A Long Overdue Update from B.C.
Looking back, it is hard to believe that the last post was from back in March after we had just returned to Ottawa, and to snow. I have been remiss in not posting since then. We stayed in Ottawa for March and most of April. We were busy spending time with family, friends, and emptying our small climate controlled storage locker into our Big Steel Box. Then at the end of April, I went to Cluj, Romania, to spend some time with my colleagues while Adam stayed in Ottawa a few days longer, before hitting the road with Rosie to head out to B.C.
When I flew back to Canada, I flew to Thunder Bay where we met and continued on our way out to west: Thunder Bay to Kenora, Kenora to the outskirts of Regina, Regina to Vermillion, Vermillion to Valemount, B.C., our final destination.
We wrote about Mount Robson and Valemount last September as we had stopped there after Revelstoke on our way to Squamish. We were quite taken by the town and its beauty, so, last fall we ended up buying a house here. That could be a post in and of itself (starring an incompetent mortgage broker and questionable home insurance policies) but suffice to say: never try buying a house in Canada while on a small island off the coast of Africa. But, everything worked out in the end and we were able to find a local property manager to look after the house over the winter as we were going from Mauritius to France for the winter.
When we first arrived at the beginning of May, we stayed in Rosie, in the driveway, because: it was cold and we didn’t want to turn on the ancient oil furnace, and there were a lot of things we wanted to do to the house before we arranged for our Big Steel Box to come from Kamloops.
Carpets and curtains had to be removed, as well as various bits and pieces that had been left behind, such as the fibreglass fake fireplace.
Needless to say, aside from our property manager, the plumber (but that’s another story), and our neighbour across the street (who immediately came over as soon as we pulled in to introduce himself) the first person we met in town, was a woman named “Helen” that worked at the local dump.
The house is a 1974 split level bungalow that has been owned by only one family. The matriarch passed away last January the family decided to put it up for sale. We were excited to discover that they had left us the original working drawings for the house.
I took some photos of the relevant drawings, sent them to the local building inspector, and got his permission to remove the internal non-load bearing walls. The upstairs had been cut-up into three small bedrooms with closets, and we wanted to open the space up as much as we could. As a part of this process, we have met the local plumber, electricians and HVAC person. Our priorities before the fall have been getting the space opened up and the furnace replaced. While the walls have come down, the furnace is on order and Adam took out most of the beast of the oil and wood-burning furnace that came with the house while I was away for work.
We are quite happy to live in a half-deconstructed space for the winter while we work on the re-design of the house with a close friend of ours. We hope to be able to start on the renovations next spring.
Valemount is as lovely as we remembered. It’s taking some adjusting to understand the somewhat slower pace of things here. The trades have their own schedule, and may suddenly arrive knocking on the door. Work has kept me busy, traveling back to Ottawa and Toronto, and most recently to Calgary and St. Catharines. To fly anywhere, it involves either a three hour drive to Prince George, or a three and a half hour drive to the Kamloops Airport. Calgary or Edmonton can be managed with a shuttle from Jasper. While Jasper is an hour drive away, the shuttle to Edmonton is six hours and the one to Calgary is eight hours. But, this was the choice we made when we decided to move here.
We bought Mountain bikes so we could learn to enjoy the enormous Valemount Bike Park. When not biking we enjoy the many walking and hiking paths in the area.
There is so much beauty all around us.
So, this is why you haven’t been receiving any travel updates, as we haven’t been nomadic this summer. Our time has been filled with deconstructing the house, planting the enormous garden we inherited, adjusting to life in a small town, and work.
Will we be nomadic again with Rosie? Yes. Just not this summer, and probably not next summer if the renovations go ahead. Buying the house was to give us a “home base” to come back to when we aren’t travelling around. We would love to make it up to the Yukon next summer, but we will see what the future has in store for us with the house renovations.
In the meantime, if you ever find yourself in Kamloops, or Jasper, we aren’t so far away from there….