We arrived here in the Okanagan Valley on January 9 after an excellent drive out. We had clear roads all the way.

But on Friday it snowed heavily. And it snowed on Saturday and Sunday. All this made for a lot of shovelling.

_02A3675 This is an apple orchard nearby.

_02A3668 This is a view of the North Okanagan from above Vernon.

_02A3674

We were told that this was the most snow in the valley in many years.

This would have been great for skiing except that then the temperature plummeted.

Monday through Wednesday the thermometer on Silver Star Mountain registered -28C at its lowest.

We had no desire to go skiing in this bitter cold.

_02A3697 This photo of a residential area of Coldstream (basically a part of Vernon) illustrates how much snow has fallen.

_02A3692 Here Veda is leaving the house that we are looking after. Nice and sunny, but too cold.

So we drove to Salmon Arm with Mo and Dennis, to buy the excellent pies at Sushwap Pie Company.

We buy these frozen and then bake them for dessert when we have friends for dinner.

_02A3699 This photo was taken near Armstrong, just north of Vernon, en route to Salmon Arm.

As of today I've been able to ski four days. The temperature has warmed, but there has been a lot of fog on the mountain.

_02A3705 This view of Kalamalka Lake is typical of our recent weather - lot of fog and no sunshine.