Baie St Marie

Hello folks,

Fall fun at Kejimkujik National Park.

We have spent most of our sabbatical time in a place called Saint Bernard, or Bas-de-la-Riviere. Our neighborhood is tucked on an out of the way loop which boarders the North end of the Clare region, and Weymouth. Our mailing address puts us in Weymouth, but municipal boundaries say that we're in Clare. These are 2 very distinct communities, Weymouth being an English settlement founded in 1783, and Clare being a re-settlement location for recently deported Acadian people (resettled in 1768, deported by the English, beginning in 1755), and still remains a predominantly French region. We are located about a 40 minute drive from Yarmouth, where I grew up. We're about an hour and a half drive from the Annapolis Valley, where Tim's parents live.

Brier Island, just across Baie St Marie.

Keji fun.

There were a few big reasons we decided to begin our sabbatical year in this area. The major reason was that we wanted to be close to our families for some period of time, and the second, we wanted to immerse our kids in the French culture in this area, which is distinctly Acadian. These obejctives have been achieved- with so much more goodness on top of it all.

Through some old connections from our undergraduate days, we were able to find a house to rent in the region. We had no idea what we were walking into, but have been pleasantly surprised in so many ways. We live in a big house on top of a hill which overlooks Baie St Marie, many days we see more boat traffic on the water than traffic on our road. We share a driveway with the landowners, who are fabulous, and we have an ongoing agreement with them where we provide them with homemade bread in exchange for fresh haddock. Every evening we get a different picture of the sunset over the bay, and every morning I sip my tea while on "baywatch" (as Tim loves to refer to my passtime). It's great big wide open space, and we love it. There is also so much to be said for Acadian hospitality and music. The best being where these two things intersect- the Acadian Kitchen Party. We've been able to really relax and enjoy ourselves here.

First day of school.

The girls are in French Immersion in the school in Weymouth, and are adapting well. It's very interesting to find out that some friends of theirs are the kids of people I used to go to school with. Never saw that coming! The girls also dance at the local dance school in Clare and have made lots of friends there, and have really enjoyed dancing. We've also started geo-caching with the kids, which has been a great way to explore the area.

Tim has been working on local research projects with scientists in the region, which has been keeping him busy. He's also enjoying time to catch up on writing and data analysis, and is really enjoying spending his work days in his home office where he can wear slippers all day.

I've been spending a lot of time doing 3 of my favorite things: biking, baking and band. There are so many places to explore here on a bike, and we still have the weather to do it in mid-November! Fall always brings out the baker in me, and the abundance of local produce has meant a lot of time spent on pies. This also gives justification to time on a bike for me. As for band, through connections made at a kitchen party, I was invited to play trombone in the local orchestra. I love it. We have 2 Christmas concerts in the next 2 weeks, and have been working on that for most of the Fall. Quite a few of my old teachers are in the orchestra, and so that has been a neat connection as well.

We have about 6 weeks left here, and although the next stop is New Zealand, I'll be sad to leave. This has been a really restorative time for our family. A time to step out of the rat race and find joy again in a simpler way of life.

Our first geo-cache find!

Another find!

Halloween hoodlums in a cop car.

Owl banding with the biology department at Universite Sainte-Anne.

Our Halloween spread at the bottom of our driveway.

3 months in, 1/4 way through...

Hello friends,

Well, we've been living the Sabbatical dream for over 3 months now. There's been a whole lot of awesome mixed with 'adjustments' to our new, temporary, life. Meaning, we've done a lot of very cool stuff and had a lot of fun, but we've had to put sad kids to bed at night on occasion too. Missing friends, missing Charlie, missing routine. But let's rewind a little bit.

The last half of our journey across the country (from Ottawa to Nova Scotia) we packed up the camping gear and stayed with friends and family enroute. We spent 2 nights with my Aunt and Uncle in Ottawa, and took one day to walk around the city to take in the sights. Parliament Hill was busy and hot, and tours were unavailable, so we split up and took refuge in places of interest to the kids. Celia and Tim took in the National Gallery of Canada, and Edie and I went to the Royal Canadian Mint. It was a great way to beat the heat, and I think we all learned something. Ottawa is a lovely place.

Note mother's hand...

Sweating it out on Parliament Hill.

National Gallery

Parliament Hill was HOT!

She was actually thrilled to be there...

Edie's coin collecting dream- the Royal Canadian Mint! 

Following Ottawa, we drove to Quebec City via the north side of the St. Lawrence River, and stayed  in Quebec City for a night. It just happened to be during their Festival D'ete, which is a huge music festival where they shut down Vielle Quebec to traffic, and party, party, party. It was super fun. Lots of fabulous music, food and entertainment.

The girls order popcorn in french, on their own.

Rue Des Jardins!

Chateau Frontenac

Monkey bars were in high demand on this trip.

From Quebec City through to Nova Scotia, we drove longer distances, and stayed with family and friends for longer intervals. We spent time in Fredericton, and then Rose Bay (near Lunnenburg) catching up with my side of the family. We were fortunate enough to be able to get all of our families together to spend some time relaxing after what has been a pretty brutal year with the loss of my sister. It was good for us, although it's really hard to get used to Heather not being with us in person. We're all adjusting, I guess. It's not easy.

Art with the lovely Cheryl.

Water park with Ingrid.

Sand Dollar Bay, Lunnenburg NS, with cousins.

Hurtle Beach, Lunnenburg NS

Ghostbusters was a huge hit this summer.

All of my nieces and nephews, from my side of the family.

Grand Pre NS, with the cousins.

And Edie got her hair cut off- looking so sharp these days!

Tim set off on his first visit to South America mid-July. He spent time in Ecuador and Chile teaching and attending a conference. He gave a "thank you" speech in honor of Brian Fry (amazing scientist, amazing person) who was being recognized for his contribution as a scientist in his career. We (the girls and I) had hoped to join Tim in order to witness this ceremony, as Brian has been a very good friend to our family over the years (check back in the Australia posts...he's the old guy playing hula hoop with 2 year old Edie). Alas, we did not make it. In reading the speech, I can see that Tim was able to use his magical word abilities to convey Brian's character as a human and a professional. I expect that there was way more emotion in the room during that ceremony than anyone there was comfortable with, given the nature of the stable isotope crowd.

Upon Tim's return, we threw in a whirlwind trip to Miramichi and PEI in order to visit with friends and family from his side, and to explore. And a whirlwind it was! We got in our visits with friends/family and the requisite senior baseball in Chatham, and followed it up with a crazy weekend on PEI. A side note- we carried our camping gear across the country, along with the 'stuff' we'd need for the year, and needless to say our car was packed to the brim. Once we got to Nova Scotia, the first thing we did was to start unpacking gear and storing it at our respective parents' places, as we weren't camping. When we were getting ready to leave Miramichi for PEI, we discovered that in our haste to get on the road, we'd forgotten to repack our tent. We were 5 hours away from where we'd left it, and had to swallow our pride and buy a new one. That turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as PEI weather that weekend was buckets of rain Friday night and all day Saturday, and insane wind all of Saturday night. The tent we'd bought was called the weather maker, and it held up. We put that thing to the test. Coleman knows what it's doing.

Cavendish Beach, PEI

Potato museam- perhaps not the most exciting museam, but AMAZING food at their restaurant. Worth it!

Cavendish Beach, PEI

Green Gables

Another dream come true!

Tim's home town of Chatham, NB, on the Mirimichi River.

Driving with our new tent in a jam packed car.

Tent is up just in time for weather.

I tried seaweed pie- it is fantastic!

Skinner's Pond schoolhouse, restored by Stompin' Tom (who was a student there in his boyhood).

Mom's dream comes true!

After another week in Fredericton with the indomitable Ingrid and Feds (my sister's daughter and husband), and a visit with the fabulous Burt, Chels and Mason in their country haven, we finally settled down to what is our new temporary home in New Edinburgh (Bas-de-la-Riviere), Nova Scotia. We are so happy here. But that's all for this post, more to come soon.

Love to all,

The Jardine Sardines