To the Beach; ISS

The one thing we do a lot when we go to Gaspé is to go to the Bonaventure beach. We stop at the lighthouse, climb it if we can, then go frolic in the water and look for starfish on Starfish Island.

The lighthouse

On top of the lighthouse. Behind is Bonaventure Beach

Before playing in the water

I'm the one with the arms in the air, with Sabrina and Mathieu, on Starfish Island

The most amazing thing happened that night. Suzanne's mom was away for the evening. The kids were sleeping. Suzanne and I decided on a whim to go on the balcony to look at an amazingly beautiful starry night. In Montreal we can only see a few stars. In Gaspé the sky is full.

That's when we saw a bright star (or planet, it didn't twinkle) move steadily across the sky. We realized it might have been the International Space Station (ISS) so I looked on the NASA website to see where it was right now. Lo and behold it was the ISS that passed right on top of us. Such an amazing site...

Has winter lost its teeth; Montreal Science Museum

Today Sabrina's class (Mr. Sylvain) and grade one French immersion (Mme Danielle, Sabrina's teacher last year) went to the Science Museum in Montreal. I went along to help out and took Mathieu with me (he skipped school) since we get in for free. It was snowing a bit (what we now call a """snow storm""") but Bertha the Ballerina (my Ford Escape) did not deceive and managed to increase the hate part of our love-hate relationship by being anywhere on the road except where she was supposed to be...

Nevertheless

We had a blast. The first thing we saw were the dinosaurs. A dozen or so robotic dinosaurs that move and growl like what we think they were a 100,000,000 years ago. Here are some pictures:

Dilophosaurus (190-200 million years ago)

Velociraptor (75 million years ago)

The velociraptor is the dinosaur Sabrina and Evelyne are doing a science paper on at school

T-Rex (65 million years ago)

Gigantoraptor (70 million years ago)

Mathieu and T-Rex

Afterwards it was time for an Imax presentation about two women who dedicated their lives to save baby elephants and ourang outangs.

Time for lunch...

Then it was time to go around the science centre exhibition. That was so fun...

It's definitely not like the Boston's Science Museum nor the Boston's Kids Museum, but they had a great time. So much that reading that night took a new level.

All in all it was a great day. Thank you St-Mary's for having us accompany the classes to the Museum.

Short Term ForecastUpdated: Thurs, Mar 1, 2012, 5:00 EST

	Thursday MorningMorning: 6:00 AM - 11:59 AM	Thursday AfternoonAfternoon: 12:00 PM - 5:59 PM	Thursday EveningEvening: 6:00 PM - 11:59 PM	Thursday OvernightOvernight: 12:00 AM - 5:59 AM	Friday MorningMorning: 6:00 AM - 11:59 AM
	Light snow	Light snow	Scattered flurries	Cloudy	Scattered flurries
Temp.	-4°C	-3°C	-4°C	-6°C	-5°C
Feels Like	-11	-9	-10	-11	-
Wind	E 25km/h	E 25km/h	E 20km/h	E 15km/h	E 10km/h
Relative Humidity	86%	86%	86%	86%	93%
P.O.P.	90%	90%	60%	40%	40%
Snow	2-4 cm	2-4 cm	less than 1 cm	-	less than 1 cm

6393pv

Tremblant, baby, Tremblant.

St-Bruno is conquered. Owl's head needs expert skis to be appreciated, so does Sutton. Bromont is very clean, very well thought out and Suzanne's favourite. Next year we'll be getting season's passes for Bromont.

But the mountain that I like and love, and the one where I would buy a chalet if I was to get one, is Tremblant. I like the village, the shops, the restos, the ambiance, the fact that we walk everywhere (uphill) in such a way that you can park your car when you arrive, and take it when you leave. And now I love the mountain.

We left at 7:00am and got to the mountain at 8:30am. By 9:15am, after getting the tickets, putting our equipment and all that jazz, we were on top of the mountain skiing.

Tremblant is as well thought out as Bromont, but on another scale. Once you're up, you ski down for a relatively long time. Hence we can spend a lot more time on the slope then not. Let me put it this way: at 3:15pm everyone was exhausted. By the time we got on the road it was about 4:00pm and we were at "La Porte du Nord" at 5:00pm. We stopped to (yuck) McDonalds for supper. Not to be repeated too often but it was good. I preferred their coffee to Tim's.

Mathieu didn't make it back home awake, he passed out in the car.

View from BeauValon (I believe). I raced that one.

Chalet on top of the mountain

The trees were spectacular

While Suzanne still prefers Bromont, Tremblant is now my favourite mountain (with family, alone I think I'd take Sutton or Owl's Head). That's where I'd get a chalet.

Nobody was awake pass 9:00pm

So to honour the mountain, here was its short term forecast:

Short Term ForecastUpdated: Sun, Feb 26, 2012, 5:25 EST

	Sunday MorningMorning: 6:00 AM - 11:59 AM	Sunday AfternoonAfternoon: 12:00 PM - 5:59 PM	Sunday EveningEvening: 6:00 PM - 11:59 PM	Sunday OvernightOvernight: 12:00 AM - 5:59 AM	Monday MorningMorning: 6:00 AM - 11:59 AM
	Sunny	Mainly sunny	Cloudy periods	Scattered flurries	Light snow
Temp.	-16°C	-9°C	-13°C	-14°C	-12°C
Feels Like	-24	-	-	-	-18
Wind	NW 20km/h	NW 10km/h	W 10km/h	SE 10km/h	SE 15km/h
Relative Humidity	65%	61%	72%	66%	66%
P.O.P.	10%	10%	20%	40%	70%
Snow	-	-	-	close to 1 cm	1-3 cm

6287pv

Sabrina wins 1st in Dictee PGL 2011

Considering that half the kids in her class are French, and she didn't speak much French two years ago... Bravo!

Ski Day; St-Hubert Chicken

Today was an amazing ski day. The kids and I went to St-Bruno to do some very good skiing. They're becoming so good it's very pleasant to ski now.

At the chalet we got to meet their favourite mascot:

Now this is a big thing. The kids have always been terrified of clowns and mascots. Now every time they see a mascot it's got to be a big hug. We're still working on the clowns...

Lucky Mathieu manages to find a dime while skiing in the middle of the mountain. You got to see it to believe it.

You have to realize that he's skiing, in the middle of nowhere, and just finds a dime. He does this all the time.

Search Results: February 26 , 2011Montreal Downtown

Max Temp: -8.3 °C

Min Temp: -12.8 °C

Mean Temp: -10.6 °C

Precip Accumulation: 0 mm