Birthday's, Gym time and Rafting

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Well, it feels like things are coming to an end already. Danny, Jenn, Nate, Chris and Kim have all left to go back to school, except for Chris, he went home to England for another job. So now there's only Andy, Heidi, Elbie and I left at res. We had a farewell party for Nate and Kim, which they both got pretty drunk and had nice hangovers for their flights home. Alot of people from work came too, Diane, Gina and Ron, Kathy and Ken, Ashley and Kelsey, then everyone from res. The fire ban was lifted the day of the party, so we were able to have one last fire for them. It was a pretty cold out that night, so I put on this huge spare jacket on that was in our house, it made me look like a sumo wrestler lol. Although, after being next to the fire fro an hour or so, I had to take it off as I was too hot. Kathy made BBQ ribs for everyone, they were pretty nice, but quite spicy, so I didn't have many. It wasn't a very late night as we all had to work the next day and Nate and Kim had to get away early too. Heidi, Andy, Elbie, Nate and Ashley all went to climb on top of the tunnel for the last time while I stayed at the fire with Kathy, Kim and Kelsey.

Labour Day weekend came and went, the town of Lytton held a River Festival, so Ken and Kathy took us up for it. Mainly because Ken wanted to see one of the bands that were playing. We went to Kanacka Bar for dinner before hand which was a fun experience. The lady that runs it was telling us that she was starting to explain the topic of sex to her son. It was hilarious. After that, we headed to Lytton to find that the town was in darkness, they had some kind of power failure which mean't no lights and no music. Kathy, Andy, Heidi, Elbie and I all headed to a pub while Ken went to have a chat with the band and try to help get the power back on. By 10pm the power still wasn't on, so we left. The stars were so bright, we stopped at a lookout called Jackass Mountain and for about ten minutes we stood looking up to stars, I saw the big dipper which kinda looks like a saucepan to me and the milky way was really prominant too, I'd never seen the milky way before, so that was awesome to see.

The days here are getting shorter, in more way the one too. We now close the gates at four instead of five and the sun is setting earlier now that summer is almost over and winter coming. It's a little strange finishing at four though, we have an extra hour at res and it always feels so much later in the night time.

We celebrated Heidi's birthday by going into Boston Bar. She turned 26, so I shouted her dinner then we went bowling. Boston Bar isn't a very big town at all, but it has a bowling alley of four lanes, three pool tables and movies that you can rent. While we were taking our shoes off, Justin Beiber was on tv and actually sang happy birthday, we all thought it was pretty funny. We spent about two to three hours there playing two games of five pin bowling in which the first game Heidi and I sucked big time while Elbie and Andy won. When it came to the next game though, Heidi and I came back and beat Elbie and Andy as their game went up the shit lol. I managed to win with a strike. Woohoo. After that, we changed it up by playing some pool, Andy and I against Heidi and Elbie. None of us knew how we played, so it turned out that I was good at getting any ball in the pockets, ours and the other teams, Andy was pretty good at it in general, and Elbie and Heidi were hilarious to watch and if it wasn't for me, they wouldn't of sunk any balls lol. It was quite funny though as we are all from different countries, we had four different sets of rules, was very confusing. It turned out that Elbie and Heidi won the first game as I sunk the black, good on ya Stacy! The second game, we swapped the teams up, so it was Heidi and I, and Elbie and Andy, we won as Andy sank the white while trying to sink the black, woohoo. We then moved onto the Fuse Ball which I totally suck at. Andy and Heidi against Elbie and I, out of three games, we won one of them. We had a good night and even saw a bear on the road on the way home. When we got home we pulled out the birthday cake, while Elbie was getting plates and forks, Andy and I were in the common room with Heidi taking the case off the cake, funniest thing ever. While she went to put the top on the table, the cake was in the other hand and toppled out of her hand onto the floor, the look on her face was priceless, I almost pissed myself, I was laughing so hard, my stomach was so sore. Andy was a little bit delayed as he didn't see it fall, Heidi, picked it up and was in stitches laughing so much. Elbie had absolutly no idea what was goin on. She found out a little while later and had a little laugh. Writting about it now, I'm still laughing about it. We then played cards for the rest of the night, Heidi and Andy taught me some games. Bed time was about midnight, I didn't have to work the next day though, so it was all good.

We also had Ashley's Birthday to celebrate this week. She turned 19, legal age to drink here in British Columbia. So of course, we had to take her out. Heidi and I had the day off and decided to start drinking early, so I drank a bottle of sparkling wine to myself, then a beer on the way to pick Kelsey and Ashley up. So I guess I was already a bit drink before we even started. We went into Chilliwack to an Irish pub called Corky's where we all took turns in buying Ashley drinks, mostly cocktails, some shots. I proceded to have three cocktails and a shot of jiegermiester. We stayed there for a couple of hours, they had a live band, but they weren't that good. We then headed to Industry, a nightclub which I was looking forward to. Between dancing, Heidi shouted Ashley and I another shot, some kind of cinnimon alcohol which tasted like crap. The rest of the night was spent dancing and dancing and dancing. It was a great night, unfortunatly though with all the mixtures of alcohol, I ended up with a nice little hangover the next day. Poor Brian wasn't feeling well either, he had some kind of food poisoning, but he wished he just had a hangover as he felt like crap all day. I started feeling better around eleven, so the rest of the day was better.

Wow, we got our first snow fall through the night of the 20th September. We had three days of straight rain which made for miserable days at work, although people were still visting. Then on the 20th, it was freezing at res, I couldn't get warm at all, it's no wonder that there was fresh snow on top of the mountains. I went to Chilliwack with Kathy the next day as I had the day off and she offered to take me in as she was going in anyway. It's the first nice day in a few days, the suns out, with a few clouds scattered about. She dropped me at the Leisure Center in town shile she went to catch up with a friend, so I went to the gym for the first time in five and a half months, and wow, could I feel it. I feel so unfit, more then usual lol. I've decided though, for the next three weeks, I'm gonna go into town with Kathy and Ken and go to the gym, try and get some fitness back again. I did an express circuit class for forty five minutes and it almost killed me, at least I didn't throw up or anything though, so I mustn't be too bad. Lots of cardio in it though, so it was good. After Kathy picked me up from the gym, we went and did a bit of shopping then headed out to Harrison Lake. Harrison is a really nice place, popular in the summer with lots of people swimming and doing water sports. We had an ice cream, which I couldn't finish. I know, I went to the gym then ate ice cream, nto the best thing to do, but you get that lol. The time came to head back to Hope so Kathy could go to her computer course. She dropped me off at a restuarant called PapAndreas, a Greek restaurant, I had a craving for Lamb. I ordered the lamb chops which came out practically still running around the plate it was so raw in the middle. Obviously, I sent it back and the got them to cook it longer, when it came back it was alot better. After dinner, I headed to the library then to the recreation center where they had a gym, pool, sauna's, hot tubs and and ise skating rink. So I jumped in to do some laps. Hope pool is really nice, although I found the change rooms to be a bit of a maze, I though I was gonna get lost. After an hour or so there I got out and dressed and waited for Kathy to pick me up again.

Andy left us a bit earlier then expected. He went to Toronto to surprise Kim on her door step. Res is so quiet now that there's only Heidi, Elbie and I left. Heidi has booked her flight for New Zealand, she's gonna go work there for a year, she's so excited. Elbie has a job lined up in Jasper at the Fairmont and I have my road trip planned and organised for across the country which I'm so excited about.

I went rafting again, this time on the Fraser River, one of the longest rivers in Canada. It was pretty good too, going through Hell's Gate right under the tram was cool and going through the rapids at Sailor Bar, we went through them about eight times of something, it was pretty cool how they were about to go back up the rapids. Luckily I got a nice day, so I wasn't too cold out there, I even managed to get sunburnt lol.

Police were doing a charity ride through the canyon the other day. Raising money for cancer. So we had about 8 to 10 police on Harley's and BMW bikes escorting about 30 police on push bikes, it was amazing to see. They stopped here at Hell's Gate for a memorial service before continuing on.

Only two more weeks here at Hell's Gate, I can't believe how quick it's gone here. Sone I'll be putting blogs on more regularly as I'm doing a road trip to the other side of the country with my friend Micha, so I'm sure there'll be lots to tell. Anyway, thats the end of this blog, stay tuned!!!

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