Happy Thanksgiving. A blog entry is long overdue, I see. The summer has ended and we are well into Autumn so it is time for me to record my activities over the last three months.
1. We spent most of the summer at our condo in Elk Ridge. Linda is quite active in the Elk Ridge community. She helps to organize the weekly Ladies Golf Night. She is also on the board for the community association. We are meeting a few people who live at Elk Ridge, but most of our socializing is with friends who camp or have cabins at Waskesiu. During the summer, we played several rounds of golf, kayaked on lakes in the area, hiked several trails, spent time on the beach when the weather allowed, and biked whenever we could. Linda and I also practiced yoga quite consistently and I must say, my knees feel better than they have been since I injured my knee in pickle ball three years ago. Speaking of pickle ball, we did play some games of pickle ball at the new courts that were created in Waskesiu.
2. I had some days that I traveled to Memorial Lake to spend time with Gunnar, Luvisa, Mary, Morgan, Dustin, and Haley. Gunnar and Luvisa have become real water bugs so their favourite activity, aside from catching frogs with Morgan, is spending hot afternoons on Uncle Dustin's boat. Gunnar and I got in a few rounds of what he calls "big golf" on the Memorial Lake Course. Gunnar has a membership at the course and takes the game quite seriously for a 4 year old. He wears a golf glove, takes multiple practice swings, and actually connects quite well for a boy his age. Luvisa likes to catch bugs and makes good use of her capture net.
3. On September 13, Linda and I flew to Paris, then took the train to Strasbourg, France, a beautiful city on the French/German border. We had an airbnb in the old town. From Strasbourg, we took a train to Nuremberg, Germany for two days. Again, we stayed in the old town. The most impressive tour we enjoyed was the Art Bunker tour, a tour that details the lead up to WWII in Germany. After Nuremberg, we traveled, again by train, to Passau, Germany where we spent three days before we began a week long Bike and Barge from Passau to Bratislava to Budapest to Vienna and back to Passau. In total, we biked well over 200 km through some amazing countryside along the Danube River. Beautiful cathedrals, scenic villages, castle ruins, and vineyards were among the many amazing features we viewed as we biked and barged down the Danube. We also went through several locks on our journey. Linda was not a fan of the locks. She thought descending down the locks was akin to being lowered into a grave.
We were with six other couples in our group. Everyone got along marvellously and sharing the experience with people we knew made the experience even better. The crew on board the barge were amazing, the food was great, and the coordinator prepared us well for a memorable experience every day. There were usually evening activities to entertain the guests. Linda and I particularly enjoyed the 70s night where we borrowed costumes and relived our youth as we dance the night away. I'm sure you won't be surprised to learn I was the first one to sign up for Karaoke Night.
The bike and barge ended on September 28, then we took a shuttle to Munich with our group. The main event was attending Octoberfest. I would recommend Octoberfest in Munich, but one day of Octoberfest was just fine. We drank a few litres of beer and enjoyed a platter of German food and listened to a lot of oompahpah music. Actually, I enjoyed going to the Hoftbrauhaus in Munich. Hoftbrauhaus is a huge beer hall that provides the Octoberfest experience all year long. The beerhall is a manic, noisy place that I think is a happier place than Disneyland. Good food, raucous singing, cheerful music, and happy faces everywhere.
4. We chose to take the train back to Paris rather than fly. Train travel in Europe is very enjoyable. We bought a four day pass and once we learned how to use the. booking app, we traveled comfortably throughout Germany and France.
5. As usual, the feeling of returning home is always a relief. We returned on October 2. The only downer was having to shed a scammer in the Paris Metro, a harrowing experience, but we came out unscathed.
6. On October 6, Scott and Sara arrived. Later in the week, Scott and Sara, along with Erin, joined Linda and me at Elk Ridge. We were thrilled to discover there was still colourful foliage to enjoy. We had beautiful weather to enjoy long hikes in the forest.
7. Following Elk Ridge, we came home to prepare for a house full of company on October 12. Linda's Saskatchewan relatives congregated at our place to enjoy a Thanksgiving meal and to meet Scott's lovely partner Sara. Scott and Sara are off to Paris in early December where they will live for the next 18 months while Sara completes a fellowship at a Paris hospital studying auto immune/ auto inflammatory diseases. Understandably, Linda is anxious about her boy moving so far away, but c'est la vie. The consolation is: Erin is moving back to Saskatoon from Edmonton so Linda will have her little girl nearby. Erin plans to study at the University of Saskatchewan after she does some upgrading. In the short term, she plans to find a job in the restaurant industry to build up the war chest.
So that's it for now. I will close by saying we live in a wonderful country. Yes, I know we have challenges to overcome, but we are very blessed to live in this nation. Oh Canada, I love you so.
No comments:
Post a Comment