The Rundown

Holy smokes, I can't believe how much has happened since I posted that last one. Our trip to Halifax was awesome; it was so much fun to just travel with my buddies, without having to have every minute planned out to the very last detail. We bussed down there and had a hotel room booked. We spent the 2 days just seeing Halifax... we walked around and saw the Citadel and all the random little shops; took the ferry to Dartmouth - it was a beautiful day out and we could practically sun-tan on the deck of the ferry! - and (finally) got some badly-needed new clothes; went down to the farmer's market, which was jam-packed with amazing people and huge variety in the stuff they were selling; in that same building we did a tour of the Alexander Keith's brewery. It was an awesome trip. Here are some pictures...

So that was all fine and dandy once it lasted, but it seemed like as soon as we got back, the rush of Katima-work started up again, and busier and crazier than ever. From then right up until when we left, we were busy, busy, busy with preparations and clean-up and stuff. We lost three participants in two days - We were sad to see Roxanne and Robyn go home, even though we knew for a while of their decision to leave the program. The day after they left, P.O. got sent home. That was pretty much a relief to our whole group, since it didn't really seem like he wanted to be in the program for any reason other than free food. Anyway, we still miss the girls so much, but we had to move on and get down to business. We had to prep the house for the next group coming, and we had a final presentation to do for our Inverness goodbye party as well as rotation camp - 2 days spent with the two other groups on Cape Breton Island just before we head on to our next spot (my group's next spot being White River, Ontario).

Rotation camp was held in Cheticamp, and we weren't coming back to Inverness between then and travelling, so we had to have allll our stuff packed and ready in time for the few days in Cheticamp. That was pretty wild, trying to get everything together and making sure not to forget anything. Then, rotation camp. It was expected to be pretty boring and none of us were very excited to go, but it ended up being better than we expected. It was more just a time to relax and get ready to go to our next place, and it was in the Centre Acadien in Cheticamp where there is pool and bowling and stuff. The worst part of rotation camp was saying goodbye to our beloved 1st-trimester Project Leader, Sarah. She was 100% awesome and we miss her soo much. Saying our goodbyes to her was a horrible moment.

Anyway, so we left Cheticamp by bus at 1 am on Wednesday with the other two groups, Marion Bridge and Cheticamp. We got to Halifax about 5 hours later and said our sorrowful goodbyes to the other two groups (who are both heading to Alberta) again and again, all the way to our boarding gate.

From there it was just a long, long travel day... we flew from Halifax to Toronto, then to Sault Ste. Marie, where we met the other two groups in our 'cluster'. This was the point where morale started to get really low. We were not too excited to be where we were, we hadn't heard great things about White River, we were coming from a culture-packed place like Cape Breton to somewhere that didn't seem all that interesting, and I was freakin' out at the lack of mountains everywhere I looked. Also, the Sault Ste. Marie airport is pretty small and features a few vending machines, a diner and some video games. We were stuck waiting there for the other two groups for about 3 hours, which was 3 hours too long, the way we see it. When our new cluster groups finally arrived, we were excited to meet them.... but they didn't seem quite as excited as us. In fact, for the most part, all they really did was mumble a quick 'hello' and pull out a pack of cigarettes. Each - I swear. Almost all of them smoke. This would be fine, if they weren't way more interested in their cigarettes than they were in getting to know us. This was all fairly awkward for our group, as we are spending the next 3 months with these people and all we wanted was to make friends. Plus not one of us smokes.

So, onto the bus... at this point all we really wanted to do was just get to White River, settle into our new house and sleep. The bus ride seemed so long (full of smoke-breaks)... and bland... until we got to see Lake Superior. Wow. The sun was just setting over the lake and it was breathtaking. The lake was so calm and still, all clear with big white mounds of ice all around the edge, and the whole sky was an intense mix of red and gold, which in turn reflected on the ice of the lake. The trees along the road were just silhouettes, and the clouds way up above the sunset looked like they were growing as they got closer to us, so the sky looked bigger than I've ever seen it. This is when the prospect of 'no mountains' started to seem like it had a good side too; I watched that sunset for so long, and without mountains to block it, it seemed to last forever. At that point I finally started to feel positive about coming to White River. We had started to talk to a few of the new people in our cluster, and they seemed alright. And after all, I was realizing, I could not ask for a better group of friends to tackle this challenge with me... if nothing else, I've always got my crew.

So, here we are now in White River. The trip was long and arduous and, after a 1:00 am departure the previous day, we finally got here at something like 9:30 pm. We settled in and explored the new house (wayy huge compared to the last one!!!) and got to know our new PL, Josh, a little bit... And then we slept.

In the past few days we've been seeing the town a little.. we walked around and saw what there is to see - the Winnie the Pooh statue (White River is Winnie's hometown - Ohh yeahh) and other stuff. One awesome part of this place is that we have a gym practically right across the street from us, so we hit that up as soon as we could. It's so nice to work out again. Yesterday we went for a 'hike', which ended up just being a huge tacklefest and playing in the snow because it was way too deep for hiking, and then we found some snowboarding gear in the basement and did some snowboarding down the driveway - small hill, but it was a lot of fun. On Monday we have work interviews in the morning, and we'll start work in the afternoon!!!

I'll keep you updated on the town and work and stuff.. My camera randomly broke in Halifax, so I'm frustrated as heck with not being able to take pictures whenever I want. But I'll borrow a camera, and pictures of the town and our house will be coming soon. :)