2024 Vacation – Day Eight – Home Again

Woke up far earlier than I intended, but that turned out to be a good thing. Even though we’d done a lot of the packing the night before, it still took a while to get ready to leave. Did I say ready to leave? More aptly, prepared to leave, as we certainly weren’t ready. Another week would have been far more to our liking. As usual, vacation days seem to go by at the speed of light.

Annabelle sensed right from the beginning that this day was different. And of course, when I moved the cat carrier out to the screen porch, that only confirmed it for her. More than once over the next couple of hours, she disappeared under one of the beds. Only way to get her out was to threaten her with the vacuum. Didn’t have to turn it on, just show it to her. I left loading the canoe until the last and then we were ready to roll.

We stopped at Tim Hortons for coffee and doughnuts near Bouctouche, NB. That was a busy spot. The drive-through was backed up by more than a dozen cars, making it difficult to even get into the parking lot; so we went inside, which wasn’t much better. We had hoped to visit a few people on our way home, but one couple couldn’t be reached, another couple were too sick, and a third couple had other plans. So the lottery fell to our good friends and family, Steve and Nadine, who live on Cape Tormentine, within sight of the Confederation Bridge to PEI. Anabelle took advantage of the opportunity to investigate a new location. What had been forecast to be a rainy day was only overcast with a few odd sprinkles.

After a couple of hours, catching up on the news, we struck out on the final stretch homeward, accepting an invitation for a welcome home supper, a pleasant surprise and a tasty one, from our son Jason and wife Maureen, who are also our next-door neighbors. Annabelle was so happy to be home she hardly noticed our absence for a couple of hours. Little had changed during our absence except our rose bush produced more flowers this year than any since we moved here, and still plenty more buds.

So, back to our old routine for another year while we look forward to another getaway next summer. Can’t come soon enough for us, Annabelle included.