My top "Adventures with Friends" videos from 2011

Adventures with Friends - Year in Review 2011


It being the end of the year, I've delved into the video archives from my youtube stream and selected my favourites of 2011 and shall present them in 4 categories.

Adventures in "How To" Photography

Adventures in Nifty Places

Adventures in Sillyness

Adventures with Friends

I've saved my favourite videos for last. So with no further ado let me present...

My top "Adventures with Friends" videos from 2011

This first video features my Mom's discovery of why feather pillows and washing machines don't mix well

After one of our Botanical Beach adventures on the West Coast of Vancouver Island we stopped in at a local pub for a pint and a rest. Then we discovered this.

While passing through Hope BC this fall my friend Kim showed me her nature inspired technique for harvesting plums ;)

I met this cat while doing some teaching and speaking at Camp Squeah. It is a very friendly cat, this Augustus.

I got to spend a bit of time with Yoshi (an amazing certified chef who does magic with food! Check out http://yoshifood.wordpress.com/ ) and we performed some wilderness rescue/relocation. With a cameo by Dustin the Pool Boy. ;) 

During a trip to Squamish a plan to climb the Stawamus Chief was exchanged for a day spent driving to Abbotsford and back in the service of helping a friend move. Time well spent. In an elevator?

Riding with my Vancouver Island photoadventuring friend Karsten in the early morning.. listening to CBC in his old Subaru 'Ruby'

And to balance out the animal appearance here's a video of Roman the dog learning to challenge fears in the rainforest alongside some rapids.

We end this Friend Retrospective from 2011 with three videos from the same trip. My friends Mark and Timos came to the Sunshine Coast and I took them to Egmont where we hiked out to the Skookumchuck Rapids and stayed overnight at the old family land, with guitar and recorder playing, singing and much laughter.

Many adventures and memories with friends occurred over the course of 2011. I look forward to even more to come in 2012 :)

Thank you to my friends for adding immeasurably to my life. You're all a treasure of great worth to me.

The Quest for my Phone left in Squamish

My Most Memorable Meal - To date

A topical challenge vs Mountaintops & A Blog

I don't have any pictures of the meal. But it happened 7 years ago and only a few months after this photo was taken. Which you'll likely find chucklesome. :P


When it comes to memorable meals there are a number of candidates. But the most memorable? It perches above the rest and was mostly cooked by me, with some (a lot of) help from Mr.Dookoo.

Ok, Paul (Mr.Dookoo), did the meal planning and walked me through the actual cooking.

It was part of a cooking contest versus my co-worker James partnered with Tracy, the Dookoo's daughter. We were in charge of dinner and they were in charge of dessert. The judges were made up of Mrs.Dookoo (Viola) and my two other co-workers Charlotte and Marleen. And with James and I being fairly culinarily inept mid-twenties bachelors, the playing field was level for this epic battle pitting father vs daughter, co-worker vs co-worker, and establish bragging rights to be blogged about over 7 years later.

A flash more backstory while I prepare the ingredients. I was in South Africa working for Canadian Mennonite University as a team leader. My 3 co-workers and I were in charge of the oversight of 30+ university students as we travelled all over South Africa. During this particular week we were billeted out in the town of Strandfontein where we were partnering with a range of different community organizations and a local Methodist church. My group, known as Team ADD, worked at Camp Joy, an orphanage for boys. We did yard work, helped with one on one English lessons, and played indoor cricket as only awkward Canadians more familiar with hockey can.

Ok, the ingredients for the meal... well.. I can only break it down so much as I was just told to add things, stir, etc.. but the whole meal was cooked outside over a wood fire! South African braai-style goodness! The meat was a fish called Cape Snoek. A barracuda-like fish indigenous to the Cape area of South Africa. We accentuated with a lovely mix lemon pepper spicing and grilled it up moist, flakey, and oh so nummy. Partnered alongside this was a stir fry. Now... this may not seem too fancy.. but the fact that we were cooking it on a wok over an outside fire was so utterly cool and as most everyone knows, things cooked outside over a fire just taste better ;) A stir-fry!! A Stir-fry of awesomeness! :D

So much savouring during the meal left my team feeling pretty confident. That was until our noble opponents pulled out their creation. A multi-layer chocolate cake with jam filling between the layers! The thrown gauntlet of dinner had been met with an equally salacious match.

The judgement would go down to the wire.

After much deliberation.....

Team Dookoo/Oram emerged victorious!

(actually I kinda think we all won.. mmmmmmmm )

As is the case with most memorable and awesome meals it wasn't just the food but the context, the creation, and the people involved that ranked this as my #1 most memorable meal (to date).

And now I leave you with a new and unrelated Maplemusketeery video..