New Year's Eve

Apologies for the late blog but Google's been playing up and we haven't been able to post for a couple of days....perhaps Santa might bring a late Christmas pressie in the form of an all-in-one computer (kinda like an iMac for the Mac-phobic...very shiny and much cheapness in the sale....!)

Anyhow, we spent New Year's eve skiing at Cypress Bowl in the sunshine (it has at last stopped raining...it rains alot in Vancouver...all this snow at sea level is somewhat of a novelty) - if I can get Blogger to work I will post pictures but the basic image is lots of snow, snowy trees, blue sky, no people, short lift queues and a really nice lodge they have built for the 2010 olympics - nice hotdogs although not as good as IKEA's and they were only 50c (25p!) - we went to look at kitchens and picked up a few things for friends as the nearest IKEA to Kelowna is Vancouver so thats 5 hours away and they don't deliver...could have spent a fortune and loaded the car to the ceiling but Mr R pointed out that we don't have a house, don't have jobs yet so perhaps the stainless steel corn cob holders, cute glass nightlights and a complete dinner service could wait a bit no matter how nice/cheap/stylish it is....spoilsport!

But I digress once again, we finished skiing around 3.30ish and rushed home to make the NYE calls at 4pm (12am UK) but Skype was playing up and only managed to reach M&D on IoW for a few minutes and that took 3 attempts...although there was a wild bridge night going on and judging by the raucous rendition of Auld Lang Syne (at least I think that was what they were singing?) there was a lot of sipping and sampling of alcoholic beverages going on in between the cards...hi to P&J btw...

And then we got to continue our NYE celebrations - there were no public displays in Vancouver (they did show London's on the tv - the fireworks looked great) so we went to a restaurant down the road in Horseshoe Bay called the Boathouse were they were doing a 3 course meal for £25 - which, considering it included whole lobster and alaskan king crab seemed a pretty good deal! We got a lovely table looking out of the marina and the log fire was roaring away behind us. Horseshoe Bay is where one of the ferries to Vancouver Island goes to and there was much debate as to whether it was bigger or smaller that the ones to IoW.

We managed to get the only vegetarian waitress in the restaurant so there was little advice when the lobster arrived as to what bits (apart from the tail and the claws) were munchable but was advised to 'poke around' inside and see what fell out and looked edible....so set to it with the nutcracker-y things and after sending a couple of bits skidding off plate and in the direction of nextdoors handbag (lucky save by Mr R) got the hang of it. They even brought a little dish of lemon butter with its own little candle heater to dip the lobster bits into it.

A couple of points I have learnt about lobsters in the course of the evening;
a) they are yummy...very yummy
b) they are messy ...very messy
c) they are slippery little suckers
d) re b) and c) don't wear anything you can't machine wash...or want to look glamourous in 30 mins after the lobster activity
e) don't let your husband/date/eating friend order anything less fiddly than you (Shaun had miso halibut and finished about 3 hours before I did!)
f) ideally take an eating partner with the lighting reaction speeds of a Manchester United goalkeeper or one of those chameloen critters who get the crickets off the leaves in the Amazon so that errant bits of lobster inadverantatly launched across the table can be surupticously (?) retrived and retuned to the plate....

Finished with baked cheesecake and a 3 types of chocolate mousse pudding and returned to the house to sit infront of the fire with a bottle of the home made Gru-Vee...

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL - may 2009 bring you all health and happiness....

Big hugs
Cara & Shaun xx


Output of ferry review: definately much bigger than Yarmouth and Fishbourne and add about a quarter on to Red Funnel to East Cowes....don't ask....