Trippin'

The Saskatchewan prairies in January are about as bleak as you can get. It's hard to tell if the sun is up yet or not. The grey of the ground and sky merge at the horizon. It's snowing lightly and there's enough on the highway that all you see of the vehicle ahead is a swirling cloud. The farms are greyed out by the snow in the air. It's -20c and there's no sign of life out there.

Shelley says "death zone". I think, yeah, it looks a bit like the summit plateau on Cho Oyu over 8000m.

But actually, what she said was "dead zone". While I study the scenery, she's engrossed in her BlackBerry, and frustrated by the lack of a signal.

I say that maybe holidays ought to be BlackBerry dead zones.

We're almost to Lethbridge and I haven't checked my email yet. But I have had my laptop out. Done a little programming, wrote this blog post.

It's not as dead as it looks out there. I've seen a rabbit, birds, deer, and pronghorn antelope. No doubt there are foxes and coyotes out there too. It's a far cry from the color and abundant life of a coral reef, but it has it's own austere black and white beauty.