Eastern Passage

Last Saturday afternoon we decided to do a little sightseeing close to home in spite of the threatening weather. Eastern Passage is about 20 minutes away from our apartment.

We'll have to go back and see it all again when things warm up. For now, it was a nice drive and we saw some pretty scenery along the way.
We saw a golf course (closed for the season), an aeronautic museum (also closed), brightly painted shops apparently that in warmer weather sell food, snacks, and beach-related items (mostly closed) . . .

The requisite (for this area) lighthouse

. . . some cold beaches (we didn't try them out), a lighthouse on an island (we didn't swim to), lots of (stark) beauty, another moose (fortunately it is rooted to the spot so we could snap a good picture).

After we drove in and out of pretty coves for nearly an hour, we came across a large hiking trail area in the middle of nowhere. It was starting to get dark, so we figured we'd better head on back. We put an address in the GPS. By the time the directions came up, we could see the Angel Moroni on top of the Halifax Temple over a hill and we soon came to a busy street. We weren't really in the middle of nowhere, but it sure felt like it!

Yes, Frances is wearing a birthday crown

Frances Buott is a new-found friend, someone Sister Holbrook's sister, Laurie, introduced us to a couple of months before we left on our mission. Frances and her family were visiting Utah. Laurie only knew Frances through an LDS email group, so we all met up one night at our home. The Buotts have become good friends and we've eaten at their home several times. Her husband threw her a birthday party Saturday night and we were invited. Here's Frances with her mile-wide, mega-watt smile and a weather-tossed Sister Holbrook.

And speaking of birthdays, Elder Holbrook finally admitted he was the one who posted on Facebook and told all the missionaries to call Sister Holbrook and sing to her last week, but he told them not to say how they knew it was her birthday!

We are grateful to the Lord for His tender mercies to us throughout the years, and for this opportunity we have to be a part of sharing His gospel with His children in Atlantic Canada.

We are grateful for His Atonement and our knowledge of His goodness.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO US!

Elder Holbrook's birthday was 4 weeks ago and Sister Holbrook's was Monday. At our age we don't need a lot of hoopla, so we didn't say anything in advance. The day of Elder Holbrook's birthday, Sister Holbrook told everyone who came into the office to sing to him, and we sang in our weekly office meeting as well. President and Sister Pratt were surprised. This birthday was a big deal because he's now 65. Last week Sister Holbrook told Elder Holbrook not to say anything about her birthday because this is a minor birthday for her, but he'd already mentioned it to someone. She asked him not to say anything to anyone else.

In our senior couples district meeting last Friday the district leader announced upcoming birthdays, and the Pratts picked up on it. At our weekly office meeting on Monday they surprised us with lunch, and then Sister Pratt pulled out some cookies she'd made.

She'd been busy. She made two miniature birthday cakes out of layers of different sized cookies. They were about the size of cupcakes and had itsy bitsy candles on top. We gobbled them up and then realized we hadn't taken a picture. Rats! So cute. But here's a picture of what some of the other cookies looked like. They were so tasty!

The one person Elder Holbrook had told about Sister Holbrook's birthday didn't tell anyone else. Instead, he just posted it on the mission's facebook page and all day long she answered the phone to hear the missionaries serenading her. Some even called us that evening on the cell phone. It was a memorable birthday.

We've loved Skyping, FaceTiming, and phone calls with family members, both last month and this week. What a great way to spend our birthdays!

Cape Breton

     More on our weekend trip for a baptism in Sydney with a detour along the Cabot Trail.

Aptly named (notice the guardrail). We think the words on the bottom are in Celtic.

     You many have noticed in last week's post that the pictures got a little "fuzzier" by the end. That's because we got about 75% of the way around the park before a storm hit. If you look closely at the picture above you can see it's snowing. Even with the treacherous driving, it was beautiful, BEAUTIFUL, BEAUTIFUL! We're grateful President Pratt encouraged us to close up the office and take an extra day to travel.

     There were several homes with boats in the front yard. We didn't get pictures of those, but snapped a few in more public places. Lots of boats have been pulled out for the season.

     Because it was off off-season, many places along the way were closed. We'd heard of several places we wanted to try out, but we'll just have to take another trip there when the weather is warmer.

     Because the weather turned, we were glad to get to our hotel in a town called Baddeck. We chose it because of the name (Lynwood Inn, in case you can't make it out through the snow--it was even spelled right!). They don't run the Inn's restaurant during the winter but they gave us a list of a few restaurants that are open year round. We got take-out from Tom's pizza--it was really good! We highly recommend Tom's if you ever get to Baddeck.


     The storm continued to rage and we were glad we had made it safely. SO glad to be out of the storm. About the time we were getting ready for bed, the power went out. The room cooled quickly, so we piled all the bedding from both beds on one bed and pulled out the extra blanket from the closet. After an hour the lights came back on and we slept warmly. We really appreciated the people who worked in that storm to restore power. And were really grateful to be off the road.

     Saturday morning we called the one restaurant from the list that was open for breakfast, except they weren't. Open, that is. They must not have wanted to brave the snow for the chance of maybe having a customer (obviously they hadn't heard we were in town). We figured we'd get something along the way. The only restaurant we saw didn't open until 11, so for breakfast we had a nice lunch in Sydney.

     Something most people do here is pull the windshield wipers up at night so they don't freeze to the windows (something we never thought of at home since we park in the garage). This was our car the next morning with the wipers peeking out of the snow. We finally got on our way and felt a funny vibration. When we could we pulled over and discovered snow and ice were caked on our rear tires and it took quite a bit of work to get them cleared off.

     Instead of feasting on fast food for breakfast, we got to feast on more scenery. It was a beautiful winter wonderland and there wasn't much traffic, almost eerily so. Sometimes the roads were cleared well and then started fading into not so cleared. Never figured out why, never saw a snowplow.

Bridge over part of the Bras d'Or

     Bras d'Or is Canada's largest inland sea, unique in that it is not quite ocean, not quite salt water, but a blend of both. It's kind of like a reverse island with land all around a huge body of water. And it is just as beautiful.

     We had planned to go to the Fortress of Louisbourg before the baptism, but we got to Sydney later than we'd planned because of the roads and we figured it would probably be closed because of the weather (it was) and wouldn't have wanted to traipse around in the snow anyway, so instead we looked around Sydney a little.

     One thing we'd heard so much about is called the Big Fiddle of the Ceilidh (pronounced kay-lee). We made a brief stop for pictures. For some reason there weren't a lot of tourists braving the brisk wind coming off the harbour, so we couldn't get a picture of both of us together and the fiddle. There was less snow by the harbour than there was farther inland. After that we went to our hotel and asked for an early check-in. They said they were about half full that night, and about 50% of those were people from Sydney who were still without power. We were grateful all over again to the guy in Baddeck who braved the storm and restored power. We enjoyed a relaxing afternoon and Elder Holbrook was able to do a little destressing after all the white-knuckle driving he'd done.



     After dinner we headed to the church and our reason for being there--the baptism. It had snowed harder at the church. Notice the straight edges on the snow. They do that a lot here. The snow was almost to the bottom of Sister Holbrook's jacket. The next day we wore our Siberian coats.

     They cleared a path to this door as per fire marshal regulations, but with the wind it didn't stay cleared. Fortunately there are other doors on a sheltered side of the building. They probably won't use this one until spring.

Elder Lerimez, Jia Sheng/Margaret and Elder Nielsen (who confirmed her the next day) 

     Margaret is a very shy, bright 19-year-old student from China. She came to Canada three years ago by herself for a special English program. She's shared the gospel with some of her friends who have set tentative dates for baptism in the next few weeks. We found out it's been a year since the last baptism in Sydney, so there was a lot of excitement.

     The members of Sydney Branch were very warm and welcoming, and so pleased that President Pratt would send someone from the mission to attend the baptism. The next morning at Sacrament Meeting we met a few more people, one of whom was the mother to a woman in our Sackville Ward.

     Driving home Sunday wasn't as bad as we'd feared. However, we learned that although "the grass is always greener on the other side" is a fallacy, it was true that the other side of the road was always clearer. We didn't think to get a picture for proof. Maybe the snowplow was following us. The roads were all passable and the closer we got to home, the less snow there was. Glad we had pictures or they might have thought we were exaggerating the storm! It was a relief to get back home Sunday night.

One of our friends in Canada posted this on her blog and we thought it was especially appropriate with Margaret's baptism. God loves all of us and everyone is important to Him in ways we can't even begin to comprehend.

Cabot Trail

     Late Wednesday afternoon President Pratt asked us if we'd be interested in going to a baptism on Saturday in Sydney (Nova Scotia, not Australia) on Cape Breton Island. He likes to have a representative from the mission at baptisms whenever possible. Often he is able to attend, but when he can't, he usually has a member of the mission presidency or a senior couple from another area. This is the first time he's asked us. He told us we could close the office on Friday and leave Thursday night. No, it's not a two-day trip to Sydney, but he thought we should take some time to see one of his favorite places in the mission: the Cabot Trail. Just over 24 hours later we'd packed up, put in a full day at the office, and were on the road.

     We got off to a good start, making it to the lower end of Cape Breton Thursday night and waking early Friday morning. We soon saw why President Pratt loves the area. Some of the sights were too majestic to capture on camera, but we'll share some pictures anyway. It was all so beautiful, even in a stark way. We're looking forward to seeing it again in warmer weather without all the snow. We didn't always get out of the car to take pictures because it was windy and cold.

     Cape Breton Island is a large land mass surrounding and surrounded by lots of water. Bras d'Or is a large inland sea in the middle, and there are lots of bays and coves around the outside of the island as well. It's connected to the mainland by a short causeway, but it's definitely different. For one thing, there's a lot of Celtic influence--signs, shops, culture. There are lots of little towns. We laughed because sometimes the signs almost seemed larger than the towns! Part of that was due to the time of year and many places were closed for the winter.

     We passed an old guy who was hitchhiking and decided to turn around and pick him up. By the time we got back to where we'd seen him, he was gone. Several kilometers down the road we saw him again. Apparently the first ride he got didn't take him far enough. We picked him and up took him into the next town where he was picking up a prescription. The only thing he wanted to talk about was the lottery.

     Toward the northernmost end of the island is a national park called Cape Breton Highlands National Park. Cabot Trail runs around and through it. The description "where mountains meet the sea" is very appropriate. The roads were open around the park, but we didn't have to pay an entrance fee. We decided it wouldn't have been worth their time to have a ranger at the entrance shack since we rarely saw other cars. It was still just as beautiful, but the hiking trails weren't accessible except by snowshoe. We didn't plan for that contingency when we packed everything up in Salt Lake. There were some scenic overlooks where the plows had piled the snow too high to see over.
     We saw two moose but weren't close enough to tell if they were male/female or female/calf before they ran into the trees. We didn't get the camera out quickly enough to get capture both of them.

There are MANY small but unique churches all throughout Nova Scotia

Many of the graveyards feature a huge cross with Christ

One of our favorite things was all the frozen waterfalls along the side of the road. They are gorgeous in this frozen state--alas, the limitations of the camera. It would be interesting to see them again in the spring for a different kind of beauty.

Lobster traps, a very common sight here

Less common are the snow crab traps

And even more common than churches are the lighthouses around nearly every corner.

This is an operative lighthouse. If it hadn't been closed for the season, we easily could have climbed a few stairs to get to the top. It's maybe 8 feet tall.

     This lighthouse was just a few miles on down the road. It was  more than twice as tall.

















     We have much more to share about our weekend, but since this only takes us up to about noon on Friday, that will be for next week's post. To be continued . . .

ENJOYING THE MARITIMES

   With the frequent changes in temperature here, the roads in the Maritimes (Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island) have many chuck holes. An example of temperature variation is that two days ago the high was 15F and today it is 41F, and another big storm is predicted for this weekend. About a month ago – we hit a GRAND CANYON size chuck hole. It’s amazing that it didn’t blow the tire or at least mess up the alignment, but it did develop a slow leak and vibration. We took it to a tire store guessing the seal had broken and asked them to rebalance and reseal. Wrong – the rim was bent. Since it was alloy, they didn't have one in stock and needed to order a new one in.

   Years ago the kids gave Elder Holbrook a self-contained battery jump/tire pump for Christmas, and it has been a life saver. Every morning he went out to check the tire and often had to pump it up. Finally the rim came and he called to get an appointment. No return call, three days in a row. Then the service tech promised to call back in 10 minutes – didn’t happen. Elder Holbrook finally called the service manager. She wrote it up so when he went to get it installed, they took him right in. An hour later he drove home with a vibration and the next morning – the tire was low again. He called and had to wait a week for another appointment and went in and reminded them that it was the passenger front tire.

   “Are you sure?”

   “Yes.” 

   You guessed it, they had changed out the good rim. Luckily they had the old one still in the pile to be scrapped and they put it on and now it's smooth sailing.

   

     A few days after the last storm we noticed the snow piles along many streets had been "shaved" to the curb and so it has a flat vertical edge. Elder Holbrook snapped a picture of it on the street in front of the office today (you can see his shadow in the picture). It widens the area of cleared street. We're wondering if that's so when the next storm hits they can heap the new snow on top of the existing piles more easily. Although you can't really tell in this picture, the flat side goes quite a long distance, all the way to the next driveway coming out of the parking lot. We'd love to see what the machine that does it looks like.

~   ~   ~   ~   ~

   The fourth Sunday of every month we speak in a branch in Newfoundland, rotating through the three different branches on the island. The flight there is just over an hour (or more, depending on which city we fly to), but it didn't take us that long this time. We did it from the comfort of our apartment via Skype. Someone told us about a nifty trick. Split the screen with Skype on one side and a word document with our talks on the other side. To them it appears we're talking right to them, even though we're reading the talk! Our version of a TelePrompter. Just like speaking in General Conference, only with a MUCH smaller audience (fewer than 30 people). And we're not apostles. And our talks aren't written up in the Ensign or quoted from for years to come, although we did quote from the Ensign and used lots of quotes. And after an hour we get to sit back and relax. And no traffic hassles when the meeting was over.

This is what our computer screen looked like

   We saw a beautiful sunrise from our balcony at 7:30 am this morning. What a great way to start the day!

   The days here are getting noticeably longer very quickly. We've even seen some pretty sunsets when we leave the office once in a while.

   This place is beautiful, even in the stark winter. We are so blessed to be able to serve the Lord again, this time a little closer to home. 

   We've found it interesting to see some investigators look and behave as though they're already members, while others take a while to make some changes. They're often ready to make the adjustments, but course corrections can take time. However, when someone feels the spark and is touched by the Spirit, the transformation can be amazing!

 

SNOW GNOMES

Okay, we might have bragged a little too much about the wonderful "winter" we've been having, but when the temperatures were in the 50s on Christmas Day, can you blame us for being pleased that Nova Scotia didn't get hit with a hard winter like last year? All good things must come to an end, especially when snow gnomes decide to get even with us for all our bragging.

A week ago an unexpected storm dropped about 8 inches. It's nothing by Salt Lake standards this year, but plenty of snow because it's very wet and dense. No light and fluffy here.

We found out we're responsible for keeping the snow cleared around our car. On days it snows we have to be out of the lot by 9:00 am so they can clear the rest of the area. Every morning Elder Holbrook has to scrape the windows and shovel the area around our car. We do miss our attached garage at home but have gained a great appreciation for the car's remote start. On the morning this picture was taken, the cars on either side of us were already gone.

Over the weekend we had a Nor'easter come through making last week's snow looks like a skiff. Rain turned to sleet, then freezing rain and all that got covered up by snow and then blown around for fun.

Inside looking out through the drifts--the window in the Primary room at church

The back of the church. The snow under the eaves was blown off the roof and is not from a snow blower.

We saw these next three scenes on our way to church.

Yes, that's a bobcat clearing the public sidewalk! When there's too much for it to push out of the way, it scoops and dumps piles of snow off to the side and then continues burrowing again. We've commented on how well they keep the walkways clear, and now we know how they do it. We've seen lots of bobcats clearing walks, small lots, and even some driveways. Wonder what the bobcat-to-population ration is here. It's gotta be pretty high!

Sister Holbrook has enjoyed her "corner office"--she gets to watch people and cars go by. That is, until last week when they piled the plowed snow from the parking lot almost to her window.

By Friday it had compacted quite a bit from the weight of the heavy snow, but after the weekend weather there was more snow piled higher and deeper on Monday morning! We're guessing after the second storm the snow is at least 10 feet high and roughly 20 feet at the base. This is her view out the side window now:

There are snow flurries almost every day, and another storm is predicted for this weekend. Winter has definitely hit. They keep the roads plowed so we're not having trouble getting around. It's so nice to be "stuck" in the office!

We found out that December is usually fairly warm and winter doesn't hit until after the first of the year. Now they tell us, after we taunted those crazy snow gnomes.

Through all of this, we're glad we have the warmth of the gospel in our lives. We are so blessed to be able to serve again in a different place and in a different way. The Lord has placed us among some people with strong testimonies and others who are just learning about our Savior. Both strengthen us.

Visa Waiters

No pictures this week because our camera finally gave up on us after 12 years. We have a new one now, but no pictures yet.

Apparently all our bragging to people back home about our warm winter here brought on the wrath of the snow gnomes. Temperatures were in the 50s for Christmas, and two days later they dipped to 15 and the next week a big storm blew in, dropping lots of snow (but not as much as Salt Lake a few weeks ago). It's warmed up again a little, but we've learned our lesson and won't taunt those vengeful gnomes again.

Last week was crazy busy. In addition to end-of-the-year stuff, we had a double transfer (regular transfers and then some issues arose between when transfers were announced on Sunday and when they took place on Thursday, and that made for some last minutes changes so we had to redo a lot of things), and 13 incoming missionaries, plus the aforementioned snowstorm caused problems. The new missionaries were supposed to arrive on two flights on Tuesday night, but because of the storm, they ended up on 5 flights over the next 3 days, zigzagging across the continent, the last one arriving Friday morning on a redeye. We had been looking forward to a day off on January 1 with the office closed for the holiday, but we put in a full day and then some. Can you think of a better way to ring in the new year than serving the Lord?


Originally we had only expected four new missionaries, but there have been problems with visas and passport renewals, so nine of the new missionaries were given to us with only a few weeks' notice. Surprisingly, the missionaries with the problems are all (native) Canadian citizens going to missions in the States, hence they need to go to a mission in Canada until their visas come through. The issues aren't due to procrastination--it's taking the State Department a lot longer to issue visas right now for some reason. The missionary with the expiring passport has been out a while and started working on getting a new passport more than 6 months ago! He was here for about a week when he was told it had finally gone through. With travel time and waiting for his ticket back, it pulled him away from his mission for over two weeks. The other 9 visa waiter missionaries are fresh out of the MTC and will get yoinked out of our mission when their visas come through. President Pratt wisely put them all in threesomes which will minimize disruptions, but we still faced the issue of not having enough beds. We ended up ordering air beds (really nice 14" air mattresses) for about a third of what regular beds cost. They will take up very little storage space when the visa waiters leave, and will be useful in the future when missionaries travel and stay overnight with other missionaries, like for zone conferences or doing splits.

We're kind of hoping the desks in the office will get really messy in the next few weeks so when the visas come in they'll get lost in the shuffle. We'd love to keep these visa waiter missionaries--they're great!