Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Back in North American

TT3 hoola hooping in Hayes Park, see the older gentleman who joined in :-)


Our trip to Australia was wonderful!! It was so nice to hang out with Sarah and Paul and their clan. We were lucky enough to catch Sarah on her days off the water and she was able to come out and play with us. We also had a nice visit with Travis and Lelia in Tasmania. We got to go crabbing with Rob Mengler! And made lots of new friends to go back and visit with the Australian Bike Friday Club. Margret Day has planted the seed and written the menu for starting the Canadian Bike Friday club stay tuned on that one!!

Our flights to San Francisco were pleasant and uneventful. We arrived in the morning and managed to stay up all day so the time/day change was a relatively easy transition. The week in San Francisco was spent in the warm glow of the Anusara Kula. Diana had classes with Sianna Sherman http://www.opentograce.com/ who I have been taking my Anusara Teacher Training with, this was TT 3 an amazing week with many of the same people who have been traveling along this journey with me.


Ian and I practice yoga every day at the Yoga Tree Hayes Studio with Darcy or Stacey or KK. On the weekend at Yoga Kula – studio’s to aspire to. Darren was in town for the weekend at Yoga Kula and MC Yogi was practicing with us too!!


Darren

Our friends Read and Arden were coincidentally in SF for a family holiday. We were able to have some visits with them. We are soooooo!!!! happy to be able to visit with Read since a few weeks ago he was caught in an avalanche in Colorado. He is getting around very well on crutches and his leg is mending well!!

Breakfast at the Squat and
Gobble with Read and Arden

While we were in San Francisco we also decided to fly back to the east coast instead of cycle to Vancouver and fly from there. There were lots of things we wanted to get done on the east coast still so why not give ourselves the time to do them without being rushed. So we managed to find relatively cheap flights with the usually nasty routeings of last minute flights Pittsburgh red eye, then to Ottawa and Ottawa to Charlottetown. Diana seems to have finally managed to learn how to sleep on a plane – not soundly or for really long but I did sleep some so I recovered quickly from the jet lag. It was pretty quiet in around the Pineau neighbourhood since John and Inez were holding the fort while everyone else was in the Dominican Republic at Kristen and Marshal’s wedding. Everyone came back with lovely happy stories and nice tans. From the photos it looks like it was a great event!

Last weekend we drove into Halifax for JR and Jenny’s wedding celebration. They ran off and eloped in January and we were honoured with their presence at our wedding so we were only too happy to be at their party! It was in the N Magazine at Citadel Hill. Ian had never been up there before so after the event we went for a wonder around the ramparts. It has always been a favourite place of mine and it was nice to be there again. After being a tourist in Australia for almost three months being a tourist in Halifax was kind of normal.

JR and Jenny's party


We went to the Dingle with Verity and Buddha – a place neither Ian nor I had been. I had been to the frog pond but not the walk from the tower to the Halifax Yachted Squadron which is very nice. We had been impressed with the stone work in Australia but Halifax has it share of impressive stone work too! It is fun to be a tourist at home.



We have been hanging out reorganizing our belongings here in PEI and planning what next. We are going to head to Ontario on the 29th or 30th and catch a workshop with Naime Jazzeny in Burlington then head up to Pembroke and look for a house then back to Toronto for a workshop with Christopher Wallis.

We will be back in PEI in May with a trip to NS in the mix. Then back to Ontario for the end of May and a White Water recert for Ian at MKC and the SPNHC and CAC conferences for Diana in Ottawa.
Then back east to try and paddle around PEI and visit folks until we head back for Ian's work in August.
Now this is all subject to change if Diana happens to get work with the New Zealand Antarctic Trust and need to go to Antarctica....

Till next thats all

Diana and Ian

Monday, April 5, 2010

ABFC Clare Valley March 22 - 28

Greetings All: A quick update on the past few days. As you may or may not recall a random inquiry about finding a bike shop put us in touch with ABFC; the Australian Bike Friday Club and we were invited to attend their annual gathering. This year it was in the Clare Valley and we managed to arrange to be there. We jumped on the train to Adelaide and were picked up by our friend Rob Mengler for a few days of sightseeing in his old stomping grounds before we went out to the Clare to meet up w the BF People.


It had been 10 years since we had seen Rob and he hasn’t changed a bit. He did however change jobs; from parks and into the Forest Service. Doing essentially the same thing (Habitat management) just for a different organization.








We went off and raked for blue mud crabs; managing to get enough for an ocean side feed prior to going to have a look at the mangrove swamps on the way back to town.



The next day was a visit to Murray Bridge so named because it was the location of the first bridge to span the Murray River.
The Murray, as it is called in Aus., is a major waterway and the main supplier of water for the desperately dry southern part of Aus.

After poking around MB a bit we were shown an area that has an endangered species of bird, the Malee Fowl, which build huge nests and uses compost to maintain the nest at a constant temperature so the eggs will hatch.



Eventually the time came for Rob to drop us in the Clare Valley. He came up and spent the evening with us as we met some of the BF folks. He was impressed by the amount of travel these folks undertake and was amused at the collection of small wheeled bikes that had been assembled.

We checked in with the BF Folks on Thursday evening and got the lowdown on the next day’s ride. The Clare Valley is littered with wineries and has some of the oldest vines in Aus. The Seven Hill winery run by the Jesuit Priests has been continuously producing sacramental wine in the area since the early 1800’s.

On Friday we joined the group (approx. 110 riders) for a ride that could be anywhere from 35 to 60K depending on the route you followed. There were folks from all over Aus. Plus three kanuks and two yanks. Bike Friday sent out one of their sales folks for the event so we had a chance to talk to him about our bikes and experiences. The après ride festivities included much food & drink coupled with info about the next day’s ride. The Sat. Ride was a bit shorter but mostly on hard packed dirt road.

We had a very enjoyable time riding with an American chap and his daughter. He was a pilot for United Airlines and his 15 year old was nicking some time off school to attend the ride. They have been attending ABFC events for the past 10 years. Saturday evening was a catered dinner with a charity auction that raised over $2000.00 for Seeing Eye dogs of Aus. There were at least 3 blind riders in the group so the choice of charities was very appropriate.

After three days of organized rides Sunday was a personal choice day followed by a catered lunch at the local golf course. After lunch people said their goodbyes and scattered to the four winds. We hitched a ride back to Adelaide with a great couple Greg and Rose. We had a stellar ride back and dinner with them. They generously offered us their spare room for the evening and dropped us in the city the next morning so we could pick up a rental car to begin the last leg of our journey which would see us arrive back at Sarah and Paul’s place in Karrajong just outside of Sydney.