Transitions

Kelowna, British Columbia

I usually start out my day on my bike, traversing about ten miles of pleasant scenery at the sedate pace of eleven miles per hour. I often see familiar faces and on occasion get invited in for breakfast. With drought this summer, I have enjoyed many fine clear sunrises a mere three feet above ground on my bike seat. Today was very different. I saw the sun from seven miles up three different times.

The first time I saw the high-altitude brilliance of the September sun was above the emerald mounds of the Appalachian Mountains. The radiance of the sun was lost as we descended into the tempestuous remains of hurricane Gustav, which has stalled out over Chicago’s airports. I will leave it to the imagination as to what the ride down through it felt like. I did a whole lot of deep breathing. A consolation is the flight only cost $8. Credit card gimmicks are great for frequent flier miles.

There is always something special about going to a place for the first time. And so it was that in mid-afternoon we climbed back out above the remains of Gustav and headed west to the base of the Canadian Rockies. The afternoon brilliance washed away the darkness of Gustav and happy prospects of grand adventures in the high mountains overwrote impressions of my earlier white-knuckle experience. Calgary is the eastern gateway city to the Canadian Rockies, best known for destinations such as Banff and Jasper with their surreal emerald tinted glacial lakes. Mineral content released from the undersides of glacial flows gives this incredible color to the lakes of western Canada. It is nearly impossible to take a bad picture in this part of the world

In the late afternoon sunlight Calgary was embedded in a cosmic-sized patchwork quilt of russet, orange, yellow, and various other earth tones. The upper North American plains have a unique beauty of their own. Happily, the landscape was exactly as I envisioned it to be, possessed of a familiarity that was comforting to me after fifteen hours of travel.

The last time I saw the sun today was at sunset over the Canadian Rockies. Truly the stuff of calendar pages.