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 2003 Olson Christmas Letter
Well what a surprise! Here we are back in Canada with a house, a
car, “normal” jobs and a wealth of travel experiences and
splendid memories. We had our ups and downs this year but are
now happily settled in Calgary,
Alberta living and loving our new life.
Let me tell you what we are doing at the moment. It is Sunday
morning and I am downstairs sitting on our own leather couch
with a hot cup of percolated coffee listening to the classical
hour on a fantastic community radio station. As I look out the
window I see a blanket of snow criss-crossed with rabbit tracks
and the sun just peeking over horizon. Ana is upstairs enjoying
her favorite moment of the week – the Sunday morning sleep-in!
I’ll soon get some bacon and eggs cooking on our own stove in
our very own frying pan. Sounds a little boring? For us it’s
heavenly! Being settled has been like a whole new adventure.
Let me think back to the first day of 2003. Oh yes, we had two
New Year’s Eves. What, you say?? Well, we enjoyed our first
one sitting in a park in Auckland, New Zealand drinking wine and
watching fireworks. The next one was sitting on a plane bound
for Santiago, Chile just after we crossed the International Date
Line and gained a day!
Thus begun the second half of our big round-the-world
backpacking tour. We spent a few days in Santiago then traveled
to the north of Chile
and crossed the border into Peru,
where we saw many amazing sights including Machu Picchu
and Lake Titicaca. We then moved onto Bolivia, which we didn’t
enjoy quite as much, except for the amazing trip we took through
the Uyuni Region. This is where we met some very special
friends, Fraser and Rebecca, with whom we would travel with for
the following two months.
After Bolivia
we returned to Chile where we were “relieved” of our laptop on
an overnight bus so that left us feeling a little bitter with
Chile, especially since the cops were useless and people were
generally unhelpful. Luckily we were able to get a police
report for the theft which is what we needed for the insurance
company to have the computer replaced. Unluckily, this police
report was stolen along with all the rest of our stuff a couple
weeks later from a cabin in Argentina!! Luckily we had faxed
the report to the insurance company in Canada from Chile.
Unluckily they lost it. Luckily we were able to scream and
fight with them and eventually get it replaced. Unluckily they
sent us a used, scratched, demo model. Luckily…..and on and on
we go. As I said, we had a few ups and downs this year!
Besides getting robbed again in Argentina, we really loved it
and had some great times with our new friends. I will never
forget the steaks we ate in Argentina, we had some of the best
meals of our lives and they were CHEAP! We lived on the
ultimate man’s diet – eggs and bacon for breakfast, barbequed
sausages for lunch, beer and steak for dinner. What a life!
After Argentina
we traveled to Brazil and spent a couple glorious weeks in a
town called Florianopolis which was a paradise of gorgeous
beaches, great restaurants and beautiful people. We had to
alter the diet a bit and replaced the rare steaks with loads of
seafood including raw oysters, fish, and mussels, all extremely
cheap. Of course, beer stayed on the menu.
We returned to Canada
in April and by that time had decided that Canada was where we
wanted to settle down so that we could be closer to our family.
So we began our job search which turned into five months of
disappointment and frustration. After giving it our best in
Ontario we decided to travel to Calgary to “kick the tires” for
a while and were graciously put up by my aunt and uncle. We had
a great time staying with them and they treated us so well. It
eventually all came together and both Ana and I ended up finding
employment with WestJet airlines…in the same week! So just when
we thought that the traveling was done, we end up with jobs in
the airline business. Once that happened we went on the largest
spending splurge in our lives and within a couple weeks had
bought a house, car, and furniture and transformed ourselves
from bag toting backpackers to debt laden working class shmoes!
Since being here we’ve rekindled a couple old friendships, made
some new friends and spent many Sunday evenings with the
Davidson’s enjoying what we came back here for…family!
We are now gearing up for the Christmas season. Our old friend
Toddy Van Hees is here visiting and we have lots of events lined
up including a visit from Carmen, Curtis’ stag and wedding and a
trip to Brantford
over the Christmas weekend. It will be anything but dull….
Best wishes from us and have a splendid 2004!
Kris and Ana
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