I have just returned from the loveliest two-week trip: a drive through the Canadian Rockies with my husband, bracketed on either end by precious time with my parents in their mountain home. I feel a little jet-lagged, water-logged, flooded with the joy of a truly pleasurable vacation.
Let’s not bury the lede: I got to meet Nicole, in person. She is, unsurprisingly, gorgeous and warm and generous and kind. She and her husband showed us the most delightful time. We drank really good wine. We ate a dinner of quinoa, roasted veggies, and lentils that I am still thinking about, plus a kale salad with the best Caesar dressing, followed by a luscious lemony cake topped by homegrown raspberries. I got to meet REX, and give him pets and tell him to his face that he is the softest, handsomest boy. I got to chat with Nicole’s son, who is one of the most charming, attentive, interesting young people I’ve had the pleasure of meeting, and he allowed me to hug him even though I am apparently of the age where I refer to twenty-somethings as “young people.” I got to ogle Nicole’s garden, and admire her prolific zucchini plants (she gave me three monstrous zucchini to take home; they were delicious). I did not take nearly enough pictures, or spend nearly enough time with Nicole. Our husbands are, obviously, fantastic, and I think next time we will allow them space to do their own thing so Nicole and I can cover all the extremely important topics we didn’t get to during our much-too-short time together.
Driving through British Columbia and Alberta with my husband was magical. Spending time together, just the two of us: It feels both simplistic and true to say that I enjoy his company. We travel well together. He’s a thoughtful and careful planner, and I like to think I’m an agreeable and supportive companion.
We listened to a podcast recommended by Engie, DNFed one audiobook and got a good chunk of the way through another. We giggled over Canada’s road signage (it seemed to us that things like “no services 110 km” would be more helpful before we’d passed the last town for 110 km) and wished that all US highways would follow Canada’s lead with the number of passing lanes they include. We stared in awe at the landscape and pulled over many, many times to try to capture the jaw-dropping beauty of the mountains and turquoise lakes with our phones. We ate tons of delicious food (my favorite, next to Nicole’s home cooking, was a meal of birria tacos in Banff) and did lots of sightseeing.
We visited multiple local bookstores, and my husband encouraged me to buy some souvenirs. (I also bought a really excellent book for a friend and had the author sign it.)
We encountered a lot of wildfire smoke. Sometimes it obscured almost everything.
Sometimes it leant an ethereal magic to our views.
Sometimes it disappeared at just the right moment for us to experience the pristine splendor of the landscape.
We didn’t see any wildlife at all, beyond a few birds and mammals that we can see in our own backyard, thank you very much.
Speaking of wildlife, we did admire our cat, via the cat cam. He spent a lot of time sitting glumly on the counter, waiting for someone (me?) to come tell him to get off. He also spent one morning exploring my mother-in-law’s set up for making hot fudge. He went so far as to get in the pot, which is horrifying and hilarious in equal measure. (Don’t worry: we did let her know that her hot fudge vessel had been contaminated before she started cooking.) I love that he looks directly at the cat cam. He knows (I fully believe) that he’s doing something we would not approve of, and he knows that we know what he’s doing, and he wants us to know that he knows we know, and he’s doing it anyway.
We had a wonderful time together, and loved the parts of Canada we saw. I hope someday soon we can explore other provinces… and perhaps visit Allison and Elisabeth in their corners of their stunning country.
Even though it’s a place I visit regularly (although nowhere near often enough), my parents’ mountain home is no less stunning or special.
Spending time with my parents feels both mundane and precious. We do things we’ve been doing for decades – walk the same mile-long forest loop, brave the black cold of the same lake, sit on the deck listening to hundred-year-old aspen gossip in the breeze – while knowing there will be a last time for each of these experiences.
Being among the mountains makes me feel small and insignificant and acutely aware of the vastness of time and the ephemeral nature of our lives.
I’m an introspective kind of gal, as you are well aware, and I spent a lot of this trip thinking about time. The mountains wrap me in a paradoxical kind of time warp, where I feel both the speed of time passing by and a simultaneous timelessness.
My parents are aging, I cannot deny that. In fact, several of our conversations this trip centered around estate planning, on things my husband and I need to know when their mountain home becomes ours. My daughter is now a teenager, nearly my height, about to begin eighth grade. My husband and I are solidly, undeniably middle-aged.
And yet: everything is the same as it’s always been.
Even though the individual aspen that make up the skyline around my parents’ house have been around for a mere century, their underground root systems are thousands of years old. The peaks I admire as my dad guides our thirty-year-old boat around the lake were thrust into being fifty million years ago. Glaciers and water and tectonic shifts have sculpted the mountains and valleys into their current form over the intervening millennia. It is astonishing to me that I can admire the artistry of forces so enormous I can hardly conceptualize them, that I am alive for this eyeblink of a moment, that I can choose to spend my time with the people I love most while surrounded by such extraordinary beauty.
I am bobbing, breathless, in the same lake I’ve been swimming in since I was a little girl, the same lake my father visited as a boy, and his father before him. My daughter, shrieking, leaping into the bracing deep beside me, simultaneously thirteen and five and two and ages I have yet to experience. Around us, a crenellation of stately serene peaks that have stood sentry over each of us in turn, in a valley that was once itself a massive inland sea.
What a beautiful and special trip–full of unforgettable memories and people! Believe it or not, I’ve never been to Banff although it’s right above me and I have visited British Columbia a number of times.
Oh my dear friend, thank you for your lovely words and how I wish you could have stayed SO much longer. Next time. Next time! And I am thrilled that you had such a great time here and in the Canadian Rockies, which is in my opinion the most beautiful place on earth. Although yes, WTF signage, there is one place at the Icefields Parkway that we take, and it’s something ridiculous like 300 km without services and there aren’t really any services NEAR that sign, and there is NO cell service for those 300 km either. So…what do you do?
Also, your writing is just so beautiful and evocative. It gave me chills, that last paragraph. Just beautiful. xoxoxo
OK, I am seriously jealous that you got to visit Nicole and Rex! But also very happy for you, and thank you for writing about your visit because it gave me all the warm, fuzzy feelings! How hilarious about Lenny defying you right on camera, like he knew you were watching! I’m glad you saw him get into the bowl before the fudge was made! Your last paragraphs brought tears to my eyes. Beautiful writing. So beautiful.
Oh Suzanne! You lucky, lucky lady! Getting to witness all that beauty AND getting to visit Nicole and Rex! I’m so glad you got to have that special time together. And I’m glad that you shared all the beauty and your thoughts with us.
Your photos are stunning! What an amazing trip. So happy for you that you got to do such great things.
What a wonderful trip! What a cherry on top to meet Nicole during this epic road trip. I was in Banff 3 years ago and its beauty is unparalleled in North America! And BC is so gorgeous. I have flown into Kelowna to visit a friend that used to live in Kamloops so I have seen the gorgeous area Nicole calls home. I plan to take a trip out there next July and will meet up with a friend in the BC area and then go to Nicole’s for a few nights. I can’t wait!
I am glad you had a good visit with your parents and that it was grounding. It is hard to discuss things like estate planning. My parents are aging, too, but my mom has good genes and I think she will live to 100 if something else like cancer doesn’t prevent that from happening. My dad has talked more about mortality in the last several years which is tough but it’s reality. He has grandkids now whose graduations he is unlikely to witness. He’s not depressed about it, he pragmatic and I think it reminds him to enjoy life while he can. Is it overwhelming to think of inheriting this mountain home? Over the 4th, my sister asked if we were interested in buying my parents lake home when they have moved out/passed. We are not interested in but that makes things easier since there are 5 kids in our family. This sister lives the closest (1 hour away) and they both love being at the lake far more than anyone else. I think we were the 3rd sibling they asked about interest in the house and so far no one wanted to buy it. A 2nd home just seems to overwhelming! But it sounds like this mountain home has been in your family for generations!!
What a lovely vacation! I have to admit that my husband and I are not very compatible travelers (he would NEVER listen to a podcast) and reading this made me slightly envious!
Suzanne you are such a gifted writer. Just beautiful words. I think you visited one of the most beautiful parts of our country. The Rocky mountains are spectacular. I am fortunate that my husband and I also travel so well together. We love road trips – exploring, listening to books and podcasts, chatting and getting lost lol. How wonderful you got to visit Nicole. And I want to jump in your parent’s lake!
What a beautiful trip, bookmarked with visits to Nicole and your parents. Their home sounds idyllic.
Having spent the last month with my aging mother-in-law, I know what you mean about last times. (Just last week a new health issue– of many– cropped up.)
What a trip. It sounds dreamy! Time with friends. Lots of shared, easy time with your husband. Good food.
I’m so glad you got to experience this and what special memories to carry with you.
Hooray for time with Nicole (I met she and her husband for a few hours in London and IT WAS NOT ENOUGH TIME), and hooray for special time at the lake. I have a similar thing in my family and it is such a weird feeling to be transported back into time. Everything’s the same in the strangest way AND everything feels different.
Beautiful reflection on time and age and ages. So lovely.
Aren’t aspens the coolest?!
So very wonderful that you were able to connect in person with a fellow blogger.
Reading this and seeing your photos immediately removed three layers of anxiety from my shoulders. Thank you.
My heart is brimming at reading about your lovely summer vacation. Time spent with your husband is such a great retreat for you both.
The mountains seem to bring out the depth of my love for the earth as well.
You got to see Nicole! And Rex! Rex is a movie star in the blog world!!
Such stunning writing … I went back to read multiple sentences just to glory in them! You captured such poignant nuance. And the photos are absolutely beautiful.
Five gold stars for using the word “crenellation”. I learned that word in a college English class taught by an ancient professor whose cantankerous exterior was just a foil for the sweet man underneath. I loved him and I love the word still!
Your writing is so beautiful, Suzanne! And evocative. Almost like I was right there with you.
I can’t believe you got to meet NICOLE and REX and smother his cute face.
The photos in this post are STUNNING. Some of them don’t even look real! What a beautiful part of our world. <3
This is basically the best vacation I could ever imagine. MOUNTAINS. Driving! Nicole! Spending precious time with your parents. And the icing on the cake… REX. I’m so, so jealous.
Your photos are beautiful. Thank you so much for sharing!!!
I love reading about when bloggers meet other bloggers. Seeing Rex on your blog feels a little like meeting a celebrity. 🤣
Your photos are beautiful!
What a gorgeous and evocative post. I felt all of the feelings, as though I was tagging along in your shadow. THANK YOU for sharing this with all of us.
The last paragraph. Right in the feels.
Thank you!
Oh Suzanne, what a precious time… a trip with your husband to beautiful places, a wonderful meetup with Nicole and her family (I am jealous! Isn’t this blogger community wonderful?) and then very precious time with your parents in their mountain home. I can relate to the bitter sweetness of it all. <3
I’ve had this beautiful post up for days, trying to figure out what to say.
Thank you for expressing the bittersweetness of this phase of life so well. <3
This looks like the most incredible vacation. It’s so beautiful — a part of the continent I’ve never seen. And then meeting Nicole would be such fun. And it sounds like you really had time together, not just a quick lunch. That’s the best. And Rex! Great bookstores — and some of your photos truly look like beautiful paintings. What a marvelous time!
Oh my gosh…. these landscapes are to die for. So gorgeous.
It sounds like you had a wonderful vacation.