Sunday 29 December

We were all up in time to go to Mass at St Patrick’s; while people got ready, I ducked around to Macca’s to get some disgusting breakfast because we needed to have some sort of food. It’s Holy Family Sunday and the scripture readings were particularly beautiful, especially so many of our family there. Ruth and Rich were introduced to Pak ‘N Save and the Warehouse to pick up a few things they needed and to stock our fridges in the motel (each unit has kitchen facilities, so we could do our own breakfast from now on).

Lunch was at Jen’s place; the weather had been cool and rainy, needing warmer clothes than the Aussies had packed but some time after lunch the sun returned. Peter, Rich, Alison and Simon went to Mulligan’s to play poker and the rest of us went for a walk along the lake, then into the park where the kids enjoyed the activities. 

We all grabbed our swimmers and went to the AC Baths for a warm swim, where Peter joined us, but unfortunately they’ve made some changes there, removing some of the shelter over the pool. When it started to rain, it was quite cold, with a cold wind blowing when we had to get out. The swim was lovely but the showers, change rooms and facilities were pretty crummy.

The card players had walked home in the pouring rain by the time we got home. Rich shared first prize at poker, only about $90 but better than nothing! Dinner was very late – Glen had been cooking while we were out and we shared a good meal: well done to the chef feeding eighteen of us!!

Saturday 28 December

It was good to be able to go through the transfer desk and straight to the gate lounge. Peter and Naomi were waiting there, so we went up to the Air NZ lounge and had some food. The plane was a little late boarding but we were soon in our seats; Peter sat with us, even though his seat was a few rows back because Naomi and I had a seat free between us. The food on Air NZ is pretty skimpy, even in Works Deluxe, not that I was hungry after all the meals on all the flights.

We picked up the car and Peter drove to Taupo, checked in to the motel and settled into our rooms. While Peter picked up Rich’s family a little while later, Naomi and I were able to get glamorous and then help settle the others in. At 7.30, we all marched around the little half-block to the Merwyn’s, as the motel proprietors wouldn’t allow us to go through the back gate to Jenny’s place. 

Glen knew we were on our way, so the cameras were focused on Jen as we walked in all in a bunch through the French doors. She looked shocked and then burst into tears! 

Alison, Jen’s friend, had made an amazing princess castle cake. 

I knew quite a few people there besides family; the kids had lots of fun dancing and playing with the new air hockey game, a Christmas gift. The party was great fun and we were quite late leaving.

Thursday 26 December

I was up at 6.15am to do the final packing, followed by a good breakfast of steak and eggs. Not that I’m going to be starving over the next couple of days! Overnight produced a fresh dusting of a couple of inches of snow – very clean and pretty again. On the drive to the airport we saw several vehicles which had either come to grief in snowbanks or ditches, or finished up facing the wrong way on the side of the highway because they spun out; on the very icy roads, Steve said some people just take lane changes too quickly, with big deposits of ice on them, and lose control.

Dianne got me to the check-in with the bags and then paid for a porter – a very good idea because he took me through customs and then got rid of the bags. Yay! They’re checked through all the way to Rotorua! The little silver bag is battling on valiantly, despite its being mortally wounded and I will put it out of its misery when I get home (put it out to pasture for someone’s road trips where wheels don't matter).

When you go in, you go through US Customs because the gate lounges are all in US territory! This saves time when you get to a US destination so all I have to do is go to the airline lounge in LA with just my carry-on bag. The only thing I still need to do is to go to Virgin check-in at LA and get my boarding pass for Sydney and Rotorua.

I'm officially in the USA now, and there's the sun, beating down through the windows of the lounge. :) Breathe a sign of relief, Kitchener!

Downstairs at the gate lounges they're all squashed into not enough seating, noisy, crowded. Up here, there are a lot of people but it's not packed and plenty of spare chairs and tables around.

Behind me are sitting a very large man and a very large woman (Spanish) with a couple of teenagers, so you get to share in family squables!

When I checked into the lounge, there wasn't much available besides eggs, cereal and toast, etc. But that was only because they were getting ready to serve lunch. Now I've got a lovely fresh salad and a cup of green tea because I imagine it will be about 2.00pm before lunch is served on the plane.

Okay, so I had checked the board and it said “Delayed” 13.40; my brain said “12.40” (blame it on the snow), so I headed down towards the lounge for a good walk about 15 mins before the original time, only to find that I now had 90 mins still to wait. I did a little more walking around and found four fridge magnets (confession, I’m keeping the inukshuk) and then settled down in the next door gate lounge to wait and read, soon dozing off for a power nap.

After about 30 mins I really wanted something hot and fluffy and brown in colour but not one of those awful things they call “coffee” here. So about 500m down the trail I found something called a “French Vanilla” in a cappuccino machine. It was very hot, very fluffy, very very sweet but don’t ask me what it was! Oh well, it hit the spot and only cost $CA1.65.

As we walked across from the airbridge to the plane, there was a blast of freezing air, reminding me it’s still snowing outside. Now I’m sitting on the plane waiting for the final cattle class contingent to board and then we’re off to LA. Yay! If any flight was going to be late, this is the one where I have a big leeway, so it’s not a problem. Reading the local paper, there’s a lot of press on the ice storm effects; 300,000 lost power Sunday morning but there are still many thousands who are waiting for reconnection. Most power breaks were caused when trees broke in the winds and ice storm and crashed on power lines, already heavily laden with ice. Getting them to heated centres is crucial and they’ve been going door to door seeking out people who are still in the cold.

We finally started on our taxi run at 2.10; our ETA is now 16:34 in LA and my connecting flight leaves at 21.50, so plenty of time to get to where I need to and rest, eat, blog, etc. Runways appear not to have ice on them in the centre, but the sides are icy and then between runways everything is snowy. I watched the plane taxying behind us and it had a huge cloud of snow billowing behind the engines. I know the snow is lovely and fluffy and powdery now but after continuing snowfalls it will pack down and become hard.

Very pleasant flight. 

A good meal; fresh salad with beef, mash and vegies and a nice glass of red. I had a sleep for about an hour afterwards and woke with 2 hours to go to our destination. At 2.20pm we flew over Denver, Colorado, where one of our previous house sitter couples lives; not long after that the captain told us the Grand Canyon was below the left side of the plane. I could see some of it over the guy sitting at the window – even from this high up it’s huge! Believe it or not more food came out – chippies and a Lindt 70% dark chocolate bar; not half an hour later we got a little tub of delicious tangy fruit ice cream and a very large cookie (which I didn’t eat). The chips and chocolate are for LA between flights.

We landed at 4.00pm; I had to find the Virgin Australia terminal and check in and then find the other terminal where the gates are. It was good to be out stretching my legs, although my carry-on bag is quite heavy. Security was pretty busy with about 50 people before me but for LA that’s not really too bad. However, with no bags to check in, it was all quite easy.

There are a lot of young girls around, all college age, I’d say and I found out they’re cheerleaders who are going to London for a big game on New Year’s Day.

I got to a food hall and discovered that there’s free wifi here, so I won’t bother paying $US27 to go to the Air France lounge. I sat in the food hall for about an hour and then went for a walk to find the gate lounge and to inspect all the food places. I ended up back at the food hall after about half an hour, still not having found tea or fruit. A gentleman pointed me to a Starbucks along a different alley to where I’d been. I happened to have some old $US with me, so I bought an enormous cup of tea and a fresh banana for $4.47: at an airport, that’s amazingly cheap! So at 7.00pm I sat near Starbucks, plugged in to power and connected to wifi; the tea lasted me till I went for my walk to the gate lounge, plus a little of the chocolate. Right outside the window where I was sitting was a British Airways A380: one big puppy! I spent some time working on the photo book from our July trip.

We backed out right on time at 9.50pm; by now I was a little weary, having been up since 6.15am Kitchener time, 3 hours ahead of LA. Less than half an hour out there was already quite a bumpy stretch. I sat with a lady who is Canadian but has lived in Australia for about 20 years. Thankfully, she didn’t keep talking after we took off. After dinner, I settled down for sleep but didn’t sleep as steadily as I did on the way over. It was a good flight and I felt okay when we landed. I probably spent about 7 hours in and out of sleep.

Still Wednesday 25 December

About 3.15 we left for Niagra Falls. I’ve seen the falls in summer but winter is a whole new level of spectacular. Last time was August and it was 108. This afternoon it was -5 when we got out of the car. It wasn’t crowded but there were quite a few Asian tourists there who didn’t seem to mind getting drenched by the spray. That’s quite dangerous on a day like today because if your clothes get wet and it’s -5, there’s a real danger of hypothermia. Because it’s Christmas Day, very little is open in the way of warm changing areas. We stayed away from the spray.

The fence is already coated in thick, thick ice, even at this early stage in winter.

These are the Canadian Horseshoe Falls.

By 5.00pm it was dark enough to get a good view of the lights before we headed home. They're not really Christmas for the most part, more "holiday" theme.

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Wednesday 25 December

Merry Christmas to us! (It takes much longer to arrive in the Northern Hemisphere!) Jesus is born! ... and outside it’s gone up to -14º (with wind chill -19º) after a low of -17º.

We went to a Reformed church for their Christmas Day service – lovely carols; a very full church, maybe 1500 people? Watching the snow falling gently outside ... it was a church full of Dutch people.

We had presents when we got home: a stocking each for Steve, Dianne, Graham and me. Graham got a Dutch chocolate letter and the cutest snowman stuffed toy; I got a Dutch chocolate letter and another snowman toy. Graham and I got a Canadian calendar as well, which has been our tradition for both families over the years. This one is special, with Inuit Eskimo art.

We’re off to Niagara Falls this afternoon to see the lights and the falls in winter.

Tuesday 24 December

Dinner was delightful last night. Gerard and Alison have a beautiful home in New Hamburg, about 20 minutes away. They’ve only been married eighteen months; Alison is a nurse educator with a masters in nursing and Gerard is a software designer for worldwide nuclear imaging technology. We had a fun night discussing their gaming interests and some fun banter about Apple (Steve) versus Microsoft (Gerard). We were home by about 9.15, so it wasn’t a late night.

Overnight we had another snow dusting, so all the crystals on the trees are coated with snow. It’s light and powdery, so it blows off in fluffy tufts as the wind comes through. And we had blue skies this morning, bringing colour to a winter wonderland.

Everyone carries a snow brush in their car. This fresh snow looks like it's solid but you just brush it away and it flies off. It's a different story with ice though.

A walk at the arena this morning, followed by McCafe; Steve’s friend, George, delivered his milk at Maccas and then had a coffee with us; he’s Dutch too. On the way to New Hamburg last night, we dropped in briefly and met his wife and four beautiful kids.

The afternoon was spent getting the house prepared for tonight; then quickly into our posh dressy stuff to go to church. We drove about 20 minutes to Elmira, a Mennonite town. The church wasn’t Mennonite, although there were some of them there; Dianne described it as an Evangelical church. Probably the service was much like the old Festival of Lessons and Carols that was more common in years gone past. There were readings from Isaiah and then the Christmas Story, done in bits with carols in between.

When we sang Away in A Manger, all the kids were invited to sit around the still empty manger; one nine-year-old carried her little seven-week-old sister and of course, having a baby on the sanctuary at Christmas is just delightful. There was a salvation message and invitation at the end, so it was a really lovely Christmas Eve celebration.

We headed straight home to wait for Dianne’s brother and sister and their partners: Jim and Carol, Mary-Jane and Jan (he is Dutch). This was to have been at Carol and Jim’s home but they only got their power back on after two and a half days of blackout, so the location was changed to Steve and Diannes place here; that’s not difficult because everyone contributes food, so the dinner is portable.

Jim and Carol have a big generator; many people out on farms and even in the towns have generators, some smaller than others, because when you get storms that take down trees, blackouts are widespread. Toronto still has thousands of homes without power; in the sort of temperatures we’re having right now, that can be fatal if you can’t get to warmth. Tonight the temperature is back down to minus 16º.

We had a casual dinner, just on our laps in the lounge room; the family has a system of picking one name each for the person for whom they’ll buy a present (like secret Santa but it’s not secret). The gift opening was done one at a time – such delightfully thoughtful gifts, some hand made. Embarrassingly, I got one too. They’re all such fun sports and we had a hilarious night.

After they left and I got into to bed to check on emails (which hadn’t been possible since early in the day), it was really lovely to be able to Skype Rich and Ruth and the kids in Queensland. It was 11.15pm here and 3.15pm there. They were just about to have their dessert, with all the Stewart family. It was so lovely to be able to see them all and I can’t wait till we can celebrate a belated Christmas when we’re almost all together. It’s been a very strange Christmas Eve, I miss Graham very much and I miss all my family, but I’m blessed to be able to give Dianne and Steve a kind of connection with Graham at this time, and I’m totally blessed and humbled by their hospitality and generosity.

Well, it’s off to sleep for me: almost midnight and I don’t want to be awake when Santa arrives!

Monday 23 December

Everything is icy this morning: 3º and it’s stopped raining. People walk very carefully outdoors. It's now just back to very cold. Toronto has put out emergency weather bulletins telling people to go to schools, churches, anywhere that’s open and has power because that’s where it’s warm. We’re heading for a high of -11º tomorrow so people need to have access to power for heating as most don’t have gas.

This is a frozen bush:

This is a close-up – every inch of the bush is totally encased in ice - and this is a day and a half after the freezing rain storm.

We went to the Joseph Schneider Museum, where there was an exhibition of Inuit Eskimo dolls from past centuries, as well as artefacts including quilts, all hand-sewn.

The Schneider House was where Joseph Steiner lived with his family and then his son, Joseph Jnr, with his family, German Mennonites from Pennsylvania. The house is  preserved as it was in 1856, most items being genuine antiques, with a few being reproductions; rooms are set up with the furnishings correctly placed as described in historical documentation.

Joseph Jnr had six girls and two boys. That was good for his wife, who had lots of help with the cooking, spinning, quilting and housework but for Joseph it would have been difficult to run the farm with his two sons, so they would have employed workers. There was a parents’ bedroom, with a trundle for a child under five and a cradle for a baby. Over five, the children were old enough to sleep on the upper level which had no heating.

There was a very large bedroom with three beds for the girls (some would have shared), two other bedrooms, a guest room and a “hobo room” for wayside travellers needing shelter. The hobo room was tiny, with a tiny bed and no natural lighting, just a little window where light came from an adjoining room. The large guest room, with a double bed, was the only room with a washstand. Everyone else would have washed in the kitchen. Their beds were shorter than ours, because they used to keep the top half of their bodies propped up on pillows to avoid fluid settling in their lungs.

It was fascinating to take a walk back through time; the guide was very generous in answering questions (actually a good afternoon to go because most people were out there frantically Christmas shopping. Tomorrow, Christmas Eve, the shops will close at noon. It’s extremely rare to find anything open on Christmas Day but this year Maccas, Tim Hortons and the other coffee chain, Williams, will all be open Christmas Day.

We did some shopping this afternoon for a couple of gift items. The sun was out very briefly, transforming ice into brilliant bling for a few short moments here and there. Then the snow started again and looks like it’s settling in. Right now at 4.30 it’s -5º; tonight’s low will be -11º. Tomorrow, Christmas Eve, will be -11º  max, -16º  min; then Christmas day will be warmer: -6º  max to -7º  min.

Thursday morning it will warm up to -4º !

Tonight we’re going to Steve’s son, Gerard and his wife, Alison for their Christmas dinner. That’s not very far away, and we’ll call in on some friends on a farm on the way.