Sunday, April 29, 2007

Belly and Hiking

Here are some pics from our hike this weekend within Chilliwack Lake Provincial Park. Below is a shot of Drew at Greendrop Lake. It was a 5.5km hike to the lake - the last 2km were in the snow which made the hike more strenuous. One of the last stands of old growth trees in the Lower Mainland are located around the lake. Probably not the best idea when you're 5 months pregnant. High waters prevented us from crossing the creek only 0.5km from Greendrop lake - we weren't giving up at that point.
Cara relaxing at Lindeman Lake on the way back down. Lindeman Lake is an easy 2.0km hike from the trailhead and is quite beatiful - crystal clear green water and apparently full of Rainbow Trout. Next time we're bringing our rods!
Cedar and hemlock blowdown near the trailhead. It smelled amazing!
And a belly shot...........week 20. Halfway there!

Saturday, April 21, 2007

New Picture - Week 19

We went for an ultrasound Friday at BC Women's Hospital. It was such an amazing experience. We didn't expect to see so much detail. We got to see the brain, heart, stomach etc. My favorite moment was when we got to see the little feet moving. Everything looked perfect - size was exactly as it should be. It seems a little more real now, especially since I hadn't felt it move before the appointment. I actually did feel it move when I got back to work after the appointment and have felt it many more times since then. Its such a weird feeling, like someone tickling me from the inside.

We didn't find out the sex, we want that to be a surprise.

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Vacation Time

We booked a trip to the Galapagos Islands yesterday. We've been looking to take one last trip before the baby arrives and decided that the Galapagos would be perfect. We're not really into guided tours but felt that we couldn't do anything too challenging with me being almost 5 months pregnant. In the Galapagos, you have to be part of a guided tour so we thought that this would be the perfect time for this trip. I'll be almost 6 months pregnant by the time we leave so I needed permission from my midwife and had to purchase comperhensive travel insurance. We leave on June 12th for Quito and fly to Baltra on the 14th where we'll board "The Darwin" for a 7 night cruise of the islands. You can see our full itinerary here:

http://www.trekescapes.com/trip-details.cfm?TripID=6814

We've haven't been on a trip outside of North America together in three years. We're both really excited about this one. This is every biologists dream trip and Drew (the rock geek) is really excited about the geology of the islands. It's turning out to be an expensive trip even though we're on a budget tour but we've decided not to buy a condo for the time being so we've dipped into our savings for this trip. I don't know if we'll actually buy until we decide to leave Vancouver which may be sooner than later (We'd like to stay through 2010 so we're here for the Olympics). We'd both really like a house, something that we can afford and that doesn't require hour long commutes to work.

In other news, we're going for an ultrasound on Friday so we should have a new photo of our little one to post next weekend. I'm definitely starting to look pregnant now. I bought a belly band on Monday which is amazing. Now I won't have to buy any maternity pants - the band allows me to wear all of my jeans with the button/zipper undone and you can't even tell. I'll have to put a photo up next week. I'm hoping to minimize the amount of maternity clothes I buy. It's great that baby doll shirts are in style this year because all of my tops should fit me for quite awhile. Today I bought a sweater that I can't do up already but I couldn't resist, it was so cute.

We've been out hiking the last couple weekends on the North Shore. The walks have been quite easy but surprisingly quiet and relaxing. We spent 3 hours this week walking in the Lower Seymour Conservation Area and 2 hours last week in Lynn Headwaters Park. The walks were beautiful and so was the weather. I bought new hiking boots last weekend so I have to break them in before our first big camping trip of the year in May. Not sure where were going yet but I'm looking forward to it.

I better go and support the Canucks. Hopefully they can win this one!
h