John's September Post

We have now been in Canada for nine months and cannot believe that we only have three months left before we return to Australia. As you complete your last week of Term Three and look forward to two weeks of holiday, we in Canada are back at school and working hard.
We have been back at school now for four weeks after a nine week break over summer. During that time we hired a pop-up caravan and headed east towards the Atlantic Ocean. During a seven week trip, camping out each night, we visited the Canadian Provinces of Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland. We saw moose, icebergs, raccoons, squirrels, chipmunks and bears. We visited the thousand year old Viking settlements in Newfoundland and saw many old forts and historical buildings. In the Bay of Fundy we experienced the greatest change in tides in the world. We feasted on local foods such as moose burgers, cod tongues and beaver tails, and met some wonderful people who told us stories of Canadian history.
We then ventured into the United States to visit Boston, Salem and Washington DC before returning home through Niagara Falls. In all, we travelled through nine states of the US and drove over 10 000 km. The final weekend of our holiday was spent waterskiing and fishing at a cottage on a beautiful lake in the area known as The Muskokas north of Toronto.
Everyone returned to school in the first week of September (except for me), and in the third week of school, Max, who is now in Year Eight, was elected School Captain of Mother Teresa Elementary School. Nicholas has moved into Year Five and is impressing all at his school swimming lessons, which take place each Thursday. Emily, in Year Ten, has just found out that she has been selected as a cast member for her school’s production of ‘Westside Story’.
Veronica has thrown herself back into her teaching and I am beginning to get some supply teaching work as the school year starts to get busy.
The seasons are changing rapidly as we move into autumn. It is called ‘Fall’ in North America, because all the leaves begin to fall from the trees, so there will be much raking to be done in the coming weeks. We are hoping for some more snow as the weather gets colder so that we will be able to go skiing and snowboarding again.
We have found a television channel here that shows NRL matches, so next Sunday we will be sitting down to watch the Grand Final between Parramatta and Melbourne. On Saturday, Max listened to his favourite team, St Kilda, get beaten in the AFL Grand Final (it finished here at 3.30am!)
All the children have grown and Max and Nicholas are developing Canadian accents. They continue to swim each afternoon, and Emily is dancing four days a week. Our life is busy, but never boring. We have made some wonderful friends, and will be sad to leave them at the end of the year.
We hope everyone is well back in Australia. We think of you often and look forward to seeing you all again. Have a great holiday.