Wow, Part II

So we arrived at night on November 29th back in Richmond after our harrowing caravan journey through Nanaimo to the Duke Point Ferry Terminal and made it to my parent’s house to park the U-Haul truck. However, the truck got stuck and so we spent a couple of hours with a bag of kitty litter trying to unstuck it which we did.

The next day we drove to our new place and with the help of my parents and brother and Tanya’s parents we moved in. However, with the mess of our apartment, we decided to postpone our first night a day as it took us longer to return the moving truck since it got stuck again once it was unloaded. Argh!! However, after a good solid weekend of unpacking and help from family and friends, we really got settled in.

I started my first day at Vancouver SEACOR on December 1st with a half day of orientation and paperwork. I’m part of the Remedial Systems Group in Vancouver with 50% of my time focused on that and 50% focused on regular site assessment work. Very interesting new work and some of the same stuff as in Nanaimo but new sites and different challenges. For example, it took me two hours to get back to Vancouver from Abbotsford one afternoon. A distance of about 90km. Conversely on the Island, two hours is the time to get from Nanaimo to Victoria (125km) or the almost time (2.5 hours) to Ucluelet from Nanaimo (180km). A trip of 90km is the approximate distance from Nanaimo to Union Bay to the North or Cobble Hill to the South. Each trip would take approx. 50 minutes. So yeah, some definite differences with travel times and mileage, but my field work load has been light, very light, so I’m happy about that as winter sucks for field work. As I am now two months into my new position in Vancouver, I have to say that the atmosphere is very different in Nanaimo. Not better, but different. The lunch room is awesome!!! and overall, I am very happy to be working in the Vancouver office. Plus the fact that I got a very nice raise last week. =D

I must say that things are different and we are very happy to be back in Vancouver. The commute isn’t too bad – ½ hour to work and ¾ of an hour home, usually. We are closer to friends and family, and we have all the great food here. Which is really the main reason we moved back. =) That and Tanya wanting to take UBC courses next year. Actually, I’m thinking of going back and finishing my Arts Degree, perhaps even do an MBA. Although we'll see where things go. Right now, I'm just happy to be moving forward with my career as a consultant and happy that our life back home is going so well.

More posts to come sooner than later. I promise!!