Storm-stayed in Victoria - go figure

We woke up this morning to a ton of white stuff all over Victoria and the rest of the lower mainland of BC. What a surprise!

This wasn't the kind of winter weather I had in mind when we decided to come out here, that's for sure. I know...I can hear all of you people in other parts of Canada saying "Give us a break. A little snow! Big deal!"

I used to say that too. But regardless of whether you figure we're all wimps because the city is shut down by a major snowfall -- I can tell you that the problems are many.

Yesterday, Heather got stranded when her new Mazda just couldn't cut the heavy snow. We're not sure whether it was because the large, oversized sport tires that didn't leave enough room for snow in the wheelwells, or whether the tires are just a bad compound. The end result was that she couldn't get up some of the hills around here - like a lot of other people. The heavy snow got really slippery, really fast.

She ended up leaving her car near the hospital, after taking almost an hour to do the 10-minute drive over there. Later, when the snowfall let up, we picked it up and brought it home.

But this morning, after snowing all night, the entire city is pretty much shut down. Schools are closed, offices, roads - everything is at a standstill. The cold weather has arrived now and the city just doesn't have the resources to clear this stuff away in a hurry. We'll have to wait for some warmer weather and a BC snowplow (ie Rain) to clear it.

Meantime, it is pretty, as you can see from the pictures. And of course, our dogs are loving it. It's not your typical West Coast weather, but for a prairie boy, it's not so bad. But that's enough for now. We can return to normal programming any time now.

UPDATE -- You can see more pictures at my Flickr site.