Ridge (aka Ridgey) and I met at a New Years Eve party back in 2012.  He began quoting from one of my favorite movies, “The Goonies” and after that, we instantly hit it off.  We dated for a couple years when he proposed.  The proposal was a complete shocker.  He had told me that we were flying to Toronto to visit some college friends of his.  When we touched down in Toronto, he threw all of our bags on a conveyor belt going elsewhere.  I looked at him and screamed (as if this was his first rodeo) “Ridge, what are you doing?! Grab our stuff, it doesn’t go there!”  He smiled and said, “Yeah, we are not staying here”.  He would not tell me where we were actually going, and wouldn’t even walk to our gate because I would find out—we sat at the bar and waited until our gate was about to open.  He only gave me one hint…he said we were going where the 1988 Winter Olympics were held.  I was born in 1988….and he wouldn’t let me touch my phone.  When we finally went to the gate and I saw we were heading to Calgary…I had no idea where that was or what was nearby.  It had always been a dream of mine to visit Lake Louise in Banff, and I so badly hoped we were going there, but, Calgary?  At the time, I had no idea that was the closest airport (for us), to Lake Louise.  He kept insisting that we were not going to Lake Louise and that he couldn’t swing it this trip, but Calgary was going to be awesome.  I should note that this weekend was our anniversary weekend (also Memorial Day), and he kept saying that this was our anniversary trip and birthday present in one.  He mentioned on more than one occasion that I shouldn’t think this was anything else than an anniversary/birthday present, since his sister, Alex, had just gotten engaged and he didn’t want to steal her thunder.  After landing in Calgary we headed to a hotel for the night, but honestly…how could I sleep! My parents thought I was in Toronto and I wanted to call and tell then I was on the other side of Canada, but I literally had no idea where we were going to end up.  The next morning when we woke up, I made my beloved shitty hotel coffee and waited for details.  I finally got them, but after he got up at his very sloth like pace and showered.  He said…okay, I lied…we ARE going to Lake Louise!!! He tossed some Alberta travel books at me and told me to find some good hikes and things to do.  Honestly…at this time I was thinking…if this ISN’T a proposal trip…then how the hell is he going to top this.

We drove to Lake Louise from Calgary and checked into the famous Fairmont Chateau at Lake Louise.  As we checked in, they upgraded us FO FREE to a nicer room (fast forward—would be the same room we would share when we got married here).  We set our stuff down and explored the Chateau.  Honestly thinking back now, as I am writing this, I don’t recall what we did or when we did it, but I do know that we did A LOT in our long weekend there.  I know the proposal didn’t happen on our first day there, but maybe the second?  We were walking around Moraine Lake and Ridge was super keen to do a really difficult hike ( I know now this was so that we could have it to ourselves), but there was still quite a bit of snow on the ground and a lot of trails were closed.  He was pushing me to do this one, but we couldn’t even see the start of the trail because it was snow covered.  There was also a sign right where it should have began saying that for our safety you have to have at least 4 people with you on this hike (because of bears I think) and there was a massive fine if you were caught.  This did not stop Ridge wanting to do it.  He said he was going to scope it out, and walked around the ridiculously snow covered, steep mountainside until I couldn’t see him anymore.  When he came  back and finally agreed, we took the flat path around the lake instead.  Stay tuned for more…