I'm Home! I'm Home!

Travel.  Holiday.  Vacation.  I've had friends return from lengthy trips, only to be befuddled, depressed and unable to deal with the realities of their "real world".  In our case, the opposite is true.  Keith and I are literally overflowing with love, for this place that we call home.

Keith loves Banff!!

We've spent the last month adjusting back to our world, our reality, our home that is Banff.  We've always know that the life we have here is special, but it only takes 3 months away to make us even more appreciative of that fact.

The Neighbours are Good.

Since we've arrived home, we've been spending an aweful lot of time outside enjoying our special place.  We're connected to this place and these mountains.  It nurtures our soul to spend time outside in this place.  We've been running around the woods, we've been skiing, we've been strolling, we've been smelling and breathing and taking it all in with fresh eyes.

Last Week - strolling on the Bow River - Fairholme Range in the background.

This week - enjoying a birthday run.

Do I look happy?  That's because I am.  My latest pose seems to find me declaring out loud I'm Queen of the World!!  This place does that to me.  It makes me whoop out loud joyfully a lot. 

On the running front, I sure am enjoying myself running around the woods again - my backyard rocks.  It's the time of year that I spend the most time on my local trails.  In winter, your options are more limited - so I tend to spend a lot of time on the same trails.  Tunnel Mountain, Fenland Trail, the Spray River Trail, the Bow River/Hoodoos, Marsh Loop and Sulphur Mountain are all part of the fun.  My favorite winter trail is something I call the "backyard loop" which is a rather amazing 30 minute loop through the woods behind my house.  It's got a killer runnable hill, it's sheltered from the wind and it's so pretty.  I seldom see anyone on it.  Today, I saw fresh coyote tracks in the fluffy fresh powder and eventually, was treated to a vocal sing-a-long of the yipping critters.  Yip!  Yip!  Not everyone gets to experience that in their day to day lives.

Enjoying the Spray River Valley - on today's run.

Tunnel Mountain Cliffs with Cascade Mountain in the background

Backside of Tunnel Mountain - enjoying the view of Mount Rundle

Babbling non-sensically on my Birthday Run

So, you get the picture.  We're unequivocably stoked to be back in Banff running around in the woods.  I just want to shout it out loud:

I'm Home!  I'm Home!