Welcome to Clyde River

July 21

We got on the plane with all 12 pieces of luggage on board (phew!) plus our, ahem, 5 carry on pieces. Here are some pictures as we approached Clyde River. The window on one side of the plane was noticeably cleaner, but we did our best. And Logan was just waking up from his flight-long nap, so that was a bit distracting while I was trying to take them out my side (the sunny side).

The Clyde River airport.

Midnight our first night here. The bay is the view out our living room window, with the town to the side and up the hill on the other side.

July 22

In the morning the boys and I unpacked the stuff we'd brought on the plane while Craig was off to his first day at work. Then we went for a walk to the playground before lunch, with a stop at the beach.

In the afternoon we went for another walk to the grocery store. In total I would say we met about 15 people, mostly kids. They come right up and say hi (it's not hard to tell we're new here!) and ask the boys their names and how old they are. They love their blue eyes! Very friendly people so far, smiles all around. It's hard to relax and just be friendly back immediately - amazing how you just get used to not inviting conversation and feeling suspicious of people.

That night 82 pieces of our stuff arrived on the plane. A nice mixture of food, clothing, bedding, kitchen items, toys. It seems the kids have at least 16 cubic feet of toys. Perhaps more. We spent that night unpacking the majority of the downstairs boxes.

July 23

The next morning I unpacked and cleaned some more while the boys busied themselves with their usual unpacking pastimes - playing with boxes and paper.

This was someone snowmobiling across the bay at 2:00 AM. He made it all the way across, doing turns and fancy stuff. Couldn't get up the speed (and the snowmobile wasn't doing very well) to get back, though.


I'll leave you with some more pictures. Time: approx. 1:30 AM

Packing - check!

So far so good.

The packers showed up at a little after 9 AM on Friday. Quite a respectable time for these parts. One of them even stayed all day to pack. The other didn't come back after getting paid. Hopefully somebody shows up Monday to pack the rest and move the boxes. I have got all the unbreakable stuff packed (sounds backwards, but insurance doesn't cover it if we pack it), so there's not a lot left for Monday.

We also have plane tickets, which is pretty cool. We should be in Clyde River shortly after 7 PM on Tuesday. Our email address won't exist after Wednesday, so if you want to send one you can use lastname @ yahoo . com.

Hopefully it won't be too long until another update!

It'll all work out.

By the time Craig retires, we'll be really good at this moving thing. Except we won't be doing it every year or so, which means we'll be out of practice and not very good at all!

So.... I've been panicking all week because it looked as though the movers would be packing Monday and loading Tuesday. In and of itself, not bad. But Craig will be at work all Tuesday morning and then we are supposed to fly out at approximately 5:00 p.m. Tuesday night. Which means Tuesday would look like this: Movers loading in the afternoon (and probably finishing packing in the morning); checking in at the airport ~4:00, luggage out there ~1:00 (to make sure as much of it as possible gets on the plane), inspection of the house before that, house clean before that. I just couldn't see how this was possibly going to work.

I was also panicking because all of this might not have been my biggest problem: Until this afternoon, the movers hadn't contacted us. At all. No estimate, no confirmation of dates, no confirmation of our booking. And it only took 26 hours between my initial phone call yesterday and the movers calling today. However, he was quite okay with them packing all day Friday and Monday morning, then loading Monday afternoon. Which means our stuff is in transit a day earlier, since it could take a week or so (oh, how the words "or so" in the North send shivers down your back) to get to Clyde River. Keep smiling Mom (she's flying to Clyde River on the 28th), it'll all work out - "it's the North, everything always works out in the North." That's what I was told on the phone when I was freaking out (mostly inside) yesterday. I'd like to add that the chances of everything working out are directly proportional to how many phone calls you make.

Loading the truck Monday also gives us extra time in case nobody shows up to pack on one of/either of those days (could happen!). And then, theoretically, I have the weekend with most of our stuff in boxes to get the rest of the house cleaned up and our stuff packed for the plane. And time for the inspection on Tuesday.

I'm making great headway in the area of packing our stuff, though. I learned a lot last time! I've already got some meals planned, with items required to make them, packed for when we get there. Most of the bedding is washed and ready to be packed. Tomorrow I'll be ready to start packing clothes. Then the weekend is just a matter of packing towels/sheets and a final load of laundry. At least that's how I'm envisioning it in a glass-half-full kind of way.

See, already it's looking more like everything will work out!

Exploring in the FJ

Over the last couple of days we have gone for drives and taken a camera (gasp - both at the same time!), even though it's just the little one I keep in my purse for exciting times at playgroup. Except the day that Liam and Leetia built an awesome robot out of blocks. But I digress.

Here is a Google Earth map of where we've been. You'll have to double-click to make it bigger.

1. Sylvia Grinnell Territorial Park

We drove to the end of the road in the park and were going to turn around but instead decided to get out and throw rocks into the river.

We were very close to the airport!

2. The Road to Nowhere

Street Sign	Nowhere

Everyone has to have a picture of the street sign for Road to Nowhere! Then we drove all the way to the end. Do you see a theme developing? More pictures of nowhere:

3. Upper Base

Upper Base was once a sprawling complex about 3.5 kilometres northwest of Iqaluit. The military base was built during the 1950s as part of the North American radar surveillance system, but with advances in satellite communications, it was abandoned in 1974. Over time, the site gradually deteriorated. -A quote from somewhere on the internet. I've closed the tab and I'm not going to go delving into my history to find it.

Iqaluit from Upper Base	Why snowmobiling here is bumpy:

Looking up to where we drove next: somewhere beyond Upper Base

4. Beyond Upper Base

Where do the words "Are those tracks over there?" lead you?

Getting there	Another view of Iqaluit
Logan looks pretty small next to that erratic rock!	Do you think we could sell this one to Toyota?

There are no pictures of the rest of the adventure (continuing with the words "How did we get up here?") because we were holding on and watching the handy dandy altimeter in the car and giving distances for the rocks on either side.

And that's what we did today!

Gone Fishin'

In the past couple of days we have had the chance to go fishing. I am so glad we got to go, as I think it's the first relaxing family thing we've done here, since we got here.

Day 1

Iqaluit in summer

A ship in the bay

Two ships in the bay

Day 2

You'll probably have to make it bigger to see the people fishing.

A snack in the sun. The jackets were to keep

mosquitos at bay - it was way too hot to wear them!

Back from the Prairies

We're back! Okay, we've been back for some time now, but I just got the pictures onto the computer, pared them down, and selected a few for the blog.

We rented a car in Regina (hooray for a double bump up to the size of vehicle we really needed!), then drove to Edmonton with friends for some fun at the West Edmonton Mall. First stop, the water park. I think we went in the wave pool first. Then we all played in the kids' water structure area for a while (bridges, dumping water and such), then Logan was just too cold and it was just too loud and he just didn't like water being dumped on him. So we went to the dolphin pool, where it was shallow and warm. I couldn't complain. The others went back into the wave pool for quite a while, but Logan was just too cold. He was quite content to watch all the action wrapped up in a nice warm towel. And I got to dry off and take some pictures!

The next day it was time for some rides for the kids. This ride was Liam's favourite 2 years ago. Interestingly, back then (oh, so long ago!) his favourite vehicle on this ride was the yellow bulldozer, and this time, it was Logan's.

This was the view from our hotel room.

The boys saying goodbye.

After the boys said goodbye, we drove to Waskesiu. There was golfing, ice cream, walks.... The highlight for Liam and Logan? Fishing with Grandma and Grandpa! And the boys had so much patience; they just kept fishing!

Back to Regina, for walks to playgrounds with Grandad and Grandpa, feeding ducks with Grandad and Marilyn, visiting relatives, watching movies and going to the Science Centre with Grandma.

A bonus day in Ottawa on the way back, since our flights got changed to the scenic tour and we'd rather not spend that much time taking off and landing and waiting.

All in all, a good trip. We got to visit lots of people and missed a few. Then, back to the reality of planning a move and, gasp, our trip out in October. But the move first. Unless something comes along that we just can't pass up!

To see more pictures: Click here