Banff Day Trip

Yesterday was another amazing day of travelling around Alberta. I have been so blessed this whole trip with weather that has been nothing short of spectacular. My friends Chris and Sarah live in a town about an hour south of Calgary so I went to go visit them. We then went to Banff for the day.
Banff is a real tourist friendly town. When I first arrived, I thought that I would feel awkward taking pictures in the town but it didn't take long until I saw other people doing the exact same as me. I just love the placement of the town because no matter where you look, you are surrounded by the beauty of mountains. I couldn't imagine what it must be like to wake up every morning and be reminded of God by way of seeing the mountains. I am intrigued by how each peak is completely different from another.
After lunch, the three of us took the gondola up Sulphur Mountain to the top. I felt like I was on top of the world. Seriously, on top of the world! I was short of breath while hiking to the old weather station which was on the top of the peak. The view was spectacular! I don't even think that the word spectacular can describe it. I really couldn't believe what I was seeing. I could see the TransCanada highway heading towards Lake Louise, the Bow River snaking through the valleys of mountains, the tree lines that never ended at a specific elevation but at very different spots along the mountains, the clouds running their course through the mountain peaks, it was all very breath-taking.
Well, I did do more that day in Banff. The three of us saw the Banff Springs Hotel. It's massive! What I didn't know is that it was built by the CP Rail. When I heard that, it made sense to me as of why it looks like a castle-sized CP Rail station which is essentially what it is. We then went to the hot springs. There is a strong, strong scent of sulphur but apparently the minerals in the water are really good for the skin and some have gone as far as to say that they have been healed because of the water.
I have once again been struck by amazement of God's creation and the thought and effort he put into it. I am thankful to have such a love for the outdoors and all that God has created.

Jasper National Park

Today was an amazing day! In the past, I have heard about the rockies and how majestic they really are. The snow, the tree lines, the animals, the villages, etc. but pictures can only do so much justice. I, like anyone else who has seen the rockies, suggest that you go see them because they ARE just as beautiful as any one person can describe.
I went today with my Dad's cousin Ron and his wife Monique. They took me to Jasper for the day to see the mountains since I have never seen them before. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. They were beautiful. So tall, so jagged, each cliff took on a different shape from another, and so...well, WOW! I felt 100% completely in my element. I am surprised my neck isn't more sore from me constantly turning my head to look at the consistently different cliff sides.
Oh how great and majestic are you Lord! I am left with a consumation of aweness at your beauty.
Psalm 95:1-7a
"Come, let us sing for joy to the LORD;
let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation.
2 Let us come before him with thanksgiving
and extol him with music and song.
3 For the LORD is the great God,
the great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are the depths of the earth,
and the mountain peaks belong to him.
5 The sea is his, for he made it,
and his hands formed the dry land.
6 Come, let us bow down in worship,
let us kneel before the LORD our Maker;
7 for he is our God
and we are the people of his pasture,
the flock under his care.

Flying

I had a moment. Correction, several moments. Just this past Friday, I flew to Edmonton to visit some relatives and friends in Calgary. I must admit that I was as nervous as could be about flying because it's been so long (or at least felt like it) since I last flew. I boarded the plane from the tarmac and found my seat and sat down. I was lucky enough to have an empty seat beside me and a nice older man at the end of my row. We talked a little and I found out he was an accountant from Edmonton running a seminar with his daughter. Well, once we got in the air(taking off is such a cool feeling), things slowly started to look smaller and smaller. I then had my first moment.
How amazing it is that God created me and can number each hair on my head when ALL of this creation is under His superiority. How amazing the whole earth must have looked from his perspective after He created it. How amazing it must have been for Him to see how humanity has progressed over time. I am but a small human being in such a massive place and here I am flying over the earth. I got a view (though it was night) of the earth from a birds perspective and was completely humbled by it. God cares about each one of us. He calls for his children to come to Him despite our failings, He loves us for who we are. I have found that as I risk my life day in and day out whether it be driving, flying, or climbing cliff edges that I shouldn't be, I am learning more and more each day to put my complete trust in God. All of me, all of who I am, is His. For without Him, I am nothing. As the Apostle Paul writes, it is continually time for the old to leave and for the new to come out; put to death the old self and all the new self to be born again.
All this from a flight...it's amazing how God communicates with us

Beating the Brutality of Boston's Blizzard

Alright, so it wasn't that bad, but it was pretty brutal when I checked the weather for the day of the Boston Marathon at 10 am. The Boston local broadcastors were saying that there were 50 mile an hour wind gusts, and heavy rain at times. It wasn't looking too promising for the 111th Boston Marathon runners. According to one runner, "It was amazing. God was there! The rain stopped, the wind died down, and it was 16 degrees(celsius) out. Perfect running conditions". That runner was my dad.

My dad is a 44 year old father of two children(my younger sister, Felicia, and I) and is married to Teresa. He has been running for approximately 8 years now and last year he was finally able to achieve his goal of qualifying for the Boston Marathon. What you have to understand here is that the Boston Marathon is one of the 'big kahuna' Marathons in North America. In order to run this marathon, one must qualify for it.

I would like to say my congrats(and show him off) for his long awaited accomplishment. This years Boston Marathon hosted just over 20,600 runners. They were split up into 2 waves, the first wave which included the elite athletes and the fastest runners to make up the first 10,000 runners. The second wave included the second 10,000+ runners. My dad was blessed to be a part of the first wave of runners as his time qualified him to be in it. He started off really good at the beginning of the race but due to an aggitated knee, he slowed his pace down a bit but still finished the 42.2km race in 3:28:50. No matter what, it's still a great time to finish with.

Here's the rest of the stats to help show you how well he did. Overall, he finished the race in 5229th place. For his gender and then his age bracket(40-44yrs old) he finished in 4479 and 1640 respectively. His placing does two things for him. First, he can say that he finished in the top 25% or 1/4(which ever way you want to look at of all who ran the race. Secondly, because he enters a new age bracket for next year, he's already qualified for the 2008 race. So my kudo's goes out to you dad and a job well done on all that hard work that you have put into this. I'm proud of you and your great accomplishment!

New Style to Help Save the World

Well, it's about time! Yes folks, it's true, Linkin Park is finally coming out with their newest album May 15. As some would know, I am a huge LP fan for some time now and I've been waiting in anticipation for this album to come out. Now, I knew that this album was supposed to be a new style for them but I never expected to hear what I did. I did figure that it wasn't going to be as 'loud' as their previous albums. I am really shocked(and not necessarily in a bad way)that their debut song is about the world and almost one of those 'what can we do to help save it' types. Honestly, I never really saw this coming from them of all groups. It is apparent in their video that the message getting across here is that we need to fix our mistakes of the past to make a better future. I am now really interested to hear what the rest of their album is going to sound like.
So if you haven't heard it yet then without further adue, here is their video and I've posted the lyrics underneath it for your pleasure. Let me know what you think(P.S. No smart comments there, eh anonymous!).



Linkin Park - "What I've done"

In this farewell
there's no blood
there's no alibi

coz I've drawn regret
from the truth
of thousand lies

So let mercy come
and wash away

[chorus]
What I've done
I face myself
to cross-out what I've become
erase myself
and let go of what I've done

Put to rest
what you've thought of me

Well I clean this slate
with the hands of uncertainty

So let mercy come
and wash away

[chorus]
What I've done
I face myself
to cross-out what I've become
erase myself
and let go of what I've done

For what I've done
I start again
and whatever pain may come
today this ends
Im forgiving what I've done
I face myself
to cross-out what I've become
erase myself
and let go of what I've done

What I've done

What I've done

Forgiving what I've done

Roadtrips

Do you ever go on a road trip and in your gut you can feel that something is bound to go wrong? Well, that seems to be the ongoing case for Rob and I. Whenever the two of us go on a road trip, it never fails that something is bound to go wrong. Let me go back a couple years ago...say September 2003.

So I am working up north at a beautifull park called Obatanga Provincial Park and I have no way to come back down to the civilization of the GTA so Rob comes to pick me up. It's my last night up there, and Rob's only night there; the car is loaded and my foreman, Rob, and I chill around the last campfire of the season (park is now closed up and we are the last ones there...creepy, maybe just a little but I got used to it pretty quickly). Rob and I get up early and I start the trip off with driving. Now, one thing to realize is that we have a 10hr. trip ahead of us, so we drive down to Sault. Ste Marie and everything is all good, and then down to Sudbury and by this time it's around lunch time. We are just entering the greater Sudbury area and Rob realizes that...he forgot his very expensive watch(it was a gift) and we absolutely had to go back to get it. Now, I am not impressed cause I just want to go home! I try calling the park and my foreman is gone, and I can't remember the sister park's staff house phone number(it's unlisted). So as much as I want to go home, I say fine, let's go back to get it. I then take Rob onto a back logging road that cut off about an hour or so off of our drive and we make it up to the park. It's all closed and locked up, no one is around and neither is his watch where he accidentally left it. We then drive another hour up north to the sister park, White Lake Provincial Park and all the guys there couldn't believe that we drove that much to get this watch. They offered for us to stay for the night but at that time I just wanted to get home and go to a church service so I said thanks and we were on our way. It's early morning and we are both tired. We make our way down and we finally make it past Barrie and...Tire blew! We pull off right away(gotta remember this little VW golf hatch was packed right up with my stuff) onto the shoulder and unpacked the car, take out the spare, switch tires and repack the car all in a matter of 15 min. Unbelievable! Alright, time for our home stretch, and yes we do make it safely at like 5am or something around there; we make it to my house with my dad getting up to go for a run, crazy guy;).

Alright, time for adventure #2 for Rob and Dan. Two weekends ago Rob and I are going on a little trip(about 3hr. drive) to see our friend, Anthony. He is currently at a school called Summit College. My car is loaded, fresh oil change, winter tires on, ready to go. We head off and I decide to take the 407 because it's much faster than taking the other highways to get to the 400. We enter Vaughn and something happens to my car. I am pushing the gas pedal and my car is backfiring and I am getting no power from my engine. I pull over onto a shoulder on a bridge. Great start to another road trip! I check under the hood of my car and I see that something is glowing bright red so I tell Rob that we need to get out ASAP and get everything out as well. We do. He's now on the phone with his brother in law and Rob gets us a rental for the weekend. The glowing dies down and everything is alright and I call CAA, they have a tow truck coming. Next, a cop pulls over and says that where my car is parked is an absolute hazard and tells us to get in the back of his Suburban cruiser(ya, we were in the back of a cop car). He calls for a tow truck(now I have to cancel CAA and send the bill to them from the tow truck that arrives) and literally 3 sec. after the cop is off of his radio, there's the truck. Turns out he deals with Robs brother's company and they know the same people and we managed to swindle him down to less than what CAA would've charged me. WOOT! We get the rental and have a great time up to Huntsville area. Nothing goes wrong throughout the weekend, we have a fun time until it's Sunday morning and Anthony thought he forgot something in the van (What you have to understand is that Anthony had to leave early to go on a winter camping trip); both Rob and I are asleep(I remember hearing something about keys but not clueing into anything at all...). Anthony gets the keys and goes on his way. It's several hours later and I get out of the shower and dressed and come out of the washroom and Rob is just waking up and asks me where the keys are. "I have no clue" I answer and then I realized what happened; Anthony forgot to bring them upstairs and he still has them. We search high and low for them hoping he left them somewhere, check once then twice in the van and still nothing. I finally decide to call the gatehouse at Algonquin where they are going and hope that maybe they are actually at the gatehouse or haven't come by yet and it's then that Anthony calls and tells us that he has them and his leader is bringin them back. It's an hour back to Summit and then another back up to the park and the leader will cross-country ski back in by himself. Wow! It works out and we get the keys and we think everything is great, until we reach Barrie and I try to call my Dad. No one is home, so I try the cell and nothing. Hmm, I try again later and still nothing and again and again. Crap, we are now stuck in Mississauga where we have to drop off the rental. Karen can't come, and we can't get ahold of my dad, so we go to McDonalds and pretty much spend our afternoon there until I finally get ahold of my dad, only to find out that he ran a 1/2 marathon(21km) to prep for the Boston Marathon coming up that he qualified for(42km in 3hrs 19min)! They then drive an hour to come pick us up and drive us over to Ancaster and have some tea/coffee at Rob and Karens which made it worth it for them. Thanks again Dad and Teresa! So...this has been another one of our great adventures.

I think anyone and everyone who knows us and knows about our travelling together has come to the realization that if and when we go on road trips together, to expect the unexpected, not worst but just unexpected. We never know what's going to happen but can guarantee that something is going to happen, it appears to bring adventure into our lives haha. We say this not only because of these two larger trips, but because we have had many, many fun adventures in the past while driving together. It's always a good time driving around with Rob!

Jays Spring Training Camp

So while I was in Florida, Joel, Ryan, Tim, and I went to the Toronto Blue Jays spring training opener. It was great to be there to see both the young, up and coming trying out as well as the stars of Reed Johnson, Vernon Wells, Alex Rios, and Frank Thomas hitting some balls to warm up for the season to come. We were among maybe 50 other Jays fans to see them come out for the first time this season. What a blast it was to see the talent Toronto has invested in, especially in the 'Big Hurt' of Frank Thomas(man that guy is huge!). So while we were there watching, we ended up meeting up with Hugh from City TV news. He's the sports analyst for the 6pm news. Hugh Burrill is probably my favourite news sports analyst out there(besides actual sports channel's news). After chatting with him for a bit, he decided to do an interveiw with us. It ended up that we actually made the 6pm news on Friday February 23, 2007. This is the link for Hugh's whole segment about the Jays and we are right in the middle of it. Enjoy!!!