My final week

Well it certainly hasn't been what I expected. I thought that this final week visiting back home would be a bit slower paced than the first two weeks. How wrong could I have been!

After arriving home from the cottage, then heading down to the Toronto Centre Island for my friend Deb's 5km walk/run in memory of her dad, dodging massive down pours of rain and finally getting back to mom and dad's place I thought the rest of the week would be very slow.

On Monday I was able to get back down into the gym and do an ergo. Considering that I have a 5km time trial 10 days after I get back I thought it would be a good idea to get on the erg! Did 10km but I think it just about killed me! After that it was time to head out to a local shopping mall with my mom. I am being smart this year, buying all the Christmas presents that I usually have to post, wrapping them and leaving them here. After getting most of them mom and I headed out to my sisters to scoff down some dinner and head to the soccer pitch to watch my neice Lea play. Unfortunately their game was against the best team in Ontario. But they can hold their heads high, they were only scored against once and even got a goal back (which was unfortunately not allowed), so went down 1-0. I think the referree has to learn the rules better.

Tuesday I was supposed to go with my dad to a brunch with a bunch of retired senior officers from the Toronto police. But when I got up I was so tired, I think that two weeks of going non stop had finally hit me. So needless to say I didn't go with him and proceeded to go back to bed. Not that I was there long as the gardener came by with his ride on lawn mower!

That afternoon I headed to downtown Toronto with my sister. Cindy has her own production company and is a brilliant filmmaker! She was going to view the final showing of her next documentary called "The Skies the Limit", so she invited me to go with her. This was exciting because I never really get to see the films that she has made. What a brillant piece of work, although many would say that I am biased. But it was a wonderful look at the airline industry and where it is growing.

We then headed over to my aunt's place for dinner and I was staying the night with her and my uncle. We had a nice evening and it was great to just sit and chat with Rheta (my aunt). Growing up Rheta was always our "cool" auntie! She bucked the trend back then which said that women should get married and have a family. Rheta had a fabulous career, was proposed to 3 times, travelled the world and when she was finished with that decided to get married. She was always someone who did her own thing and she was a great role model for Cindy and I as we were growing up. So her and I had a great catch up.

The next day my cousin Marg-Rheta (yes you can guess she was named after our aunt) picked me up, we went to her place and then to the local pool where Marg teaches an older crowd to swim, or should I say she does stroke correction. I think the oldest woman is 86! We then headed to the west end of the city to a Japanese restaurant and the most wonderful lunch. It was then time to head back to mom and dad's, so Marg came with me and had dinner with my dad. It was a really nice catch up.

Yesterday I ended up meeting up with mom and dad down the street for coffee. Both of them head off with their respective friends for their walks. Dad doesn't do too much, but mom and her ladies walk for about an hour. I just met them for the coffee part! Mom and I headed to another shopping mall to try and get one last present...not to be! I was unable to find what I wanted but was able to get Russ (my husband) a couple of gifts to take home. We then hurried home as we had to get ready for a "Pub Night". I was going to see all my police friends that I hadn't see in about 3 years!

What a great night. There were people there that I had not seen in almost 20 years, if not longer. People I had never even thought would be there. My friend Deb did an amazing job of getting in touch with people. So it was a wonderful evening to have a couple of drinks, some great food and some fabulous conversation.

I am off tonight to catch up with two couples who mean more to me than just friends. I worked with Kim and Bill just before I left the police force 14 years ago. So I am meeting them for dinner with their wives and mom & dad as well. So it will be a great ending to the week.

My trip does not end there as I have a few more days left and when I will write about those later. I will certainly need to have a rest when I get back home!

Back to my roots

I have been home for 2 weeks now and this is the first chance I have had to write something! My 'Social Secretary' my sister has had me extremely busy! In fact although I haven't had time to scratch myself, she has done a remarkable job of setting things up so that I have been able to see quite a few people in a short time.

I arrived on the 10th of August and my journey took me 27 1/2 hours from my door to the airport in Toronto. Although I had organised before I left to have wheelchair assistance it was a bit lacking with Air Canada. After waiting in a wheelchair, with two other ladies who needed assistance, for more than 10 minutes I decided to kick up a bit of a stink. Needless to say that got them going. Then the attendant had the audacity to tell me that if I wanted to use a wheelchair then I was going to always have to wait. Boy he picked the wrong person to say that to. After stating a few facts I then asked him if it meant that I was a second class citizen! He didn't say another word, but took me right to the luggage retrival. Once there I thanked him for his assistance (no reply) and told him I didn't need him anymore.

After gathering my one bag I headed out the door to my excited family waiting for me. But when I walked out I stood there looking for them! It took me a couple of minutes to find my parents sitting away from the entrance, mom yawning and dad (although blind) starring into space! After finding them, I advised them I was glad they were excited to see me (tongue in check). They thought I would be coming out in a wheelchair...so much for Air Canada service!

On the way to their home I realised why I love Melbourne so much. I felt like I had landed in a concrete jungle and to top it off there had been a huge propane gas explosion that morning. This propane depot was located in a residential area, there was one dead and hundreds evacuated from their homes with damage to homes like a bomb had gone off. The major highway that cuts across Toronto from east to west was closed so getting from the airport (located in the west) to my parents home (in the east) was in itself a chore! But we did eventually arrive and was very happy to see my sister, nephew and niece waiting for us.

We had a bit of a birthday party celebrating my sister's, neices and mine all in one. It was great to be able to actually give them their presents. I think the worst part about living half way around the world is not seeing them and being able to celebrate things like birthdays.

The first week seems like it was a whirlwind. With spending a night with my ex partner from the police force and his wife, to my nephews soccer game (which they won 7-3!), to spending a night at my sisters house, then taking a train to my best friends home almost 3 hours out of Toronto, then returning home via train to my parents.

If I thought the second week was going to get any better then I had better think again.

My sister Cindy had organised a lunch east of Toronto with two very good friends from my police force days, Bonnie and Deb. We went to Bonnie's home (I must admit my dream home!) and had a great afternoon with not only her and Deb, but also Bonnie's husband Mark and son Chad. It was a great catch up but again probably too short.

The next day I had put my foot down and told Cindy that it was a day for the girls. Unfortunatley my mom couldn't make it, she had a previous appointment with a surgeon for cataract surgery. So Cindy , my neice Lea and I had our own spa day, pampering ourselves with facials, foot baths and pedicure's. This was a good break in an otherwise busy week. Although I must admit that the next 3 days were great, spent in Northern Ontario on a lake. The weather reaching 28 degrees for most of the 3 days. My neice and nephew now being older (13 and almost 15) were great to be around and wanted to show me the skills they had now acquired behind a ski boat! Absolutely amazing, but then again they are my neice and nephew!

We also had another couple and their children join us, friends from high school days. What a blast to catch up with them and talk about other people from those days. Funny enough it turns out one guy I went to school with is now living in Melbourne! Talk about a small world.

It was then time to hit the road again and head back to Toronto for my last week in town. Today we attended the Toronto Island for a 5km walk/run in memory of my friend Deb's dad, who died of Prostate Cancer. Deb has run this for the last 8-10 years and although the weather man had called for thunderstorms today, the rain held off, the event had double the people from the last year and it was a huge success. I met up with other people I had worked with on the Toronto force, had a great catch up, my dad walked with my sister, while I babysat the bags and chatted. The rain waited until all the awards were given out and we were waiting for the ferry to take us back to the mainland. I told Deb that her dad must have been watching over her to hold the rain back!

So here I am now after having had a light dinner with mom and dad and catching up on my emails, facebook and blog. It has been a whirlwind 2 weeks but I have enjoyed every minute of it. I have even been able to fit in a 2 ergos a week so that I am not completely out of breath when I pick up my training in just over a weeks time. Athough I will be on the strictest diet when I get home! To much visiting, eating, drinking, eating and drinking!

I am now bracing myself for my last week in Toronto and I am certainly looking forward to catching up with more friends and family!

Heading home to Canada

I haven't said much since the end of May most likely because there hasn't been much to say. After finally coming to terms with our defeat in Munich, it was back to training and setting new goals. But that wasn't the only thing I had to think about in my life.
The charity event that I have set up was happening in Sydney for the first time in June, so had to do alot of planning for that and decided that it was best that I drive up there picking Margo (my aussie mom) up along the way.

The swim was held at the Sydney Olympic Pool and what an amazing place it is! We only had 7 teams entered but they raised a whopping $70,000! So Sydney will definitely be a good place for years to come for this event. Everyone enjoyed the event and I am sure that it will grow bigger and better next year. I also met some amazing people who were taking part and they have come to be pretty good friends, even if we don't know each other very well.

During June I also had to organise the lunch for the "Go For Gold Scholarships". This is what my events raise the money for. I am happy to say that we were able to present 4 scholarships in the amount of $1000, 19 scholarships in the amount of $3000 and 2 scholarships in the amount of $5000! So it was a very good lunch and gives me such satisfaction to be able to do this. It makes all the hard work during the year worthwhile to see the smiles and tears on the winners faces.

During all this I tried to keep training at a high rate and needless to say that lovely disease that I have decided to rear it's ugly head. Yes in almost two years I have not had a relapse but at the end of June my body rebelled. This landed me in hospital for 3 weeks, first for some Methyl-Prednesolone and then rehab. I think it was the gods way of kicking me in the butt to remind me that I still do have MS, so I just have to manage my life a bit better. I also think that because I was so fit I was able to overcome the relapse a lot quicker than ever. So I am back to training (however not as much) and slowly trying to regain my fitness.

In June I also decided that because I wasn't going to Beijing, maybe it was time to head back to Canada to visit family and friends. It has been over 3 years since I was there last, so it will be great to catch up with family and friends. I am only going for 3 weeks so I am sure that it will be a fun filled, action packed 3 weeks! Even better is the fact that my mom and dad have paid for the flight. My husband Russ was invited to come along, but he declined, something about looking after the dog (but we really know he hates flying)! So I am off on my own and the long flights begin again!

I will try to keep this blog updated over the next three weeks to keep track of the great reunions I am hoping to have.

New Goals

I have had just over a week to think about our race, not qualifying for Beijing and thinking about what my goals will be for the next year. I was going to take a couple of weeks off and I was doing well until tonight!

I don't feel good if I am not working out. I have literally done nothing for the last week or so. But today I received a phone call about a crew who needed an 8th person for the Masters Nationals at the end of May. I really don't know how to say No! So with 4 of us from Yarra Yarra Rowing Club and 4 from Richmond Rowing Club, we headed out for our first training session.

We didn't do a whole lot but we rowed really well. I am one of the youngest on the team, which is certainly a different feeling. I am usually the oldest!

I was in Canberra yesterday taking part in filmig for a training video for classifying adaptive rowers. It was a long day but interesting and if it will help in the adaptive rowing area, then I am all for it.

The LTA camp that we were going to go on the first week of June has now been cancelled because we didn't have enough rowers able to attend. As most of us have to work full time to support ourselves it was impossible for some of the them to get time off. This is something that has to be looked at so that people are advised well in advance so they can get the time off.

I am now not rowing until Saturday which will give me a few days more off.
I have decided that I will work my butt off for the next year and hopefully make the team for the World Championships in 2009. Along the way there are a few things to do, such as the Australian Masters Rowing championships, the Australian Indoor Rowing Championships and Head of the Yarra.

I look forward to keeping you up to date on the progress of my goals!

We have arrived home

What a long flight!

Almost 12 hours from Frankfurt, 4 hours in the airport at Kuala Lumpur and then another 8 hours to Sydney. We arrived in Sydney Tuesday night, minus my luggage. Everyone else's arrived except mine. Never fails...no clothes to change into.

We stayed the night in Sydney and then had flights the following morning back to Melbourne (for Lisa and I). We were to leave at 10:30 a.m. but unfortunately after sitting on the plane at the terminal for an hour were asked to get off as there was a problem with the hydrolics. We finally were put on a plane at 12 and headed home. Still minus my luggage!

It finally arrived on Thursday night at my house, but wouldn't have if I hadn't constantly called not only Sydney airport but also Melbourne. My mind boggles to think what they spend on lost luggage and getting it delivered to people. But at least when it arrived it was intact and all the things that I had purchased were still there.

I have had almost a week now to reflect on our race and I have realised that we did a damn fine job! I have also had so many people email me and call me and I think it is summed up perfectly by my sister who emailed me and said "I want you to know how many people you have inspired once again on this journey. It doesn't matter what the destination. It matters about the journey and your courage, hope, and enthusiasm during this one swept away so many people and is something that will be with us forever. This is true success, not how you placed. You brought us up so high with important lessons that you could never let us down." Thank you Cindy, this comment put things in perspective.

I think that it is important to have a goal and the hardest thing to come to terms with after our race was "what do we do now". We have all been invited to a National camp the first week of June, so I think it is important to know what I want out of this sport for the future. I can't look 4 years down the track right now because I don't know if my body will hold out. So I have decided that I will look at my long term goal as the World Championships next year and my short term as being the best club person as possible. Supporting my home club of Yarra Yarra RC and taking part in crews for them in the coming season.

I will continue this blog over the coming months just to keep track of my progress but for now I just want to thank everyone who has supported me over the last year and a half. Without all of your support I would not have been able to accomplish what I have. It has certainly been a hell of a ride and I look forward to even more!

An official photo from the World Cup in Munich, this was at the finish. You can just see the tail end of the Chinese boat, but you can see how close it was for 2nd, 3th and 4th!

Time to let our hair down!

With the racing over it was time to go out, explore Dachau and let our hair down, so to speak. Dachau has some amazing history to it, so we decided that it was that history that we wanted to see. It is not a nice history and one that a couple of members of our crew did not want to see, so only 5 of us went exploring.

You see we went to the Dachau Concentration Camp. This concentration camp was the first one to be built during the Hilter regime. It was the also the only camp to be operational for the entire 12 years. It was finally liberated by American soldiers on Sunday the 29th of April, 1945.

When the camp originally opened, only known political opponents of the National-Socialists were interned, but this didn't last for long. Eventually prisoners came to Dachau from all the countries which were at war with Germany: resistance fighters, Jews, clergymen, or simply patirots who refused to collaborate with the occupation. Originally the camp was to hold a capacity of 5000 people but at times was known to hold up to 50,000. Barracks that were to house 200 men at times housed 1600!

Dachau was also know for it's gas chamber, hangings, medical experiments on prisoners and other punishments such as flogging, tree or pole-hanging, standing punishment, cutting off of rations or detention. Standing at the door to the gas chamber it was with extreme caution that I entered! I know that is silly but it was not a pleasant feeling.

So it was with a bit of trepidation that I wanted to see this camp. It was a very sobering afternoon to think of the horrors and atrocities that men and some women went through. They had just celebrated the 63rd anniversary of the liberation of the camp and it was amazing to see the floral wreths that had been placed in memory.

As I stood on the parade ground I could feel the ghosts of the past, thousands of men made to stand at attention for at least one hour and sometimes over night in the cold as punishment. It actually brought goose bumps to my body!

It is uncomprehendable to me how people can do these things to other people because of their beliefs, religion or look. I can only thank God that I was born when and where I was. But it is also something that I want to remember and hope that this type of thing will never happen again.

With the sobering part of our exploring over we decided it was time to head to Munich for dinner and a wander. But before we left the hotel we were offered a beer by our hosts. This was the first beer that Pete had, had in almost a year! And it was not to be his only beer this night!

Gene had left us at this point because his sister was in town and he was meeting up with her. But the rest of us headed to the "English Garden" to sit under the Chinese Pagoda and have a real German meal with huge beer mugs! From this photo it looks like Lisa was drinking one...but I can assure you it was not hers!

She did however have more food than anyone! Our cox who had been watching what she was eating so that she would be less for us to carry was now making up for it! We didn't think she would get through the whole meal...but she did!

You can see she wanted everyone to think she drank a whole mug of beer!

We are now getting ready to leave Dachau for Frankfurt. We will be spending the night there before catching our flight home on Monday.

This has been an amazing experience and one that I will not forget in a hurry!

Race Day and beyond

Race day had finally arrived! We headed to the course at 7:45 a.m. as our race was to be held at 9:30 a.m. When we got there we noticed that the wind had picked up more so than any other day. Usually it was pretty calm in the mornings and then got worse in the afternoon, but this morning was more like the afternoon wind and it was a direct head wind.

We had a team chat about our race plan. We always seem to loose it in the third 250m, so the idea was to have a great start and hold a rating of around 36 for the first 250m. We knew we could do this as the adrenaline would be pumping. We were to then go long, drive hard and hold a rating of 32 for the second 250m. On the third 250m we were to drive and pull the rating back up as we wanted this 250m to be our fastest. Then if need be to try and pick up the rating even further for the last 150m.

The start of the race was delayed because one of the Arms only women broke her chest strap, so we had a bit of a wait which we used to our advantage by practicing more starts. The time had finally arrived to head to the start (about 15 minutes late) and get ready for the race of our life.
I certainly give Lisa (our cox) credit for being able to have the boat held straight as the wind was huge. My heart was beating faster than normal, but the nerves had disappeared during warm up. I guess I just knew what I had to do and once we had started our warm up the head took over.

I felt that our start wasn't too bad. We were all engaged with the water and no one missed any water during this start. But we were still slower than the other crews and at 100m were in 4th place. We followed the plan to a "T". Lisa's calls were brilliant and by the 500m mark we were neck in neck with Denmark. China was out in front and I don't think anyone would have caught them.

It was now time for the third 250m and we have been told by the coaches that you could see us engage and at this point we pulled away from all the crews except China. The others held back just a fraction longer. With 150m to go we were still ahead of South Africa and Denmark but with about 50m to go the Danes were able to pull ahead...just! It was almost a blanket finish for 2nd, 3rd and 4th and unfortunately we ended up 4th. I have to say that the last 50m I don't remember much except the pain!

Needless to say it was not the outcome that we wanted. I think the pain of not making it to Beijing was worse than the physical pain. When we got back to the landing I was physically wrecked as were my other crew members. It took me almost 30min to actually be able to walk, my body had completely stopped and all I could think about was that the dream was over. It was extremely hard to stop the tears from flowing, thank god for sunglasses!

Noel Donaldson and a few of the other coaches from Rowing Australia stated that they felt Adaptive rowing had come of age during that race. They said it was one of the best races they had seen, tactically, by every crew, in the wind, in Adaptive rowing. David was extremely please with us and how we had rowed the race. We had followed the plan exactly but just didn't have enough in the last 50m. We had given it our all.

Each one of us in the crew spent some time on our own in order to deal with the disappointment of not finishing in the top two, but eventually we were able to come together, discuss the race, look at the positives and talk about where to now.

We did meet up with the Danish team later to congratulate them and I was able to trade a zootie and have a bit of bubbly with them to celebrate. When they told me that they had been training together since December 7 times a week I realized that we had done alright. We have been together since the end of February (basically two months) and because we live so far apart from one another, did not have alot of time together. So if there is one thing that comes out of this is that we have the ability over time to be right up there with the best.

It was then time to de-rig the boat so that it could be sent back to the Italians, pack up our belongings and head back to the hotel. But I tell you we all still had heavy hearts! I think the hardest thing I had to do was send text messages back home to tell family and friends that we hadn't succeeded in securing a spot. Everyone from home have been so amazing in their love and support that I felt like I had let them down.

The dream is over and where to from here is unknown, but I do know that I have made some amazing friendships over the last year in the rowing community and more so in the last 3 months with my crew members. So thank you everyone for that. But stay tuned, you never know what could happen in the future!