, in the Slocan Valley of south central British Columbia. The ceremony was held in a lovely meadow in the forest above Little Slocan Lodge where the rest of the festivities took place, over the weekend.















My other son, Colin was the Best Man. Guin's dear friend Valerie was the Maid of Honour.
Signing up! It's a done deal! Best Wishes to you both, my dears!
After a photo session with the bride and groom, all the guests and honourees assembled for a fabulous buffet dinner, outside the lodge. When the dishes were all cleared away, the dance party began and carried on until the early the next morning (for some!).
All in all it was a fabulous weekend of visiting with friends and family, relaxing in the lush mountain surroundings, and going for cooling swims in the Slocan River, with the majestic Valhalla Mountains overlooking the goings on.

First ever blog entry for me!

Here I go, into the scary world of blogging!!! What have I done?? Well, I guess we'll just have to wait and see how this all works out in the long run.

Hopefully it will become a reasonably concise journal of my upcoming travels to Eastern Europe. If I figure out how to add photos and stuff, that would be a good thing! I'll try to make sure that I get it all sorted out before I leave in October. Meanwhile, maybe I'll get some summer photos up from a few hikes and from Ryan's and Guin's wedding.