I've been a little silent online for a couple of reasons: for one, life has continued to trot on as normal (or new normal, anyway) and there hasn't been a lot of new information to share. For another, we've been out of town--out of the country, actually!--for a vacation we'd been planning for over a year! We went out to Eastern Canada to explore the east coast along with my parents.
The trip was a little touch-and-go at times beforehand. Originally, many months before my health issues came up, we had planned to explore a few of the national parks and spend a lot of our time hiking, sight seeing, and walking. Obviously that had to change. Then when I took time off of work, we debated about cancelling the trip. We finally decided to go ahead, having made some changes to our itinerary to accommodate my limitations. Then, just a day or two before we were supposed to leave, it suddenly dawned on us that we hadn't looked at the expiration on Micah's passport for a while. We had just been up in Canada in March and it had been fine, so we didn't think to check it. When we pulled out his passport, our worst fears were confirmed: it had expired in April of this year. We made some frantic phone calls to the passport office, and he was able to get an appointment first thing in the morning on Thursday at a passport office in Detroit, some three hours away. We were slated to leave Friday morning. He had to wait all day in the lobby of the office, but by late afternoon he was on his way home again, passport in hand. Not the relaxing lead-up to vacation we had hoped for, but we were full steam ahead at last!
Henry wanted to see how many states and provinces we could visit, so we made our way through as many as possible between the trip out and the trip back. We drove through Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Maine, New York, Vermont, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island. And a partridge in a pear tree. It was a
lot of driving, which was a bit of a gamble with three young kids. But they did far and away better than we'd expected! My parents rented a 15-passenger van (actually, it was supposed to be a 12-passenger, but the rental company switched it up at the last minute). The kids called it "the camper," and weren't far off. It was
huge. But the many seats meant we could sit in all different configurations, no one was too close to anyone else, and we had plenty of room to stretch out. We drove in three hour stretches, stopped to see things that interested us along the way, and soaked in the stunning vistas.
Some of the highlights were a whale watching tour on the Jolly Breeze, a tall ship that let the kids dress up like pirates and take the helm. It was the thing I was most looking forward to on the trip, and it did not disappoint. What an adventure!
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| Just leave me here. I'll be fine... |
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| Beautiful, and exciting, and COLD!!! |
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| Captain Cora, at the helm! |
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| The Jolly Breeze--what a beautiful ship! |
We stayed in a stunning bed and breakfast on Prince Edward Island, and the kids were sure they could never be content staying in another hotel. We ate breakfast in the beautiful dining room and shared an attic suite.
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| What a beautiful place! |
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| Breakfast will never taste the same... |
We visited a cultural tour hosted by Mi'kmaq guides. We learned about their culture, tools, way of life, and beliefs. It was an unforgettable experience.
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| Learning about the smudging ceremony in a teepee. |
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| Practicing a traditional dance. |
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| These two would like to stay. |
In between all of the experiences were these stunning views of beautiful eastern Canada.
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| Cabot Trail, Cape Breton. |
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| Stanhope Beach, Prince Edward Island. |
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| Cabot Trail, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia |
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| Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. |
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| Fundy Bay, New Brunswick. |
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| Fundy Bay, New Brunswick. |
I was a little nervous about the trip, given my recent health and energy levels. It wasn't
exactly the trip we had originally planned, but we made some accommodations. For one, we spent less time in the national parks than we'd anticipated, other than driving through and taking in the scenery. For another, I spent a good chunk of the time on the long drives resting and sleeping. We spent two days on Prince Edward Island, and on the first night I stayed in while the rest of the gang went out on the town. I slept and laid low in the hotel room and recovered so that I had a little steam for the next day. While everyone shopped in the gift stores, I often sat on a bench nearby. And then there was my arsenal of mobility devices!
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Micah reserved a beach wheelchair for me to explore the Prince Edward Island beaches!
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We made it work, and I'm so glad we did. But let's talk about something more fun. I'm 100% an idea person--meaning, ideas give me energy and excite me. Part of the fun of this trip was coming up with new ideas for making it an adventure for the kids. And finding ways to keep the kids entertained for the 20+ hour drive out east, and the 5+ hours of drive time each day between sites was no exception. Here are some of the things we did to make things smoother.
We created activity bins, like a little activity library. We took a photo organizer, and filled it with games, crafts, and activities that fit in the 4"x 6" containers. They would "check out" one case at a time, do the activity, and then return it to get another one. They absolutely loved it. I replaced a few of the cases with new activities mid-week, since we had so much drive time. Some of the activities included little play figures (sea animals and native American people), friendship bracelets, cross-stitch kits, mazes, letter-writing materials, and pipe cleaners.
My parents bought them each a seat organizer, and we filled it with small toys, light-up bracelets, ear buds, and books we'd gathered at garage sales.
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| They also each had a travel journal--the leather-bound book in the pocket--with journal pages, travel games, and fun facts about each of the provinces, animals we might see, etc. |
We made clipboards and covered them in themed drawings with "hidden pictures."
We made neck pillows: a fox, a wolf, and a skunk. I'll let you guess who got the skunk. There was some type-casting involved. But he had it coming...
Last, because we were staying in so many hotels (and because the kids took turns staying with my parents in their room each night), we put their clothes in a baggie for each day. I labeled it with their name, the date, and the place we would be visiting that day, then tucked them all into their suitcases. Each night they took their clothes off, folded them, and put them back into the bag. It not only kept things organized, but it saved space since we could "vacuum" pack the bags.
It was the trip of a lifetime, and overall, left us feeling about like this:
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| "Best. Trip. Eveeeer!!!" |
