Hi-Ho, Hi-Ho, It's Off to Work We Go

Last blog, I described my new home and this time I will tell you why I'm here. One month ago, Gareth was offered a position managing a small, budget, wilderness accommodation. We both already had jobs, but this opportunity was too unique to pass up. He is the sole employee for the property, with the exception of a relief manager for his days off, and his duties include everything from guest services and entertainment, to maintenance and accounting.

Because the property is located about an hour from our former home, it didn't make sense for me to keep a job there. Finding a job here would save me lots on gas and even more on time, making it worth the decrease in pay. Plus, I wanted to submerse myself in the local community here, and I figured that being a part of the local work force would be a good start. Just when I was starting to feel foolish about turning down good jobs in favor of some perfect position within biking distance of my home in the middle of nowhere, I got an email. The small sporting goods store/rental shop 5 minutes from my house needed someone immediately. Luckily, the person who had been hired in April to start in mid-May had decided at the very last minute to back out, creating an opening for me. I got the job. Oh, the whimsy of fate.

After a few weeks of slowly moving and preparing for the summer, work officially started for us both last Wednesday. The hostel opened to the public (it is closed for a month in the spring due to a lack of interest during the shoulder season), I went off to the store, and so far, we both love our jobs! Gareth has been chipping away at the messes left behind: throwing out years worth of paper from the office, organizing old manuals and safety records, scrubbing refrigerators, etc. I'll occasionally hear him yell, "Eeeww! Should I throw this old, smelly, stained ______ away?" I then ask, "Is it disgusting?" and if the answer is yes, it goes straight in the garbage. Not your standard spring cleaning. At my job, I've been packing up winter rental gear, putting out the summer stuff, rearranging the store, renting equipment, and best of all, learning lots about bicycle maintenance. I even got to help build a few bikes from scratch!

In our spare time, we've been exploring the hiking and biking trails around here, watching movies on our new TV, cooking like crazy and making our new home feel homey. I bought a used mountain bike and it has been so much fun! On my day off, we did our first long ride which entailed about 1500 feet of elevation gain and plenty of walking our bikes uphill. The views were totally worth it and the ride down was terrifyingly awesome. Hopefully, I'll get used to the downhills a bit more as time wears on. That's all for this week. We're expecting up to 30 cm of snow tonight, so the next post may end up being about shoveling. I really hope not...