Goin' Back to Wolfville

As we faced our final days of driving, we were sad that this portion of the Big Year was coming to an end. Even though we had our longest car day (11 hours!), we savored the audiobooks and movie time. Johannes even got in the back seat to watch his birthday gift movie, (Rogue One - the "best" star wars movie in the canon). We played trivia rounds and had conversations about the state of the world. We ate Timbits, drank lots of coffee, and compared the merits of our favorite road snacks.  

After a lovely night in St John, NB, Johannes drove ever more slowly on the final miles. It was a bittersweet return as we were going back to Wolfville for the first time without our beloved Linda there to welcome us. We were sad to end our wonderful (and challenging) road trip, but good to come full circle: back to the Bay of Fundy. We played this song over and over. Goin' Back to Wolfville: the Wolfville Song.

However, it was wonderful to meet the newest member of the family, little Ellis, and reconnect with our cousins over chocolate bunnies and egg hunts. 

To their delight, the kids got to spend a day with their classes at the Booker School, visiting with friends and enjoying the comfort of being back in a classroom with teachers who are not their parents. Ahem!

It was a busy week. Not only were we unpacking and getting ready for Europe, but we were also getting ready for (drumroll, please...) our move to Nova Scotia in August! As we have traveled and reflected this year, we have recognized the importance of being near family, deep community roots, and the ocean. While we have loved our friends and time in Vermont, we want to be north of the border for the next 10 years or so. After that, who knows?

As a result we spent the week in job interviews, looking at houses, meeting with mortgage brokers, and imagining our future. Not the most relaxing week, but we left with our backpacks and our hearts full. Our passports were ready for some new stamps as we embarked on our 6- week journey across Europe. 

Thank you all for reading these posts. They have been a way to reflect on our journey and stay in touch with family and friends. Experiencing something, writing about it, and then posting a week or more later is difficult, but knowing a few of you are reading our exploits and sharing in our adventures has made the extra effort well worth it.  

Vancouver to Syracuse

Our first stop, heading slightly east was to see Asha, Seth, Luca, and Hali, our lovely family in Vancouver. They made us feel so welcome; we got to meet their dog, Jada, and eat Asha's delicious food, which is increasingly famous in Vancouver and beyond. Check out Kula Kitchen ! Mostly we just hung out and relaxed, always a treat for these road warriors.

We went to the park, the beach, and had a beautiful woods walk. 

One way to measure this year is the number of walks on the woods we have taken. There have been a few.

After a visit to Johannes' PhD alma mater, Simon Fraser University, we had a lovely dinner with Raegan, Jon (Jo's friend from SFU and co-author), and their daughter Kate. The next morning we headed to back to Washington, to begin our eastward trek in earnest.

After a quick stop in Seattle to experience the Pike Place market, we got back on the road to show the kids Othello, WA, where Jo and Liz lived and worked for four years, and where Margaret was born.

We visited with Jon and Ricardo, old colleagues and friends, at the best pizza place in Connell, WA. Next we found our way to Medical Lake to stay with Liz's former boss, Mary Jo. She was part of our Washington family and one of the first people to hold Margaret. She took good care of us and it was special to reconnect after almost ten years away from the west coast. 

Next we saw highway from a variety of elevations, listening to our Big Year playlist and chewing up miles. Medical Lake to Missoula, Missoula to Havre, and then north to Regina, Saskatchewan.  From time to time, spicy Bloody Mary's were consumed. 

In Regina we saw David, Amy and their lovely family. Jo and David studied political science together at Dalhousie, were in each other's weddings, but had never managed to get the kids together. It was great. The five of them were fast friends. We "experienced" the Royal Saskatchewan Museum, played some music, and laughed a ton!

Back on the road, we tracked down the "Biggest ball of twine in Minnesota," and blew our monthly data limit bingeing all the Weird Al music that Liz could stand.

Back on the road, we hit the Windy City for some Deep Dish, a view of the bizarrely blue-green waters of Lake Michigan, and a scenic cruise along Lake Shore Drive.  

Of course, the Big Year is not all seeing the sights and visiting with friends and family. There is still work to do, as the kids splash in the pool. Someone needs to keep searching for the best Bloody Mary in America. Jo was up to the challenge.

This next leg of the trip included some long days and early mornings. And traffic. So much traffic. The closest we got to an accident happened on our way outside of Chicago. The kids learned some new words, and how to string them together.

Our final stop before making it to Syracuse for a long weekend was Niagara Falls. 

This is where Jo and Liz were engaged some 14 years ago. A brief sense of how it started and how it is going....

The weary crew limped into Syracuse to see Jo's Aunt and confidant, Donna. We were definitely ready for some down time!

Travelling up the coast

We successfully avoided blizzards and road closures, which meant we couldn't drive up the Pacific Coast Highway, but we made it to beautiful Monterey to head south along Route 1. The iconic drive to Big Sur down to Essalen definitely did not disappoint, even on a cloudy day. 

We had our first taste of redwoods, found a quirky book store, and breathed in the huge, salty vistas. This may have been Margaret's favorite spot so far.

After some otter spotting - in the wild only, no aquariums for these animal-rescue-educated kids - we headed north to Santa Cruz. Johannes spent a formative year here after high school working, living, and working some more. We walked the high street and the boardwalk and visited the movie theater he worked at. We enjoyed perusing the vintage clothing spots, music stores, and eating slices from the wonderfully named Pizza My Heart.  

We headed up the 1 to San Francisco, where Liz took over the roots tour. We found her old apartments in the Haight, and the Castro, saw all the hospitals (fortunately just from the outside), and got treats from her favorite bakery, Tartine.  

We practiced our travel skills - getting around by MUNI, trolley, bus, and even electric scooter to enjoy San Francisco highlights on a string of beautiful and cloudless days.

We headed north with a brief stop in wine country at our new favorite vineyard (La Crema) to soak in the beauty of the redwoods. If you have never been, there is something indescribable and so powerful about these ancient giants. We were inspired to write poetry as we wandered through the groves.  

We also stayed in an amazing house tucked up in the trees and loved waking up to beautiful views.

Johannes was scheduled to give a talk at Cal Poly Humboldt in Arcata (or we may never have left the trees). We had a few more woods walks with our friends the trees (though sadly some groves were closed due to storm damage on the roads) before we drove through a snowy pass into Oregon.

Thanks to Karen and her family we are now big fans of Corvallis and the rough-skinned newts. Music was played and Nova Scotia memories were shared. 

Our trip through Portland hit the highlights - Powell's books, where 2 hours of browsing was barely enough; a ride up the tram to see the city views; and best of all, dinner with Liz's cousin Lee and her family.

We ended up on one of our favorite spots when we lived in the Northwest - the Oregon Coast. We spent so many vacations wandering the sands between Pacific City and Cannon Beach. Liz had also spent a rotation in medical school, working in Tillamook. The cheese factory tour was as good as we remembered (hooray for free samples).  We had some lovely relaxing days of playing music, walking on the beach, and soaking in the hot tub before getting back on the road. 

After a stop at the Goonies house (of course) in Oregon we wound around the Olympic Peninsula through more old growth trees to a wild stay at the Olympic Railway Inn in a converted caboose. It was a fun and funky stay (but also reminded us why we are not tiny house or RV people). 

The next day we boarded the ferry to cross back into Canada. Victoria is a special place for our family. Johannes spent a summer working in the famed Empress Hotel during college and Trevor was born here.

We visited the house we lived in during that time, the beautiful beaches along Oak Bay, the peacocks in Beacon hill park and the harbor.  

A highlight was the Malahat Skywalk with beautiful views over the fjords and Salt Spring Island where Johannes' father Trevor lived. Best of all, you can slide back down! 

After traveling up the west coast, we headed to our family in Vancouver and began to plot our route back east.