Randy: My brother and I are 5 years and 4,400 km apart. I am the one that will always be 5 years, 10 days younger (smile). Once a year we go away, just the two of us, and alternate planning. We've had some amazing adventures from Salmon fishing in BC, to Formula One school in Ontario, to discovering Gros Morne National park in Newfoundland. No matter where we go, we always come away realizing how great it is to get together and reaffirm the importance of this habit... whether it's a simple get together or crazy adventure.

About a year ago we decided to introduce a theme for our next adventure - it needed to be something that was physically demanding, and required a little training to prepare.

Randy: My suggestions were like "let's hike up Killamanjaro", aligned to my somewhat over ambitious sense of adventure and capability. When properly challenged by our wive's, I realized that I was probably getting a little ahead of ourselves. Maybe next year. What resulted was Chris both deciding on our next adventure, and committing to his own personal training regime to prepare. This was great news!

Chris: it was so great seeing Randy at the airport. You could tell the energy and excitement from both of us for the upcoming adventure was very high. We collected our luggage, rental car and headed off to Banff, Alberta, where we bought our park pass, lunch and a few final provisions (who says pepperette's and pumpkins seeds aren't great trail food!). We then headed to Lake Louise to settle in for a final night before heading out on the trail.

Chris: The Fairmont at Lake Louise was impressive (through in our opinions you need to really appreciate being in that spot to justify the room rates). We walked out on the lake, took some pics of the hotel and of ice sculptures being carved and just enjoyed our amazing surroundings. This has to be one of the prettiest spots in all of Canada. We enjoyed a nice dinner in the pub while we talked through prep and packing strategies. It is amazing what you think you need for an adventure like this before you head out. I re-packed 4 times, each time justifying a whole new group of items I thought I would need. When I was done, my pack was literally stuffed and I felt content that I was ready for whatever could come my way. I am not exaggerating when I say it was somewhere between 25 - 30 lbs, and somehow I thought this was logical at the time -to carry on my back for the 11km journey.

Randy: So much to my surprise, the trip my brother selected was a Snowshoe-in and out adventure in the cold, Canadian Rockies. Yes, we were the night before a trip where my full preparation was concluded only in the 2.5 weeks prior - getting gear for -15 Celcius before windchill, snowshoes, poles, backpack, and trying it all out a few times. Two times to be precise. These trips were on Seymour mountain (north Vancouver) and while they got me familiar with the gear, by no way prepared me for snowshoeing in the back country with the addition of a heavy pack and big inclines.

Chris: The Lake Louise shuttle picked us up at the parking lot at 9:30 and we were off. It was a brisk morning (-6), but we were ready! We were dropped off at the base of the Temple Ski hill, and I marvelled at what I saw -skiers literally descending thousands of feet down the hills at what I thought was break-neck speeds. My first thoughts were that these people are nuts! Who does this, and thinks it is fun? Randy and I headed to the snack shop to get final directions to the Skoki trail, gear up and head out.

Randy: psst bro... I think you are giving away your skiing experience ;)

Chris: I knew it was going to be a very long day after the first hill - to get to the trail! It had a massive incline and I was completely winded before I had even stepped onto the trail.

Chris: Within the first 10 minutes, I had my first equipment failure - my pole came apart where it should have been locked. We got it fixed and headed out again.

A lot of snow had fallen the night before and we were first on the trail, so the first part was tough going. I found myself wondering what I was thinking to do a trek like this. Another 20 minutes in and I had my second pole failure -the bottom part of my pole stayed in the snow while I kept going -so McGyver Randy pulled out some camo-duct tape to fix the issue.

Chris: By this point I was a walking furnace, so layers came off quickly...coat, gloves, hat..who needs all this stuff anyway? Thankfully we found a more compact trail to follow and we started picking up a bit of speed. The scenery on this hike was breath-taking. I can't imagine anywhere more beautiful. It was sunny, crisp but thankfully not windy.

Randy: I've hiked a decent amount in around Vancouver, but there is something about the Canadian Rockies that is so amazing. Armed with two cameras (that worked flawlessly in -10) I had my canvas before me!

Chris: we started to gain significant altitude about 3 hours in. The fatigue was starting to take its toll. We had worked our way up the the edge of Ptarmigan Lake and stopped to catch our breathe and grab a quick bite to eat. Looking back on where we had come from, I couldn't believe we have traversed what we did...I also (thankfully) didn't know what we still had to do. We geared up again after our brief stop, I put all the layers back on that had shed much earlier as the wind started to pick up and headed across the Lake. I started feeling better about myself as we made great time -why couldn't all of the trail be a nice and flat as this? Once across the lake, the trail took a sharp turn the the left up the side of the mountain through 'deception pass', and my heart sank. I knew this was going to be the hardest thing I had ever done in my life, it was going to take every ounce of my willpower...and we still had 4 km's to walk to get to the lodge.

Chris: To say the trek up the pass was brutal would be a gross under-statement. It was a major achievement just to make it to each of the trail markers on the path. Randy seemed to have boundless energy going up and I struggled with every step. I just kept telling myself -put 1 foot in front of the other and we will eventually get there. Randy snapped some amazing shot of our surroundings (he had some time on his hands waiting for me to catch up!).

Randy: we got some great advice from our host we'd meet later that day that I'd wish I'd heard before (and it worked great going out). Leo snowshoed a ton in his life in teams for work and said they always were first...

He urged us of the importance of going so slow you don't need to stop for breathe to keep the fastest overall pace.

Chris: we made it to the top of the pass and I felt like I had conquered Everest. What a feeling! We knew from what we had read that it was all down-hill from here to the lodge, so the worst was behind us, but Randy's GPS watch still said we had 3 km's to go! When was this going to end?

Chris: Bad news. About 10 minutes from the top of the pass I lost my footing, slipped off the path, fell sideways and sunk in about 4 feet of snow. It was all I could do to get back up and going again, in my overwhelming fatigue I didn't realize that I had seriously hurt my rotator. Every step was painful but I wasn't going to let this get the best of me! Thankfully it was easier going being downhill but I thought it was never going to end. We finally arrived at the lodge almost 6 hours after leaving the ski hill -we had survived the trek to Skoki!