Newfoundland: Epilogue

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It was a dark and stormy night. Sunday, August 30, 2009 to be exact. We drove back from Notre Dame Bay to Manuels, Newfoundland (my hometown). We quickly changed and and washed off the bog to accept a gracious dinner invitation from our friends Geoff and Jennifer Pearcey. We were delighted Geoff's brother Jason and his wife Kathy were also there. It was a pleasure catching up them as I had not seen Jason and Kathy for a few years, and Eva had never met them before. It was almost 10 pm when we arrived. Kindly, Geoff and Jennifer stayed up until well past midnight, talking to us about our trip and pretending they were not tired. I hope no employees at Diesel Injection paid the price the next morning.

The next day, we saw some more friends - we went to breakfast at Cora´s (not a friend, but I wish!) with my parents and our pal Trudy again, and hung out with our friends and proud Newfoundlanders Fred and Sarah Mills in the evening. They took us for a walk around the historic Quidi Vidi (pronounced however you´d like), home of North America´s oldest boat race. Afterwards, we went to the Gypsy Tea Room for some wine and dinner. Oddly, they did not have tea.

Tuesday, we had a "Christmas in September" feast (turkey and all) with some of my extended family, including Liam and Juliet, my ´adopted´ brother and sister from Burma, and their children. This was all thanks to Mom, who was sorry we´ll miss Christmas with any family this year and was worried we wouldn´t find any Turkey in Bolivia. We didn´t sing carols or exchange gifts, but we celebrated Eva´s birthday that night as she will turn 30 shortly after we arrive in Guatemala.

On Wednesday, we finished our Newfoundland trip with a visit to the berry barrens one last time. While the rest of us picked blueberries, Eva picked the more elusive and challenging partridge berry. Thursday morning, Sept. 3rd, after saying goodbye to my parents for a year, we flew to Florida - our last stop in North America.

Overall, our Newfoundland trip was best kind!

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