Last Spring (in Spring Grove)

This post illustrates three things:  1.) how far I am behind in editing photos (these are from LAST Spring), 2.) how mild our winter was this year (these were taken in April and the magnolias were blooming a full month ahead of schedule this year), and 3.) just how much none of this matters because magnolias and tulips are glorious any time of the year.  Even if they're a year late...right?

Have I said recently how magical Spring Grove is?!  I know it should be a place of sadness, but it's hard to be melancholy in a place that just booms with life and beauty in the Spring.

This plant reminds me of an octopus!

It's hard not to go overboard taking photos in Spring Grove...just remember that when I finally catch up with my photo editing and I have magnolia/Spring Grove photos to share from this year!  You have been warned.

Anniversary Trip: Yoho National Park

Finally!  The last post from our trip to the Canadian Rockies for our first anniversary!!  Let's just forget the fact that in two months exactly we'll be celebrating our 2nd anniversary.  It'll be our secret that it took me 10 months to get these photos edited and organized, okay?

For this last post I'll share photos from Yoho National Park, which I think is the lesser known of the Candian Rocky Mountain parks surrounding Banff.  Banff and Jasper are definitely the big two.  Whereas Banff and Jasper National Parks are located in Alberta, CA, Yoho National Park is actually in British Columbia, CA.

One attraction in Yoho is the spiral train tunnels which loop, out and around the mountains.  We checked it out, though neither Antoine and myself are really into trains so we were a little underwhelmed. 

Right near the spiral tunnels and along the main highway that runs through Yoho are the Takakkaw Falls, so we decided to check them out.  Unfortunately the higher road that led to the falls was closed due to a rock slide, but we still enjoyed the drive halfway up, especially since the weather was so lovely.

The milky color of the river is caused by glacial silt from the Yoho River. 

Here's where I learned that little fun fact about the glacial silt...

Where Yoho River (on the left) and Kicking Horse River (right) meet.

Next we decided to head further south in Yoho and check out the Wapta Falls.  Unfortunately, this is pretty much the only time during our trip where the weather turned dreary.  But we armed ourselves with our raincoats and went off to explore the falls...

The hike to the falls was a little long and soggy, but it made for some really nice photos of the greenery and fungus along the trail.

By the time we made it to the falls it was pretty much full on gloomy, but waterfalls are still cool, even if the weather is lousy, right?!

Luckily by the time we made it back to Field, BC, which is right near Emerald Lake (where we were staying) the pretty weather had returned so we took advantage and checked out Natural Bridge.  Natural Bridge is located right next to Emerald Lake and is literally a bridge of rock that's been carved out by the river and falls.

You can kind of see where the bridge is in this photo (though I apologize that it's not the best angle).  The bridge kind of forms the shape of an N with the river flowing quite vigorously out from underneath it.

And that's pretty much the end of our first anniversary trip!  We spent our last full day in CA in Banff getting souvenirs and eating Beaver Tails, obviously.  It was an incredible trip and a perfect way for us to spend our first anniversary as two married folks! 

Sadly, this year we don't have a fabulous trip in the works for our anniversary, instead we're saving up money to remodel our bathroom!  That will be a very different but equally awesome anniversary present to ourselves.  But we've got something special in the works for our third anniversary that I'm super excited about....but more on that later!