Thursday, November 15, 2007

enjoy the silence?

i can't believe it's been over two months since i've written anything here. the time has flown by and i must say that the fall has been.... in a nutshell? really really fun. i finally have a pretty solid crew of friends here on the rock and i must say, we know how to have fun. whether it's lunch, drinks, an all night party or just hanging out...they are a great group of people. and the really cool part is that i can actually understand them all through their sometimes gnarly accents. when i first met a few of them i remember thinking "holy COW, i will never pick this up...WHAT?" but now, it's good.

i got off the Avalon peninsula, finally, and went out to Fogo Island with my friend Krista. i am never one to turn down a bit of adventure and holy...an adventure it was. it's about a 4 hour drive (maybe 5 actually) to the ferry crossing, and then a 45 minute boat ride....then about another 30 minutes or so to Fogo proper. you basically leave St John's and drive to Gander, turn north and drive until the land ends, then get on a boat and chug out into the middle of Notre Dame bay and there you are....on an island in the middle of nowhere....which is off the coast of the bigger island in the middle of nowhere..... in the winter the island is surrounded by ice - the ferry needs a ice breaker pretty much continuously through the bad months to help it get through. the harbour freezes over solid (although not quite as solid as it used to according to the locals).

me and maggie overlooking the harbour and Fogo Head. we saw whales from here. i freaked out a little bit.

it's pretty desolate... this is actually the location of one of the old settlements.... if you turn right and look out to sea there is nothing but horizon staring back at you.




me, standing on Fogo Head with Change Islands behind. it was really windy, as evidenced by my hair. the binoculors were courtesy of krista's dad who insructed me to use them to look at Change Islands. i did, and it was cool. i also used them to spy on people in the town.... this is one of the four corners of the earth:



this was at Tilting, or Joe Batt's Arm, or some other little town.


Krista's family was really really fun, sort of what i would consider "typical" newfoundlanders. they fed us until we were full, filled us full of drink until i was pretty sure i was toxic and were so welcoming and friendly. very cool trip. i'd do it again...but maybe if it was warmer....


Olivia is getting huge, and has changed SO much since they moved back to the rock it's incredible. This is really the first time i've been around a kid this much as they are growing and it's really cool to see her develop. it helps that she has a great personality and isn't irritating. (that sounds really bad, but some kids are irritating. i'm allowed to say that. don't judge me.) she loves to play in my yarn baskets and take out the balls and squish them. it's really cute. and it's really the only thing she's interested in playing in (as opposed to say, the laptop, or the books on the shelf) so that's great!


other than that... school is basically draining the life out of me, but i'm trying to balance it with at least doing some writing for fun (which is going slowly and painfully). i think the events of my life are basically going to make a really cheesy/bad romance novel... the movie could make me a lot of coin though.... i wonder who would play me?


on the knitting front i'm full on into christmas knitting....only a few people are going to benefit from it this year because i've left it too late, procrastinated too much, was too indecive, and i knit too slowly. i've knit myself a pair of mittens, having lost my store bought pair. i'm not convinced they will be warm enough, but they might be. plus, they were quick and now that i've knit one pair i'm sure i can bang off a second pair easily enough. no pics of that though, it's too dark in the evenings by the time i get home from work and in the mornings i'm just not organized enough.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

The photos from Fogo are great! We made it was far north as Twillingate (ill-fated iceberg trip; ill-fated because the iceberg was somewhere in ocean, far from shore).

I hope that your knitted mittens are fabulous!

nadinebc said...

Some really impressive shots there!

Anonymous said...

i say sandra bullock should play you in your made for tv cheesy romance novel of your life...glad you are blogging again! tales form the cooold side are awesome! happy holidays!