Hiking the Bay of Fundy

So I have a lot to update with, however I think I am going to split it in to two posts, this one detailing the adventures of my hike along the Bay of Fundy and the next one about Dorjl Denma Ling center I arrived at today.

Me ready to face the wild

So the hike consisted of 8.5km on saturday to our camp site and 8.5 km back on sunday. Initially Serena's uncle, Bo, was hoping for us to hike 17 km to another campsite...thank god we didn't do that! hah!

So we started off with a ridiculous amount of equipment, Serena's uncle being an army man that has done a lot of hiking made sure we were prepared for LITERALLY ANYTHING!!! And food consisted of instant chili and oatmeal and trail mix...NO LIE!! It was slightly painful, however I did discover, thanks to Bo and his wife some delicious tea, Good Earth, that they had and is apparently only sold in the US, so I brought lots of that. SOO good, its like a drug! If anyone goes to the states, please bring me back some!

We also discovered raspberry and gooseberry bushes by the campsite, so Serena and I did a lot of berry picking, which I was already trained for after living/working on a farm for 2 weeks! The hike was pretty awesome, the views were gorgeous, and even when we were surrounded by bush I felt like I was in a postcard. There were times were you would walk through 3 different "lands", as Serena and I referred to them: Jurassic park land, fairy land, and hobbit land. The fog at the campsite was also unbelievable.

Fog on beach at campsite

So at the start of the hike my pack was wicked bad hurting, think digging into my hips and slowly ripping away my skin, thanks to the absolutely horrible packs that apparently Serena's parents used to hike across Canada, I don't know how they did it! So after a few painful minutes I decided to switch packs with Robbie (serena's boyfriend), who had a good pack, it did miracles, although now Robbie was stuck with the shitty pack, a bad shoulder, and a bad knee. I felt just slightly pampered...but they said I should switch, so what's a girl to do?!

On the trail on the second day

While at the campsite I played cribbage with Serena and her uncle and won both games...so watch out, there's a new champ in town, although they did put up a fight. no braggin. After we returned the guy at the interpretive center was apparently hitting on me (my stinky, sweaty, dirty self), which was sweet...never had that before! So you boys, just remember, it does make a girl feel good, esp. when she smells bad. Then we had dinner waiting for us which involved tons of veggies (YES!!!)! We were spoiled by Serena's aunt and grandparents.

It was a great hike, thanks so much for having me Serena!!

Saying Goodbye to the First Farm

I have already spend 1 week at Bantry Bay, 2 days left and I am pretty excited but also super nervous about the future. Why? Because I used to have nothing planned for next week, however i just recieved an email from this budhist retreat center that I can go live and volunteer there for the next few weeks. I am super pumped, because that is something I have been wanting to do for a while, plus I will be volunteering in the kitchen! So I will keep you posted on that.

The sad part about that is that I am not going to PEI, which is what I was really trying to swing. But I guess that will also be there for next time. Can't do everything, which I have learned on other adventures too.

So this farm has definately been a learning experience. I have held chickens (that are now sadly dead due to a wessle that ate there heads! Gross eh?!), harvested, cleaned and bunched a plentiful of veggies, weeded, cleaned dishes, cooked, sold veggies at the market, and hitch hiked! All of these were first on some scale or another for me. Along with this I have been able to go on some beautiful runs(of which I wanted to go on today, but I only finished work at 7pm, and now i am tired and lazy), read, chilled by the water, contemplated my future too much, watched a few movies, and done a bit of knitting and jewelry making. However, as a WWOOFer I have also felt somewhat out of place and on the outside here at the farm. I have fell into this quite zone of me, which is very interesting indeed. I don't really feel like I belong here, yet I am so grateful for all that I have been given and the experiences and knowledge that I have gained from the time spent here.

So where to next? Well this weekend I am off for a hike, which i am somewhat concerned about (I hope its not too intense) with my friend and her uncle and boyfriend. Her uncle apartly is a hardcore outdoorsyer, hiked in Tibet and elsewhere, so we will see. We are starting in St. Martin and from there hiking the Bay of Fundy...I dont really know whats happening....Then on monday if everything works out I am heading to the Buddhist center! I will hopefully we there for 3 weeks until I head to the tofu production place. Then at the end of August there is a workshop thing I am planning on going to called Free School...sounds really cool.

Know what else is cool? Community Share Restaurants, you should check them out. I am seriously considering them for my future. But everyday I seriously consider something new, so who knows! Miss you all! Don't hesitate to shoot me a comment or e-mail, they seriously make my day!

Peace out.

In New Brunswick...at the farm!

Arrived at the farm just outside of St. Andrews, New Brunswick, yesterday. I havn't really done much yet, helped harvest and wash some radishes this morning and now i am sitting at the dinning room table, while we all have breakfast. (Correction to that...it is not tuesday, and since yesterday breakfast i have washed the radishes, washed and picked through lettuce, wieghed and bunched beet greens for the CSA bags, picked off A LOT of potato bugs and unfortunately there poo too from the potato plants, picked strawberries, washed a lot of dishes, made fruit crisp, and thinned out carrots)

So the farm is essentially a vegetable farm, there are 2 chickens, of which i got to hold one this morning, which they have for eggs but not for meat. They essentially keep the chickens as pets, but eat the bi-products, being the eggs. As a vegan I actually have no moral problem with this seeing how the chickens are raised and loved. There are 5 other people, plus a 2 week old baby on the farm as well. So this is my new home, at least for the next week.

So The past few days i was chillin in Fredricton with my friend Serena, it was pretty awesome, quite an experience. First of all, considering Serena and I (friends from Shad Valley) hadn't seen eachother for 5 years, it was pretty sweet to actually see eachother, chat, reminise, and just hang. We strolled around fredricton, made some sweet phymo jewelry, went to Tree-go (which is this awesome obstacle course thing in the trees, cool as a demo of how to make money without having to destroy the forest), and did so much more!

Sorry no photos again, I tried to load them, but the internet on the farm has limited bandwidth, so no visuals...use your imagination!

New Brunswick is an interesting place. The people are soo friendly, and the scenary is gorgious, but the people are not what i would call healthy. in fact, serena was telling me that it has the highest obesity rate in canada, and you sure can see that when you look at the people around you. Its pretty upsetting, the lifestyle choices that are happening here, especially when there is so much farming and ways to be active all around them.

So here i am, im pretty quiet on the farm right now, sometimes feel a little awkward and out of place as i try to find how and where i fit in with the productions. being my first time working in the field, doing wwoofing, in the maritimes, i am a hardcore newby, but you got to start somewhere! Well, back to to work i go!

ps. one of the guys here just put on some bread (ie through ingredients into a breadmaker)...home cooked goodness

Pictures from Hali

Top of a Tippee at the Mi'kauw Festival/Event

Sorry for the lack of pictures on the previous post, I had lost my camera (to the bottom of my bag) and couldn't add any pictures, but alas the missing camera has been found! SO I hope you enjoy the few photos I am including here, they are all from Halifax, although now I am in Fredericton, so stay tuned for new adventures!

Me saluting my audience

Friends by the harbor

Maritimes Adventures-Halifax!!

Having left for Halifax on June 24th its only been 4 days here, yet I feel like its been soo much longer. Right now I am slightly delirious from over eating at a Hare Krishna gathering in Halifax where we watched a play dealing with the issue of "lonelyness", which was actually really amazingly done, chanted/danced for a hr, and ate some absolutely rock-star food. All of the monks dress in orange, although I am currently unaware of why the colour orange is used, perhaps someone reading this knows, if so please comment and let me know!

Other then Hare Krishna today was spent watching the FIFA game england against germany, woot the germany winning, and working on job stuff at starbucks next to my ginormous free soy frapachinno. Oh I also went for a run and yet again got lost! The weather today was gorgious!

there are soo many graveyards in Hali, its crazy! There are also a lot of public green spaces which I love too. The other day when I went out for a run I was trying to find this park, but I ended up hitting a graveyard with lots of Titanic victims buried there. Until today I had no idea that Halifax was the closest place to the Titanic disaster, as a result most of the bodies were brought and buried in Halifax! There is so much history in this city. What else? Let me tell you!

So I leave for Fredericton tomorrow after an action packed week in Hali. Other then Sunday with the Soccer game and Hare Krishna gathering, I also walked a lot through gardens and graveyards, went for 3 beautiful runs, visited the maritimes museum where i learned that Theodore the tug boat is from Halifax, who knew?! I also edited and updated my resume which i handed out to many places in Hali, visited the amazing farmers market where I sampled raw chocolate, bought strawberries and peas, a vegan muffin, lots of soy products from this local production which i may WWOOF at later in the summer, yummy curry dip, some really good coffee(but it made me crazy), soup, and i think thats it! I also bought some pins and shampoo soap, there was soo much and it was in such a beautiful building! THe busking musicials were pretty amazing too. Other then the market I have eating a bunch of great meals, weather it be cooked by me, or others at potlucks or free Hare Krishna food, or at one of the two restaurants i went to, i definitely have not been food deprived. We also enjoyed some shesha on the porch, had some deep philosophical discussions, and per usual I had a few freak outs about my future!

What else?! Well, I also went to the pub last night with Liz to see an amazing fiddler, just reg. business for thems maritimers, rockin it out on the monday night, and a few of the ppl in the audience got up and did the jig too! SOo cool! This weekend was also an aboriginal festival, so we saw some singing, drumming, dancing, and demos of traditional mikquaw (prob. spelt that wrong...sorry!) lives!

Liz and I have also played a few intense cribbage games, thats right, she converted me, I am a follower now. So who ever is interested, lets play! Well, I'm going to end here, tomorrow I plan on going to Sentinel Hill before catching my bus to Fredericton, for some more adventure I'm sure!

Miss everyone, hope your lives are fun filled and exciting! Can't wait to hear from you via email, facebook, or comments on this post!

Third and Last Post from Trois-Pistoles

Last post in Trois-Pistole. Today is the last Monday I have here. I am sitting my Madame Hostess’ kitchen, at her dining room table typing this. I really should be going to sleep, cuz I’m super tired, but I’m not. Soon…

Liz, Roslyn and Steve licking up the water at a sexy fountain in Quebec City

Before typing this I read and looked up words I didn’t understand the dedication of “Le Petit Prince”, a children’s book in French that I bought today to provide me with something to use to work on my French after I leave TP. As the end nears it has been a good experience, although extraordinarily tough. I have found a new respect for French, and I love the artisticness of Quebec culture, although don’t love so much the unhealthiness of the traditionally food. Very few ppl in Quebec are veggie, and the staples are poutine, processed meat and beer…at least from what I have experienced! However, there also does seem to be a love for “veggie pate” in Quebec, which I’m down with.

It has been raining and shitty weather for the past 3 days which is rough on my mental well being. I need to be outside, especially here in TP, but we have been spoiled with gorgeous weather for the 3 weeks prior to this one. I leave this Friday, and although exciting, I am sad to leave the St. Lawrence and all my new friends! But new adventures are already being formed; I plan to catch a plane to Halifax at the end of June to WWOOF on farm(s) for a few months! Stay tuned!

Still in Trois-Pistole

Hello there!

Another update from TP (aka Trois Pistole)! Commencing the third week here I am approaching mid-way point, and although there has been definitely a lot of great things about the experience and program I am also excited to be almost midway done! Why? Well…let me start at the bottom(bad) and work my way up to the top(good).

Bad:

1. being paralyzed and trapped in language that you suck at! Although I am getting better I am still not very good and can’t be my self, communicate my desires, or take control of my life when I can only speak French. I see how hard it must be for immigrants in Canada who don’t speak English very well, and why they flock together to speak their mother tongue whenever they get a chance!
2. The food here sucks. Well, ok, perhaps that’s SLIGHTLY harsh, it could be worse, but its definitely lacking. For example tonight was “spagetti” however the tomato sauce was more like tomato water with a few pumpkin and sunflower seeds in it with ice burg lettuce salad. Who likes iceburg lettuce salad, really, who?! The food hardcore lacks nutrition and paluability, but much to my shirgrin I have grown used to it…can’t wait to come home and be re-united with spices, fresh veggis, and cooked (rather then raw) tofu!
3. Lastly for the whine fest, is …

Now for the Good:

1. there are tons of super fun activies, such as tonight when I finished my sweet mask for the maskerade ball next Friday! Its made from bandage plaster and painted and I love it.
2. weekly movie nights, although in French, its still pretty sweet to aller, and its at the school aditorium, so its like going to the movie theatre for free. This week was this crazy messed up movie with this guy that fantasized about women…
3. Although class kills me every morning, I am happy to have it and to be learning. I do love learning, yes I am a nerd, and I am happy to be one. I am so grateful for the sun though, when we have our breaks and I am able to sit outside with my friends in the sun on the grass. Ok, computer about to die, that’s all for now.
4. meeting lots of really interesting other people from all over Canada! We all seem to have such diverse lives its really awesome! This weekend there was a trip to quebec city that I went on and it was absolutely fabulous to have a break to speak English and actually get to know one another…and to be in a big city. And what a beautiful city, its like your in Europe, so many ppl out and beautiful architecture! Ahhh!!!
5. the gorgeous exterior here! Just spend 2.5 hrs outside tonight biking and sitting and journaling and its so calming and grounding. I love it!
6. although I don’t think I could do a small town, I love the community feel of it. Everyone saying hi to others as you walk, recognizing people, etc. although annoniminity is nice sometimes…but I guess when that is wanted is when you go off for bike rides in the woods!
7. I also love the water. I have found my sole mate, the ocean.

I could go on, but I will stop here! The experience is a challenge, and its got its bads, but also its goods. And its important to keep the goods bright and shinning, cuz those are what are really important (cheesy but I really thinks its true…although I have to remind my self of this!)!

Well, thanks for listening! 2 weeks left in Trois-Pistoles before I come home, I will try to make another post before I leave, but if not, desolate (sorry in French).