Weekend Fun

This weekend was something else: plenty of sunshine, a 70 mile quad ride, finding a new cache, and a beautiful night at the cabin - and even a nice bon fire with Brats at the meadow. Stacie worked while Erica and I hit the cabin. We even got a load of wood delivered so the cabin was nice and warm all night.
Here is how it went... Saturday, Erica and I hopped on the quad and decided to go find the Island Lake Cache. We traveled north along Bitterroot Lake through the Lost Trail Wildlife Refuge to Island Lake. In the video below, we never got to video Island Lake as my camera died somewhere along the way. Oh well...

On our return trip home, we headed south toward Lost Prairie . This is the site where hundreds(?) of people come each year to skydive.
Lost Prairie Skydive Videos
From there we returned to the cabin and built a fire in the meadow. Too bad Stacie couldnt join us...

Oh yeah... I forgot about Sunday. After a late start (slept in), we rose and brought the horse trailer home with us from the property. Then we spent the rest of the day doing some riding and re-acquainting the horses to the trailer. My head, neck and face are sunburned!

With my camera dead, this is going to be my last video for a while.

Saturday

As promised, here is my post. Today Erica and I are going to the cabin and will stay the night. The weather today is nice and Erica cannot find a cloud in the sky.
I will bring the camera and will show how much fun we are going to have.... Bye!~

It's been a week?

I find it hard to believe that it has been a week since my last posting. Last weekend's weather turned to crap on Saturday and Sunday so that pretty much cancelled all of our plans of being outdoors. No horses, no cabin, no nothing... except plenty of hockey.

Erica went to 2-night, 3-day camp in Glacier Park earlier this week and she took some pictures. I will let you know when she updates her blog with the pictures.

Fishing season is upon us and I am getting ready to hit the rivers. Patrick recently got some casting pointers over in Bozeman and he too is itching to fishing. Of course, Robbin (pictured above) is also anxious. Plans are in the works to have a fishing expedition out here in early June. I will keep everyone posted as things move forward.

I will post again this weekend... Go Wings!

Thursday 4-17-08

Today Erica and I went on another hunt for a geocache near our house. You may have seen in an earlier video our first geocaching adventure in Marion. The weather was nice after work so I found another cache across the valley from here for us to find. With the camera, GPS, and map in hand we headed out.

For those who do not know what geocaching is:
Geocaching is an outdoor treasure-hunting game in which the participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers (called "geocaches" or "caches") anywhere in the world.

We parked the car near the trailhead and headed up the mountain with the aid of the GPS. I had pre-programmed the cache's coordinates in the unit so it simply points me in the right direction. We traveled straight up the mountain without using much of any deer trails - because we thought the cache was near. After about 20 minutes of continuous climbing, we found the cache at the said coordinates.

We really werent sure how high we had climbed until we arrived at the cache. My GPS showed our elevation at 3850' - with our car below at 3150', we climbed 700'! What a view!

In the cache we found a geocoin - a unique coin placed in a cache and tracked online by users to see its activity and travels. We grabbed a geocoin and will move it to a new cache this weekend. Anyways, it was great exercise and a fun adventure.


For more information on geocaching, see www.geocaching.com.

Congrats Erica!!!!!

Check out her blog and new video here

Beam me up Scotty

 
I had a special visitor come to town recently and some of you may recognize him. This is Scott - my counterpart emergency manager from neighboring Okanogan County (WA). Scott was in town for the Rocky Mountain StarTrek Convention and Annual Trekkie meet held in Kalispell, MT. Scott was actually the keynote speaker at the event as he is the largest collector of Star Trek collectables this side of the east coast. His topic of discussion was about the new generation of Trekkies and how the internet influences character variants and inaccuracies. What a topic... Although I am not a Star Trek fan, I was surprised on how many people recongnized him on the streets of Kalispell. What a celebrity!

Thanks for visiting Scott..!

Stanley Cup Update

I was thinking tonight as I watched playoff action that I should try to give some input on the Stanley Cup playoffs on this blog. This would only benefit the two people who frequent here (assuming the love hockey) and it would also help relieve my painful passion for the game. Why not? I watch at least two games a night and may have some actual analysis on whats going on. If you want real insight I suggest visiting www.tsn.ca - it's Canada's ESPN with real NHL coverage (unlike ESPN).


Anyways, tonight's big matchup is Game 3 between the San Jose Sharks and Calgary Flames. Being a best-of-seven series, a win for #7 Calgary would be huge as it could seal a 3-1 game advantage over the #2 Sharks. San Jose has been the hottest team in the west in the final month of the regular season and Detroit fans would love to see the Flames knock them out of the post season. That did not happen this evening in Calgary. Up 2-1 with under 5 minutes left in the 3rd period, San Jose pressed hard on Calgary goalie Mikka Kiprusoff by out-shooting Calgary 14-3. With 4:05 left in the 3rd period, Jonathan Cheechoo tied the game with a blind shot to the net from the corner. Calgary continued to struggle in the remaining minutes and always-rowdy Calgary crowd was silenced.

Finally at the 19:50 mark of the 3rd period, Shark captain Joe Thorton scored the winning goal to secure a 3-2 win in Calgary to even the series at 2-2. It was an amazing game - especially for Shark fans.

Next matchup: Game 5 April 17th
10:00pm EST @ San Jose

Tomorrow's key match up: Detroit vs Nashville (Versus 9:00pm EST)
Preview (Link) With a 2-1 series lead, can Detroit pull a win out on the road after Nashville's 2-goals in 9 seconds comeback win?? We'll see....

Sunday II - The Video

High Quality Video

Sunday

Are we ready to hit the river yet? I am anxious to dust off the fly rod and hop holes along a quiet stream. ahhhh


Today's agenda is quite simple for a sunny Sunday. I NEED to wrap up the floor plans and get them sent off tomorrow. I have already written an 8-page narration to accompany the plans so hopefully our ideas and wants are clear. We'll see.

After that, Erica and I are going to work the horses and throw some saddles on them. It has been a few months since they saddles on them so its time they are reminded how they feel.

Finally, there are a couple games on this afternoon that I cannot miss..!
Capitals vs Flyers (preview)
Sharks vs Flames (preview)

Have a great day!

I am going nuts.....

This is why I love hockey... under 30 seconds left, Edmonton is down one goal with a pulled goalie... can they pull it off??

Dallas blows an empty-netter.. and leaves it to Hemsky.

Stanley Cup

If you haven't noticed, hockey plays a huge role in my life (along with my family) and now is the time of year I love. Spring? That too.. but it is playoff time. The reason for the season!
You can catch all of the action on Versus and NBC.
Be sure to check out the latest highlight/videos on the right! -->

Also, please participate in my new poll - also on the right -->

Playoff Bracket

With the regular season over, its time for the NHL's second season - the Stanley Cup playoffs!

Party time

High Quality Vid
As you will see in the video, we were all going to spend Saturday eve at the cabin - but our plans have been postponed until the weather gets a little better. This morning I woke and it was cold out. I woke up without a fire and it was in the 20's in the cabin (I am not done insulating). We also had some snow fall last night. After rising to meet Stacie and Erica, the quad got stuck in the warming snow. We spent several minutes digging, pushing and pulling it free. Then it got stuck again and again. I had at least 1 hour of digging on Friday too.. So, the quad is put away until the snow completely melts. Tired, beaten and wet, we decided to head back to town. Besides, Hockey Night in Canada is on!
Thanks for watching!
Eric

I miss her

 
I miss my old rig...:(
Anyways, today I am heading out to the cabin to get things going before Stacie and Erica's arrival tomorrow. Saturday night will be our first over-night stay at the cabin (as a family)... but tonight I am staying out there by myself. I still need to get supplies and some furniture hauled in. Of course the cabin is not ready for a complete move-in yet, but we are excited about staying out there and we will need to sit somewhere.
I have the video camera on the charger so I should have some mind-blowing, edge of your seat video action...
So stay tuned,
E