love and mountains and puppies, oh my!

IMG_7757 IMG_7764 IMG_7765 IMG_7785 IMG_7798 IMG_7800 IMG_7811 IMG_7816 IMG_7823 IMG_7830 IMG_7833 IMG_7834 IMG_7837 IMG_7851 IMG_7856 IMG_7862 IMG_7870 IMG_7874 IMG_7883 IMG_7886 IMG_7887 IMG_7936 IMG_7949 IMG_7959 IMG_7976 IMG_7979 IMG_7985 IMG_7986 IMG_7989 IMG_7994 Lessons learned this trip:

  • When one of your best friends is getting married on the other side of the country, it is definitely worth it to go, even if it’s only for three days, and even if it depletes your savings. The memories you’ll make will last the rest of your life.
  • When you hit a deer in New Glasgow on your way to Halifax to spend the night and fly out the next morning, say yes when the fireman offers to put you up for the night with his family. Also say yes to his twin brother who lives next door, who works near the airport and offers to pick you up at 5 am to drive you to your flight. Trust kind people who remind you of folks from home.
  • Don’t trust yourself to do your own hair considering you think it’s “special” just to use bobby pins on a weekday. Absolutely call some of the local hair salons one hour before the wedding, in order to find the one who will fit you in, and give you a 1950’s-style updo. $70 is completely worth it. Bulletproof, awesome hair for the rest of the night is a must.
  • The belly laughter of four good women travelling together is medicine for the soul.
  • 90’s music is now retro, and that is really weird. I feel old! (The satellite radio in the car had a 90’s station and we listened to it while driving around.)
  • At the reception, dance to every single song if you can. If you don’t feel like it, that’s OK too, but give it a try even if your feet are sore. It’s nice to just to move to fun music. Even if you’re the only one out there. Who cares, half the people (at least!) are drunk.
  • I think maybe I have only ever heard “Way down yonder on the Chattahoochie” at wedding dances. And yet I still know most of the words.
  • The red-eye flight is aptly named. Leaving Calgary at 11 pm their time and landing in Halifax at 6 am local time isn’t very restful. No matter – when I land in Halifax my Mum is waiting for me and I get to sleep in her car on our way back to Cape Breton (stopping in New Glasgow to collect the rest of my shit from my car).
  • A car can look not-bad considering it ran right over a great big deer.
  • Insurance companies can actually be great to deal with. (Mine is Aviva.)
  • You never know what’s going to happen, and the best way to be content is to keep an open mind to it all.
  • Failing that, take a walk around the block.

(If you are wondering where these pictures are taken, they are mainly in and around Invermere, BC, with shots on the highway between Invermere and Banff, and then between Banff and Calgary. The cafe shot with the kids looking through the window is at the Dairy Lane diner in Calgary. The last few are in the Halifax airport, and in New Glasgow.)

This entry was posted in Day to Day Life, Leah's thoughts, Out West and tagged , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

7 Responses to love and mountains and puppies, oh my!

  1. tani says:

    Looks like you had a great time. Love the stuff about hair!!
    Reading this Makes me want to empty out my bank account and go somewhere!!

  2. haya says:

    i am so glad you got to go and that the trip was wonderful! hurray for adventures.
    also, crazy that we both had vehicular encounters with cloven hoofed animals this summer. that is a great story about the fireman. for sure one of my absolute favourite parts of the atlantic provinces was the people. they really make a lot of ontario folks look like jerks.
    (i spotted some newfs at the food court at the mall near my house yesterday and got very excited)

  3. JoAnn says:

    Sounds like you had a great short trip, even though you hit the deer! But then we would never have gotten the chance to meet you! We had a wonderful conversation. Glad to hear you made it home safe and sound. Maybe some day we will meet again! I do believe that things happen and people you meet in life happen for a reason! Take care and who knows our paths may cross again!

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Google photo

You are commenting using your Google account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s