There is life after teaching and it's busy

It's kind of embarrassing to see the last time I actually posted anything here; however I can always start again. There have been lots of changes since the last blog post. The shop is finished and is too small. We knew that was going to happen. Just like you can never have too many clamps, you can never have a big enough shop. We have most of the machines we want and I've built a tool tower and a couple of rolling carts. We still haven't decided how to handle the space on the wall by the sink. I need something for sharpening and we can't cover up the cold air intake. At the moment, we're still using the door and sawhorses to give a horizontal surface.

We've been on some very cool holidays: hiking in Italy last October and hiking in Switzerland for a month in July this past summer. All those trips were Road Scholar (the new name for Elderhostel) trips. We spent time with Bart and Brigitte whom we hadn't seen for 15 years since we met them at Mount Robson and they gave us a lift into Jasper when our bike rim split on the long trip across BC. They live directly above a train station which is very cool indeed.

The way the Switzerland trip worked was that we signed up for back-to-back programs and we had 5 days in between. We took the train to see Bart and Brigittewho were wonderfully hospitable and we both enjoyed getting to know 4-year-old Eric. When it was time to hook up with the second program group we took the train to Villars sur Orlon. We had very warm weather and it was good that we were staying above the valleys where it cooled off at night. We only had one day of rain and another day when it spit a little bit. We took over 1,000 pictures. You gotta love digital cameras. I can't include any at the moment because we combined our efforts and all the photos reside on Richard's Mac. The countryside of Switzerland is gorgeous and I'd go back there in a heartbeat.

So far we have no specific plans for next summer. We joked that we would go back and raft down the Nahanni River for our 25 wedding anniversary. I don't think that's high on the list anymore. We rather like the creature comforts of staying in hotels. We'll just have to see what jumps out at us from the Road Scholar catalogues or elsewhere. In the meantime, this winter looks like it will be busy and interesting but more about that later.