Last day and the trip home

We’re home now, and with a big effort, we’ve gotten things shipshape around here. The last day of our vacation was packed full, and to quote Dickens:

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

As I said to Tammy on the drive yesterday, “I can’t think of yesterday without pain.” It was that good and bad. Good, because we had a fantastic time. Bad, because we had to drive away and know we wouldn’t be back for a long while.

Updated April 30th, 2017

When I posted this, Mom and Dad were asking for privacy on Mom’s health. For most of this visit, everyone thought that Mom’s cancer was in remission. Her mobility and ability to use her hands were problems due to the chemotherapy’s damage to her nerves. Stephanie, Tammy and I spent an afternoon at her place discussing how we were going to help Mom get the rehabilitation she needed. But then on the last evening before leaving, we came over to Mom and Dad’s, and Dad answered the door in tears. They’d gotten word that afternoon that Mom’s cancer was back. They still didn’t know the full extent of it or what treatment options were available, but we all got a punch in the stomach.

And that’s why driving away was so hard.

And now, back to the post…

The big event of the day was going to visit Jeff, Sasha, Katya and Alyosha in Sooke. We hadn’t seen them since we left, excepting a couple of Skype calls. Katya and Alyosha are growing rapidly. I got them to line up with our kids. Katya doesn’t turn 11 until October, and Alyosha turns 7 in late November.

Katya’s already taller than Tammy by a fair margin. 🙂

We had a visit, and Jeff told us about his new company making election management systems that sounds like it’s going gangbusters. The kids picked right up where they left off and played for hours. We had BBQ at their place and then headed out to Sooke Potholes.

In 10 years of living in Sooke, we’d never gone there to swim. It was one of my “cycling destinations” when I was there (20 km to the Potholes and back), and we’d gone as a family just to kick around. But today everyone except Tammy and Sasha got in the water.

We had a blast. Ian just finished telling me (again) that he had fun at the Potholes and wants to go there again the next time we visit Victoria.

The kids were initially put off by the cold, but overcame it and had a ton of fun.

Then we had to say good bye and head to Stephanie’s house. I had stashed my bicycle and the rack there, and there also was the small pile of Mom and Dad’s stuff to take back with us.

We couldn’t really do more than pack the stuff in the car and give Steph a hug, because she was off to work that night at the hospital. Then we went over to Mom and Dad’s condo for a last visit. We ordered in White Spot (mmm… club sandwiches) and had a good visit, but too short. We had to truck back to the hotel so that I could pack up the car. Between the suitcases and other paraphernalia from our trip and the stuff to take back, the car’s hatch and the top box was packed full.

Then it was off to bed for an early morning catching the 7:00 ferry. It started raining overnight. What is it with us? It rained when we left Calgary, and it rained when we left Victoria. It was another ferry ride, which was just fine with Ian. He had a million questions about the ferry and the route that it took through the Gulf Islands.

The drive home was pretty much what we expected: long, and a constant fight to entertain the kids. 🙂  They played multiplayer Minecraft basically from Tsawwassen to Merritt. Then it was movies, then they had a nap. From Golden to Calgary it was back to movies. Lunch was at Mr. Mike’s in Kamloops. Dinner was at DQ in Golden.

For us, the interesting part was the forest fire smoke. There are a lot of fires burning in Washington State, and the weather is funnelling the smoke into the interior of BC and southern Alberta. We spotted the smoke in Kamloops, and it just kept getting thicker from there.

We made it home at about quarter to 10 Mountain time, so it was 13 hours from the ferry. When I made the trip in March, I was home just after eight. I don’t think all the difference was due to the longer and more frequent stops with the family. I think the large number of delays due to construction played their part.

So today, it’s been about getting things done. First of all was getting the cats from the kennel. Tammy did that with the kids, while I went to Rona to get a lightswitch and wall plate and to Petro Canada to get the car filled and washed. Of special note was getting the speakers set up. For a while, I’d been “thinking out loud” about getting a pair of good stereo speakers for the bonus room. The Bose home theatre speakers work fine for that, but they really don’t do Hi-fi well. Now, thanks to Mom and Dad, I have a nice pair of Mirage 200 speakers. When I finally figured out how to set up a second zone on my Yamaha receiver, I sat Tammy down and then did some A-B testing to demonstrate how much better they were.

The trip was a raging success. The drives were long, but everyone survived. We had great visits (not enough with Zachary and Brianna, but the kids did have a sleepover) and the Tour de Victoria was successful too.

Now to rest up. Work is around the corner…