If you haven’t seen it yet on TV, the following is our commercial:

You’ll be able to follow the link to our interview by clicking on our photo on Libro.ca…
or you could watch it here:

Hope you enjoy!!

On through Manitoba and time flew by as we entered Ontario again… then it stood still.  The last leg of our trip, we basically drove in shifts through the night – with Karl’s amazing ‘get up at 2 & drive till 6′ skills (the hardest part of the drive), we were back in Southwestern Ontario in no time.  I’m marveling at how close Toronto actually feels now after passing through and declaring Yay, we’re home!!

Being back to work and into a routine has been pretty stress free so far.  Looking back at the amount of work and the amount of events that we were attending before we left, I can’t imagine getting back into those 18 hour days anymore.  Life’s just not worth the stress! I am guessing that our lifestyle is going to head that way again (especially with a wedding to plan :) but for now we’re laying low.

I’ll close the trip now with some of our un-edited self-portrait engagement pics..
Yay getting married!!

Karl is taking every opportunity to marvel at his new PlayBook and use it wherever possible. It sure has made working on the road much easier.
The next stop after Jasper was Edmonton where we toured the mall and I reminisced about how I almost took a job as a designer for an Edmonton radio station before deciding to go back to Australia in 2009 (phew! Dodged a bullet there!).
We didn’t stay long in Edmonton but barreled through the province into Saskatchewan. While passing through Lloydminister, a town half in Alberta and half in Saskatchewan (sound familiar Kitchener-Waterloo?) and head about some Chuck-Wagon races that evening at the local pavilion. Always up for some spontaneity, Karl and I stopped to find that not only were we invited to the event but we could camp on the fairgrounds as well. Well, yee-haw, we jumped right in. The chuck-wagon races were brilliant and after we finally managed to work out the rules, they were even better. Following the races, we enjoyed a concert by Codie Prevost (a well known country singer in Saskatchewan).

The next morning we were up bright and early to continue our drive west. We stopped in at Elk Island national park for a quick tour. About five minutes drive into the park, we found ourselves surrounded by buffalo on every side! Oh wow, these guys are enormous!!! Their grunting noises sure sounded mighty but we learned quickly that they are gentle giants and didn’t seem to want to hurt us. Even though at a point we were so close to one of the males that I could have pat his head, I didn’t muster up the courage – plus they smelled.

And on we travel. Having covered all of Saskatchewan and Manitoba in one day, we’re well on our way to getting home.

We stopped along the way for some side-road gas-stove dinner.  There just so happened to be a sunflower field and a great photo op.

Having grown up in England, Karl finds it strange that I don’t identify more with the ocean as opposed to a lake. For me, I much prefer warm weather + lake than cold weather + ocean, like what we experienced today.
We spent the afternoon playing frisbee, napping on our rug in the sand and checking out the nice little stores in Tofino. The town here reminds me of Byron Bay, the town in Australia that I lived in with my friend Lindsay while touring that country. A very laid back feel and a no pressure attitude from the residents. We bought some art from a nice young girl at a market. (pics to come!)
Having left our lodging details much too late in the day for a weekend, Karl & I found ourselves without a campsite for the night. Having called every place we could find, we finally got to the bottom of the list and luckily found somewhere that had room for us – Mussel Beach. We ended up getting just a little bit nervous when our short drive became a slow and bumpy journey across an 8km, seemingly barely manicured driveway into the campsite. WOW, it was worth it! The friendly family owned business greeted us with smiles and let us choose from lots of gorgeous sites. Ours overlooked the ocean, with a fence of driftwood. A quick look at the rocky path to the water greeted us with hundreds of tiny crabs, hermit crabs and tiny fish. We later learned that the tide would come up and cover this section of land only hours later.

The next morning, Karl found a real masterpiece and was so excited to show me that I couldn’t even guess what the surprise was. He brought me out to the again walkable ocean floor to an area covered with hundreds of multicoloured starfish. Aaakkk!!! I wanted to take one home they’re so cute but opted to save a life and the smell in our car, so left the creatures alone.

We spent that afternoon hunting for shells & driftwood, watching whales, and lounging around the campsite … the first time we’ve really RELAXED this whole vaycay. One more night in Mussel Beach then we’re starting our journey back home. I can’t believe we’re as far west as we can go!! Now we’re east-bound!!

We also took a great walking tour of the city and really started to experience how chilly things can get on the west coast.  No more shorts for this one!  The dragon boat festival was also on in Victoria this weekend so the harbour was dressed up Chinese style and lots of fair-type vendors lined the parks and streets.

Later in the day, through our awesome friend Dana, we met up with a lovely couple out here and had ourselves a business meeting. Hope the connection works out, it would be great to have more excuses to come out west.
Off this evening to Nanaimo to stay in a lovely (and finally family friendly) camp ground.

Next stop, Kelowna, British Columbia. We spent one night just outside of Kelowna, BC. A great little town, I’d parallel with Niagara on the Lake for it’s quaint touristy feel and multitude of wineries and wine tastings. We visited Mission Hill Winery and even though it was about 10am in BC, we took the opportunity to try some delicious wines, tour the grounds and take some great pictures.  There was a ton of history in this estate as well as an art exhibition right on their property. Following our evening and morning in Kelowna, we continued our journey west to Vancouver.

We stopped in a few places, our favourite was Bridal Veil Falls where we climbed up some treacherous paths to a beautiful waterfall.  Photos!!

Once we arrived in Vancouver, we began touring the city like the regular pair of tourists that we are! We took in the sights across the harbour and really enjoyed the shopping in Gas Town.  One of the must-see’s on my list was checking out the yummy fresh fish in one of the many sushi restaurants in the city.  We found a great little hole in the wall very quickly and sure weren’t disappointed!  The fresh fish along with the generous portions will have me dreaming of Vancouver sushi for quite some time.

By late evening, it seemed that we had waited a little bit too long to find camping accommodations in Vancouver – which meant that I got to wake up in a real bed on my birthday! yay! Feeling older already, I really appreciated the extra comfort…  We spent my birthday wandering throughout Vancouver again, lunching at a local hot-spot and boarding the ferry headed to Victoria Island (& let’s not forget the on-board ice-cream for dessert, yumyum).

We camped for the night in Castle Junction, just past Banff, we woke and headed south. Taking the time to drive through the rockies, through Banff and then down to Radium Hot Springs was stunning.  Not only did we spy a bear cub at the side of the road calling for it’s mother, but we stopped at basically every sight seeing road-stop to take photos of the scenery.

At the hot springs, we enjoyed swimming in the hot mineral water for a relaxing afternoon. Heading back up the highway to the Trans Canada, we’re not entirely sure where we’ll stop next – you’ll be as surprised as we are ;)

Karl will also be writing about his experiences working from his new Playbook… So far he has been chirping away to me about it, but I think its worthy of its own post… So I’ll get him to write that up either on here or cutegecko.ca/blog, I’ll let you know!

Jeff’s birthday fell on our second day here (Happy Birthday Jeff!!) so we got to meet some of their friends and try out a few of their favourite local pubs. The great thing about visiting friends in a new city is all of the inside info about cool places to see. Our favourite was a day-trip to Inglewood, Calgary’s trendy area with Antiques, Arty stores and yummy breakfast cafe’s.
We also took a canoe trip at Glenmore Park – a great afternoon on the water, me pretending to paddle & Karl doing all the hard work.

Another day-trip during the week brought us to Head-Smashed-In-Buffalo-Jump (As recommended to us by Gavin).  This beautiful location is full of thousands of years of aboriginal history from hunting grounds to a physical location where their ancestors had guided dozens of buffalo herds off of a cliff in order to feast, store foods and use skin & bones for survival.  The sheer magnitude of this location’s past was incredibly intriguing.

On our way back from Head Smashed in, we stopped off in Nanton to peruse the antique shops as well as Claresholm where I picked up a beautiful pair of cowboy boots!!! All suited up for the wild-wild-west, Karl & I will be sure to find some horse-back riding along the way to take the applicable photos.

After some sad goodbyes (Thank you Meagan & Jeff!!!) and Karl picking up his brand new PlayBook (woot-woot, He loves it!), which he hasn’t stopped working on… We’ll be on the road again on our way to BC!

Saskatchewan was a blast. I still can’t believe how beautifully flat the Province was. Seeing a train in the distance, we could actually see the whole thing, front to back. They’re not kidding when they say that the sky in the praries is SO much bigger!

We left next for Medicine Hat, Alberta. At the Province border, we stopped at the information booth only to find out that we would be entering Medicine Hat just in time for their annual stampede!! (July 27th-30th http://www.mhstampede.com) What luck! Driving straight for the Stampede grounds, we lost little time, hoping to enjoy the whole day there. Noting carnival rides, vendors and lots of carnie food, our main interest was – get this – the Rodeo :)

This show was so incredibly enjoyable .. if you haven’t experienced the barrel races, calf roping and bull riding be sure to put it on your bucket list.

After the stampede, I got myself into a cowgirl hat and we headed to Calgary.

Calgary is a great city, lots of artistic touches (a big plus for me!) and close proximity to those beautiful mountains. We camped last night near Canmore, about an hours drive from the city (and found out the next day that there had been a Cougar attack… Wild!). In the not-too-distant distance, the beautiful scenery wowed us during sunset and became a great backdrop for our breakfast routine (Karl making omlettes and me trying to tidy and pack up).

We’re off now to visit with my friend Meagan from University to talk about weddings!! (they just got married :)
From there, we’re not too sure – we’re on the edge of our seats!

We have also been happily surprised about how effective it can actually be to work “on the road”. The data plans are holding up well and we’ve also been positively treated to really good 3G coverage and reception for the majority of the journey so far. That, combined with beautiful views, (only the occasional animal noise as distraction) means that getting work completed is surprisingly effective.

We left our last post in Winnipeg, a city which we ended up avoiding slightly – although, now know thanks to our friend Erica, Winnipeg is a place that I’ll need to see with new eyes during our drive back. Following Manitoba, we drove straight on along the Trans Canada Highway until we noticed a sign outside an old house saying “Old Geo’s Wild West Antiques, Whitewood Saskatchewan” – So in the nature of spontaneity and pulling over to experience new sites, we thought we would check it out. What an experience that turned out to be…

We pulled into the driveway, and immediately noticed hordes or discarded “antiques” that hadn’t made the grade to be brought inside… which began the experience.

Karl made his way along a creaky old porch and rang the doorbell, only to realize after that to his left was a 6 foot high pile of animal bones… which immediately made him think twice about pulling over.

With that, the shadowy appearance of a pioneer gentleman with flowing white beard revealed itself through the doors window. He began kicking and pulling the door to try and get it to open. At this point Karl and I were seriously thinking twice about what we were doing there.

Once the door was open, we were greeted with “Sorry about that, I haven’t used the front door in a while, people usually come around the back…” we were ushered in and were surrounded by the largest, most eclectic and amazing bunch of post 1800 antiques and items you have ever seen! Buffalo & Mooseheads on the wall and to our delight, we found ourselves in front of another family that had also decided to pull in and check the place out. Then another couple came in… and another…
We had stumbled into one of the least publicized, most attended attractions in Saskatchewan.

Old George

Old George led us on a tour of his house and then (even more remarkably) to a tour of a recreated 1800 pioneer town in his back yard, with genuine original buildings that he had collected and brought back to his home. Over the last 16 years, he had set them up with period pieces and personality – it was truly amazing and definitely worth a visit – we would certainly recommend to anyone to check this place out! You can even stay in one of the recreated pioneer cabins that he has on his land and pay him whatever you feel its worth. Needless to say, its one of the highlights from our trip so far! Check out some of the pictures and details on his site (facebook) OldGeorge.ca

Next, on to Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. What an adorable town! (Although we are asking that a design warning be issued for their website. We took the opportunity to tour The Tunnels of Moose Jaw and learned about a vast array of local history from bootleggers during prohibition with links to Al Capone, to the struggle of Chinese immigration in Canada’s early years.

Moose Jaw is also home of a Temple Gardens mineral spa with warm, mineral rich waters piped in from a kilometer away, just for our enjoyment. Luckily, after dealing with work most of that day, we could relax and enjoy the water. What a great way to unwind (and a welcome luxurious break from provincial campgrounds!)

We also ran into a little gem called the Dutch Bakery – delicious smells wafting out the door drew us in to try the warm, fresh flavours of cinnamon rolls, apple turnovers, apple danishes, coconut walnut cookies and a meat pie for Karl (yes, we ate all of this for a total cost of about $4) Nom nom..

Our next stop will be Alberta! Having never seen the mountains before, this will certainly be a highlight of the trip.. Can’t wait!