THE RADS

Boof is a Gonner :~(

2007-03-14T09:14:00.000-07:00

Well I know it has been some time since I have told the tale of our poor misfortunate friend, Boof Verhoeff. As of late the Dr. was telling me the next steps in bringing up the chicken from the bloated belly of Boof.

Dr. (Mr. Helpful) tells me I have to induce vomiting. Now I wasn't sure how to give a dog the Heimlich maneuver, and I thought that was only for people who were chocking....I waited for the grim description, and he said....

You have to have the dog drink a quarter cup of Hydrogen Peroxide...

What, isn't this guy crazy, don't you use that stuff to clean your cuts when you get dirt in them, isn't this the stuff you use if you want to bleach out your hair? Was I to send the dog to its doom tonight? Dr. Mr. Helpful asked me if I had a Turkey baster and I said, "isn't that the long eye dropper but for greasing up the Turkey." "Yes and he said put that down the dogs mouth because she won't want to drink the Hydrogen peroxide otherwise. Once down it should take about 20 minutes for everything to come back up, if not give another quarter cup. I left the Doc and began looking for a Turkey baster.

Well we didn't have one so I got Anya to hold a measuring cup over the dogs mouth as I pulled on her bottom jaw wrestling with the dog as we tried to fill her mouth and have her drink without me letting go. All this did was have Boof cough and spit Peroxide all over me and the kitchen. What were we going to do? Then I remembered that we had some syringes left over from when I had to give our cat some vaccinations. But the problem was that our syringes were only 12cc. That is 1/16 of a cup. Well we had to get Boof's insides out and this was our ticket home.

Once again I pulled Boof's jaws open Anya filled the syringe up and jabbed it to the back of her throat. But once was not enough we had to do this 3 more times. All I can say is wrestling an 80 pound dog wet with Hydrogen Peroxide while prying open its mouth isn't what I call a day at the Rodeo.

After about 5 minutes of this we waited. And to our surprise every time Boof would like her lips her tongue was a little more yellow. I guess the peroxide was bleaching out her mouth. tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, the minutes seemed to creep along as we waited. I decided we better take Boof for a walk. Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock. Nothing was happening and it had been 4o minutes...I didn't want to give her more, I didn't know what to do.

So we locked her in the Studio downstairs and I read her some Harry Potter. Another 20 minutes went by and I was getting worried, what was I to do, so I went up stairs to ask Anya and by the time I got downstairs there was the dog munching on a huge white frothy pile of dog stomach acids, hydrogen peroxide chicken bones and whatever else was in her stomach. I quickly pulled her away to keep her from re-eating everything she had just exhumed. Poor old Boof had been saved...hip hip hurray, hip hip hurray.

And right by her side was her trusty companion Elliot the cat. Comforting Boof on her nights adventure....what a good cat.

For the next few weeks Boof and the cat played all day, a new lively skip was to be seen when Boof was chasing the cat, she seemed to be much younger and would play harder and cuddle closer. It seemed almost as if boof was catching up on something, perhaps the last bit of life that was left in her. She knew the end was near.

Well boof is gone now but not forever she will be remembered by the Radvanszky's (Jeremia, Anya, and Elliot the cat) and every time we think of her it will be happy thoughts. A tear will be shed in the absence of that sweet old dog, until we go and visit her up in Calgary where she is now with Anya's parents, oh, I bet you thought she was dead, sorry, no, just gone from our doggy sitting care. Ah, it sure feels good to have saved Boof Verhoeff's life. Thank you for following along

jer

P.S.
If you read this before I get home tonight you won't see the pictures of the real Boof, I will add them to this post again tonight.

Ohh..Boofff :( Dead at 98????

2007-03-05T08:58:00.000-08:00

Well I know it has been a long time and you have been dying to know if Boof Verhoeff has made it or not....but I figured like any excellent episode of Prison break, 24, or Lost you couldn't just have the end without a little pain...so here is the rest of the story.

So after phoning the Pet hospitals it didn't look good for Boof, you see many dogs and mongrels out there eat whole chickens, turkeys and even the occasional Ostrich all the time so whats the big deal, but you see this is all eatin's for the young pup. What I mean is that Boof isn't a spring chicken anymore she is 14 people years, I guess that equals about (14 X 7 = 98 years old). She has survived a stroke and each morning we hide heart medicine in her doggy treats. Let me assure you, Boof of any dog should not be eating a basketball sized chicken skeleton and skin....

A waring to anyone with a sick pet is to get a second Doctors advice. The First Doc. that we spoke to said it doesn't look good, if Boof is still kickin in the morning bring her in for x-rays (I know x-rays don't come in the visible light range and don't have colors we can see...) to see how many bones are stuck where. What kind of crappy advice is that, I wanted answers so onto the next flashy add in the yellow pages. The second Doc, at the Highland Pet Hospital was amazing. He broke it down and espeaky me lenguigh (he spoke my language). He asked what kind of chicken Boof had eaten and then told me the kind you buy from the food store are GMO and fed growth hormones so they can grow that big in 6 weeks, their bones are kind of like jelly and shouldn't be a problem. If it had been a Huterite Chicken, we would have had problems, dem bones sharp like needles.

He told me the real problem is with the fat in the skin and gristle. Dogs aren’t supposed to be eating this much fat and especially 98 year old dogs, because it causes major problems with their Pancreas and can cause bloat, this didn't look good because even before the vet told me this Boof was making gurgling sounds in her stomach and was getting very bloated....

....Now the skin on my back was crawling, I had just sentenced my mother-in-laws dog to a long painful death, is this how they were going to remember me for the next 20 years of Anya and my "till death do us part", was this to be the first of a long list of me murdering my newly married families pets...and if so, what am I to do, am I to get the dog stuffed and have the taxiderm put a BIG fake red tongue hanging out of Boofs mouth with lifeless beady glass eye balls forever staring up at them and me...

so then the Doc. said you have to.....

gotta go to class, will write soon, I promise...sorry, and hold on Boof, just hold on poor girl!!!!

the Night I (Jermia) killed our doG?!?!

2007-02-26T09:45:00.000-08:00

It all started on a quiet Sunday evening. We had a wonderful weekend with a visit from our Oma and Opa Verhoeff. A weekend of food, drink, merriment and games. To set the stage I want to express that my wife Anya is a wonderful cook and makes most things from scratch and very healthy.

This was one of those occasions as she bought a roasted chicken cut and prepared the meat for a wonderful chicken noodle soup. Her cooking is always to die for, but usually not literally. You see after cleaning up from the weekend I managed to leave the garbage out after I was done. And as I am thoroughly into reading Harry Potter I thought I would sit down for a moment and read, well one moment passed to another and after about 30 minutes of moments I went to steep a tea but to my surprise there was garbage everywhere. To this was Anya's shock that Boof Verhoeff, (the Dogs name) had eaten the entire carcass of the chicken including the bones. It was weird as a cold sweet came over me in a helpless understanding of what an entire skeleton would do to the insides of a dog, so I called up all the 24 hr pet hospitals and asked what would happen to the dog and what I could do.

Are you ready for this....well I will finish my tragic tale when I get back from class.....

Don't be fooled, Quack, Quack

2007-02-15T09:00:00.000-08:00

Every time I see a flock of little ducklings I run or get out my axe....well maybe not an axe, but when we were in Vict0ria this is what we saw and were appalled by the sight of the moral and social degradation that has lead to ducks doing the inconceivable... robbing the innocent. This almost feels like a sick backwards Robin Hood, with the ducks robbing from the poor and giving to the rich, I bet they are giving all this money to Petroleum executives to make their pockets even thicker, I bet these ducks would even steal candy from a baby!! What has happened to our society? I give up, if you feel like you can muster it leave a comment about this sick sight..ahhhh

jer

Ohhhh boyyyy, where have we been?

2007-02-12T19:00:00.000-08:00

Well, hello our friends, so sorry for the long delay in writting to your about our adventures, here are some of the things that are new, well maybe a little covered in dust since we last met.

SETTLERS OF CATAN CHAMPIONSHIP!!!

My wonderful wife has risen up against all the world at SABC for the first ever Settlers of Catan tournament. She played nearly flawless and came away winning a limited edittion 3D copy of the game. For those interested there will be a tournament each year in January with all monies raised going to the camp. For $35 per couple you can't go wrong. Check out this sweet board. I am so proud of my lovely wife.

This is the tough crowd for the final. 4 drooling games.....

This is the final out come, Anya is Blue

Look at the four finalists and that babe named lord of CATAN!!!

We spent our christmas in Victoria and had a wonderful time with family, friends and even a violin playing Darth Vadar, so cool!! I was loving it, what a beautiful place the west coast is

These are our party hats that we all were wearing for New Years supper, very funny.

Me and my favorite villan Darth

We love the West and especially the romantic dream of owning a boat and sailing around the world, well thats more like crazy but it would be fun to sail on someones boat one day...

Well that is all for now, we will try to update about ten times as often and thanks for checking out our home away from home

rads

p.s. If you could go to Anya's blog and read her articles and comment on how they impact you and what your thoughts are that would be great as it will help out her grade in her ed class. thanks, jer

What we havn't been tellin you....

2006-12-23T21:59:00.000-08:00

Over the last few weeks or more we, the rads, have been having alot of fun and have not been filling you in with the details.

To start with about 4 weeks ago SABC had their high school retreat. It was a blast, and I Jeremia was able to teach some young adults how to crochet a touque as well as intoduce everyones tastebuds to a delectable morsal like none other....Prairie Oysters.

Next I want the World to know about the best student teacher in the World, that is Mrs. RAD. Or as the little kids say Mrs. Fancy, or Raddelanpsy, or Radvansssss.....it is funny to hear little grade ones trying to say Mrs. Radvanszky's last name...ha ha. Here are some beautiful pictures that her class did for Art.

This is a snowplow that one of Anya's students drew with pastels. Anya had an amazing story about the different things snowplows do and how the people driving them keep the roads safe for drivers...very cool

Anya taught her students about snowflakes and symetry, this is one that a student made with vegitable stamps and paint, very beautiful

Next special event was going up to Red Deer and seeing Rudy, our grade 12 brother win Provincials. This weekend was amazing with Calgary Christian not loosing even a single set. You may be thinking to yourself, wow, thats pretty good, except that there is more. This was a David vs. Goliath provincials. You see Calgary Christian is a 2A school, meaning they have less that 300 students. Provincials was against the 4A schools, which are larger than 1000 students, some of the teams that Calgary Christian played had over 2500 students. Now I think you can see how amazing this team is. 16 strait sets without a loss. Part of the enjoyment was that some parents put in money and bought t-shirts for everyone cheering for Calgary Christian, in the end there were more than 130 people in green cheering. By far we were the dominant volleyball team.

Look at Anya The Proud Sister

Then about 2 weeks ago I, being Jeremia, continued on with a tradition that has been ongoing for many years now, actually this is the 5th annual Jeremia Christmas tree hunt. But I was able to bring my Wife this time and two other friends. It was fun snowshoeing around Beaver mines and pulling the three trees out of the bush. We have the largest at about 9 feet, Becky has the next at 7 feet and Richard has the smallest at about 4 feet tall, only strong enough to hold up two strings of lights, very fun.

Richard with his little tree, shoulder height

This is us with our tree right behind us, gotta love those organic Christmas trees, a little less full but all character

Also durning that -27 degree stretch I continued to bike to school every day, but had to make some minor adjustments, most noticable is the ski helmet in place of the bike helmet, the googles replacing my sun glasses and not present in this picture are the snow pants and boots. It was fun in the cold when dressed up.

About 2 weeks ago we also went to visit a friends family up in Wetaskwin and Jeremia snowmachined for the first time, hours and hours of fun were enjoyed in the frigid north.

An ongoing event in our life has been Elliot, our new well not so new anymore kitten. We got him at about 2 months old, small enough to fit in one hand, now he is growing and about 4 months old, loves to fight, climb, eat your toes, pounce on your head from ontop of the couch and play in anything that krinkles...Jer used to call him Rusty Nails because he crapped on all of our curtains...A quote from Jer, "crazy little punk, he's as anoying as a Rusty nail in your foot, hence his name for Elliot. Jer has come to love him and even lets Elliot sit in his lap while he was studying for Finals

A sneak picture of Anya and Elliot, what a cute couple.

Most Recent is Jeremia bringing in the Christmas season with a pan on his head playing Starwars with Payton and Cole, what a funny buch those three.

Well that is about all for our life over the past month, glad we could write and hopefully eveyone has a Merry Christmas and a Happy new Year. Remember the reason for the Season.

rads

2006-12-06T13:47:00.000-08:00

Free Hugs Campaign. Inspiring Story!
Just click away, you might even cry, pretty amazing. Give someone a hug today, how about giving a hug to every somebody

Enjoy and have a great day.

rads

Look up!!

2006-12-06T13:35:00.000-08:00

My First Birthday.... Since 25

2006-11-29T21:40:00.000-08:00

Well this last week was one for me to reflect on how old I have become. For some I am just a young buck but as I have heard over the years I am getting old. When I turned 20 I entered the old man club as my punk Jr. High kids said, then at 25, the song that people were singing was another one bites the dust. But now that it is my 1st birthday since 25 things seem to be going a little better.

It all started at 5:30 am with breakfast in bed, which is a Verhoeff tradition.

Throughout the day I had more little special memories like my 5 year old gymnastics class all singing me happy birthday infront of all the manly male gymnasts...ahhh. That evening Anya and I had dinner with my parents and I was given the most amazing Birthday cake in the world.

A Lord of the Rings cake with Ents (talking and walking trees), Frodo, Aragorn, Elves, Orcs, and many other things on it. Truly amazing and my favoritest (I am so happy I use made up words) in the entire Universe.

I don't know if things are better on birthdays because I am now 1 or because I am married or because of amazing cakes but my 1st birthday since I was 25 was a sweet dream of a birthday.

Thats all for now, can't wait till I'm 2....

Jeremia

Feature of the Week!

2006-11-15T09:22:00.000-08:00

Well, I sometimes think that I have a lot of friends and one of them is in "New Media" here at the University of Lethbridge. This young and SINGLE man has some talents and our feature of the week goes out to him, Mr. Brendan Coffeey (don't make the mistake of spelling his name COFFEE).

He is very special to my heart because he is presently in my small group, I have seen him in action out at camp as a counselor in 2005, gone to concerts, YQ and am in a Math class with him. Lets all get to know this fantastic guy a little better.

Brendan likes to take nice strolls in the river bottom as you can see him here walking down the tressel train bridge. He likes to wear hats that are Red, colorful shoes and dark clothing, a little mysterious I would say. I think that Brendan has also had an injury like an attack by a heard of black bears as a child that disfigured his face, becasue he always has a smile, that can't be normal.***

Where you can find Brendan on any given night.

Well on Thursday nights he works the post-supper pre-night shift at VHQ on University drive, so if you want a great recomendation on a movie he's your man. On Wednesday evenings he is a sponsor for Jr. High youth group, it takes a special man to work with Jr. Highs, and on the other evenings....well as I said this is the get to know you edittion, and that is all I know.

If you would like to know more about this outstanding batchelor just follow the link to his growing webpage where there are movies he has created and pictures he has taken and made. Well for this weeks feature it has been a joy getting to know Brendan a little better, ta ta for now, te te for later

J rad

***All things said about Brendan Coffey are true except the black bear thing, as he has no concious memory that far back and no scars on his face to prove or disprove the non-maybe-a-little-fictious claim

House is done, framing Memories

2006-11-07T19:21:00.000-08:00

Well our house is done and as I was looking back at some of the pictures I got a little teary eyed today, the house and me had alot of good memories, black fingers and bumped heads while in the rafters. I have added some photos taken from framing. The skeleton of our house, so fun.

HalloooOOOOooOOOOOoeeennn

2006-11-02T07:58:00.000-08:00

This Halloween was a treat for your senses and your fight or flight response at the Rads. This scary looking scarecrow is me, Jeremia. I sat lifelessly on the straw bales by my front door and when the kids or party guests came over I jumped up at them...mwa ha ha ha.... A lot of fright that night!!!

Also Anya and myself had an enjoyable time carving pumpkins not only did we carve a mask that I put on my head but we downloaded some stencils from a very funny webpage called homestarrunner (link on the side) The four pumpkins together are the King of Town on the left then The Cheat then Strong Sad and finally the guy with the boxing gloves is Strong Bad.
The Cheat is my personal favorite, a little yellow sidekick to Strong Bad that looks like a yellow piece of cheese and mumbles in very high octaves.

Well to all you ghouls and ghosts have a great year till next HalloooooOOOeen

Some of Our Favorite things

2006-10-20T20:03:00.000-07:00

Some of our favorite things to do in the entire world are to....well BABY SIT! It is like having your own kids but then you get to get rid of them after you have sugared them up, kept them up past their bed times and do crazy things that.....well...there mothers wouldn't let them do. Here are some of our fonder moments of baby sitting and hanging with our friends kids.

Here we have a couple of kids that would normally not be allowed to eat an entire plate of cookies, but while being baby sat by the Rads, oh yah, a big plate of double chocolate cookies, and look how happy they are!!! Not only does grandma spoil the kids, so do we....

Next on our list is the famous baby stair crawl races, you may see the potential danger is this but I have heard that little kids can heal from broken bones in half the time of adults, so no big worries. And look at the determination on little Norah's face as she is trying to pass her brother Nolan

Here we have Cole, you can see how excited he is to be over at my grandma's basement, this used to be my batchelor Pad for 7 years. Cole was asking me for future advice on how to trick out his baby room and what sleeping in a real bed would be like one day. Since he is only 1.8 years old and doesn't speak english very well I just gave him an L.E.D flashlight to play with.

Some times this happens when you are being sat by the rads. Sometimes Jeremia gets a little crazy and starts to hog tie the kids up. You can see how worried Nolan is in the back not wanting Jeremia to find him, while all the while Payton is very relieved to have Anya save him.

Finally, all the super cool kids having a wonderful meal at the little table for Coles 2nd Birthday. What a great smiles they all have.

So you can see that having friends with kids is very fun, you get all the benefits of having your own and none of the mess to worry about. Well for now that is all, and if you can, get involved with someone's kids, it is so very rewarding and you will make a huge impact in their lives an in yours.

the rads

A bad hair day!!??

2006-10-13T11:08:00.000-07:00

Each one of us wakes up in the morning and has a bad hair morning, but what happens when it continues till lunch or supper or even till you go back to bed? I would love to hear or see pictures of some of your worst hair experiences. Maybe some of you have had some pretty cool hair-do's in the past. For instance there was one time when I used to shave my head and do different things to it. And for one particular shaving I had strips of tape put to my head before the shaving and was left with a wonderful checkered head that people at school actually played a game of chess on. Well let me hear your stories and if all you have is bad memories of hair I hope Sam the ugliest Dog in the world can brighten up your day....ahhhh this thing is scary.

Rads

What my Friends are reading

2006-09-22T09:44:00.000-07:00

A little while ago I asked people to write and inform me as to what they are reading while they are on the toilet. Some responses have been, the weekly Future Shop flyer, to the plain old ads, "because I don't get the newspaper", some are reading Lord of the Rings books, but my favorite was from my friend Jan, who sits and reads the shampoo bottles. Thanks for taking time to write and if you still want to add to the survey you are more than welcome to.

Have a great day and if you have a question as to what's the best hair product, you can ask Jan.

rads

How we love the Fort!!

2006-09-20T09:33:00.000-07:00

We would love to tell the world how wonderful SABC is and through this blog we are able to do that. Today I updated some more pictures of our experience at the Fort. So many amazing things happened this year while we were the directors. To start with the staff that we had was truly amazing, and everyday it was a joy to work beside them as they taught the Love of God and showed it to the campers here at the Fort.

I love to see the pictures of campers and staff that are not posed, because they show a real sense of fun, excitement and enjoyment. The pictures added are from these moments, of caught on the camera fun. Just check out the smiles and laughs and pure crazyness. It was a "Fancampingtastic!!" summer. We sure do miss our summer, but life back home is more than exciting and full of fun, as we finish our house, coach at youth group, start dancing lessons and bike to school every day in the rain, snow, and wind.

Have a great day and try listening to CBC a little today, it just might bring a smile to your face

Don't forget to click the link to the Fort Photos

the rads

To Read or not to Read...

2006-09-14T11:52:00.000-07:00

So I was wodnering as I put the cream cheese onto my poppy seed bagel, what do people read? And not only what do they read but do they read different things while they are sitting on the toilet? I want to conduct a survey to find out what the world is reading on the lou. So please write in the comment section what you are reading, be it the newspaper, a book or an instruction manual let me know, also if you feel it, you can send a picture of what you are reading to jerandanya@yahoo.ca. Now lets keep this G rated I don't want to see any photos of you reading on the toilet, only what you are reading while on the toilet. Lets see how big we can make this servey, send a link to all your friends and get them involved as well.

Well happy trails, excellent reading, and don't put your finger through the toilet paper

Jeremia

Some much anticipated photos of the Fort

2006-09-07T20:31:00.000-07:00

Well, if you have been checking out the blog you may know that we like to add pictures. But there has been a serious shortage of summer photos from Camp. But have no fear I have put a nice handful, or two, or three handfuls up tonight, check out the link for the Fort Photos. And don't forget to check out Camps webpage as well.

Have a good night

rads

University, dun dun duhhhh

2006-09-06T10:49:00.000-07:00

Well today was a day that I found out I am mature. I was speaking with some second year students and they were comenting on how they love to see the jitters that the first year students have. After awile they asked how old I was, I said 25 and they almost apologiezed for me. It was funny, some of them right away commented that they had some other mature students that were 26, 27 and 28 in some of their classes last year. So funny, I am mature because I am in University and 25 mwa ha ha ha.

I think I am going to start a club for those that are still finishing off their degrees and are not 19 years old. Any that want to join e-mail at my reactionary fan club,

20+andlovinuniversity@jersclub.com

ta ta for now, te te for later, jeremia, the Mature student

We are moved in!! Home Edition

2006-09-05T07:55:00.000-07:00

Our lovely home has seen a lot of change, from a dirt pile as the only kid on the block to part of a neighborhood with parks, little children playing, sports cars and green green grass. If you were un-aware my family begun building a house last September and finally we have moved in to the upstairs. It has been a long haul, from -25 and pulling wires to rain out days before the roof was up. But through and through it was exciting. One of the best parts was working with my parents over the past year and just as cool was teaching Anya to become the master roofer and the foremost expert tiling. Just the other day she installed our bathroom mirror, so exciting. She still doesn't like using the air framing nailer but that’s okay, I love it. Now that we have a home we are expecting to have a good time with company so come on by to a place where the tea is always warm, the coffee is always dark and the smiles are more than free but plentiful. Well gotta run, I have a tree waiting to be planted....

Jer of the RADS

CAMP is Flying By

2006-08-20T18:41:00.000-07:00

Anya (Raven) leading some activities at Mug up

Crayola meal, we are both green crayons

Well we have had an excellent summer out at camp, it is amazing to think that three months have already passed! Can you believe it? We can't. Sorry for all the delay. A little about this summer. Over the past 7 weeks, we have had around 350 campers come to the fort. 6 of those weeks have been grades 3 to 6 and one was a Jr. High camp. A favorite memory that have is during one of our El Moy queso's (The very Cheese(Talent show)). During the section where we have the campers come up if they want to do any crazy body tricks a small boy came up and asked for a spoon. Not thinking anything of this because there is a staff member who snorts dental floss up his nose and out his mouth. This boy then bent the spoon into a number 7 and then into a letter C. He did this with such determination on his face and was convinced that it was totally crazy. It was and everyone loved it so much. Another amazing little adventure that occured weekly is our out trip where we squish 50 to 60 people onto a little hay wagon and go off roading to a beautiful beach on our lake, called Pelican Cove. Once there we spend the day relazing in the sun, playing games in the water and eating a great meal out doors...I could go on forever about how amazing our summer was but in a few days we will be able to download our pictures, so till then, thanks for tuning in and sorry for the delay. Jeremia

This is Silverfish on his Birthday during Toga meal as the kids sing him happy birthday!

Home again, Home again!

2006-06-05T07:18:00.000-07:00

Well, First off sorry for the delay in writing, as many of you know we are back home again and have been already for over a month! Its been super busy, mostly trying to finish of our house, we are still about a month away from moving in, but are super excited when that day comes!!

We moved out to camp on June First to get ready for a season directing the fort, we have lots to do to get ready so our focus now has changed for the house to the fort! We are really looking forward to the summer, and the planning and prep is already going really well!

If you have never heard of sabc, check out the web site, and it will give you a better idea of what camp is like!

So far being home has been great, we miss our travels, but for the most part are glad to be back around friends and family!

we hope all is well and promise to update more often, we will also share some pics of out almost completed home, and some new ones from out at camp!!

Thats all for now,
Anya and Jeremia

The Pisac Market = Chaos!

2006-04-24T06:09:00.000-07:00

Sundays in the village of Pisac are known for one thing and one thing only... THE MARKET! We decided that we should make our way there early in the morning to try and beat all the busses that come with hordes of tourists from Cuzco... So we woke up refreshed from our long sleep... and a little sore from the hard day of riding before... and started on our way to Pisac, we jumped on a bus and rode for about an hour. When we got to Pisac we started to explore and found out that the market was absolute chaos! It was huge, and you could forsure get lost!! We started in the section where you could find all types of food! We treated ourselves to fresh squeezed Orange Juice, and then walked about... there was chicken, fish, onions, peas

(Jeremia Loves peas and bought two huge bags, all the old Peruvian ladies were laughing at him because he was eating them raw... something they had never seen before!) mangos, grapes, avacados, every kind of spice, pineapples, apples, ginger, mushrooms, fresh herbs, and many more things I could not even put a name to if I tried! There wre also ladies selling pigments, to make your own paint! I deffinalty bought some,and am evry excited to start panting when I get home! THe market also consistied of every handi craft imaginable! So we did end up buying a few little things... well maybe not little, I think we will have to buy a new bag to bring ervything home in... oops! Anyways we had a great morning in Pisac and arrived back to Cuzco last night.

And today, sadly is our last day here, we start the long trek home tomorrow, a bitter sweet day for both of us it will be. As for today we plan to see some other ruins close to town here, and then just enjoy the last little bit of Peru... Cafe in the Plaza perhaps, stealing just one more look at the Beautiful Andes that surround the city... it wil be a good day!

Mountian Biking

2006-04-24T05:28:00.000-07:00

This weekend we were able to take a bike trip out to the Sacred Valley, it was amazing! We started the day in Cuzco, met up with our guide and got all our equipment, and then rode to the bus station, we then took a hour ride into the valley and started trip to see the ruins of Moray and the Salt mines. We rode for about two hours through the country side, on single track, up and down... it was a bit difficult due to the elevation and again the thin air, but we made it, and for both Jeremia and myslef it was a good challenge, since we are pretty much both begginers at biking!

The ruins at Moray were very interesting, again, showing the geneous of the Inkas, as we rode up to the archeological site, we began to see circular terraces going down and down, into a huge valley of sorts, our guide explained to us that this site was actually a labratory for agriculture for the Inkas. Since the Inka empire was so large the climate for each region was very different. The labratory was a test site to see which crops would grow the best at each specific elevation, the crops being maiz (corn) and Potatos ( for those of you who dont know the potato originated from Peru, the Inkas had over 4000 varieties) The circular terraces that we saw were the test stations for the crops, each level varied in temperature of about 5 degrees! With this temperature change they were able to simulate the growing conditions of all the different elevations in Peru. When they found out which crop grew the best in each elevation they would tell the people what to grow in thier specific location! WOW... We both thought this was pretty amazing!

After the ruins and Lunch we started down to the town of Maras, a small villiage where most of the people make thier living by working in the salt mines.

The salt mines were also really cool to see, mostly because they still use the same method of cultivating the salt as the Inkas did so long ago. As we rode down into another valley we began to see the thousands of salt pools. Our guide explained that there was a natural salt water spring located here, and what the Inkas figured out to do to get the salt was to construct terraces, or small pools where they would funnle the water in every two weeks, once the water was sitting in the pool, they would cut off the water supply and then wait for the sun to do its magic... evaporating the water from the pools would take about two weeks, and once the water is gone, all you have left is the salt! The mines are only in use in the dry season, running from may to october, in the wet season, the rain messes up the system so they do not use the mines from novermber to may. We were told that about two hundred people work these mines, and it is run on a co op system. The salt mainly goes to the city of Cuzco, but is also shiped to all over the country. Being curious we decided to scrape off some of the salt left over, and low and behold, it tasted just like salt... although it was very strong.. or maybe thats because we just tried too much! Collecting the salt is all done by hand, as most of the agriculture is still done here in Peru. Once the water is all gone, men, women and children all set to work scraping up all the salt into bags, and then transport them by Mule back to the town of Maras, where they then go to Cuzco to sell it.

After the salt mines, we continued on our way down to the town of Urabumba. Where our guide left us, and where we stayed the night. It was a cute little villiage, we found a small palce on the river, had dinner and pretty much went to bed really early... the biking wiped us out!

It was a wonderful day, and a great way to see the valley, We would both recomend it over just taking the bus or a tour, we saw so much more on the bikes!

WE ARE COMING HOME...soon

2006-04-21T06:50:00.000-07:00

Only 5 more days till we arive on the Tarmack back in Canada, home sweet home, where the gophers run wild dancing with the Pronghorns and cattle need to be branded and castrated in the spring. Oh home, the windy city where we will be coming to finish off our house and drinkingg water from the tap and drive cars and see our friends and family. Things that I, Jeremia, look forward to are as follows. Being able to go to a church where the service is in english, having a snow cone at Whoop-up days, driving a car (not sure how expensive gas is, in Venezuela gas is 2 cents a litre). I look forward to taking my little pseudo-nephews, cole and payton, swimming and splashing the other kids..mwa ha ha ha. And finally a major excitment will be the continuing of Dance lessons with my wonderful wife and Joe Meller.

We are very excited to be heading out to camp on the 1st of June as well and for anyone interested in camp ministry and creating some amazing relationships this summer with young students check out SABC´s webpage and see if God is calling you to a life changing summer out at camp.

A little news on what our last few days in Cusco will entail. Tomorrow we will be embarking on an exciting mountain biking trip to visit some amazing inca amphitheaters, ruins, lost cities and spend the night in a small village with a massive sunday market, we have heard that you can buy a pan flute over 5 feet tall, I don´t think Air Canada would let me bring something like that home... at least not for a small fee!

Well thats all for now, we sooo look forward to seeing you very soon

jer

Easter in Cuzco

2006-04-17T09:03:00.000-07:00

Well I hope that everyone had a great Easter. It was a strange one for us here in Cuzco, we sure miss chuch and fellowship, we see how important it is now that we have been gone for 3 months not able to find any english chuches down here! We had a nice little easter service on our own, and then set to exploring for the day. We are still recovering from our hike, its taken a few days to feel normal again!

On good friday we were able to see the big procession to the main catherdral, it sure was something, everyone had candles and it was like a huge parade... floats of Jesus and Mary, big crosses and shrines, it was quite something, as most of you know it is about 98% catholic here, but the old Qechua and inka traditions still run thick so it is a interesting mixed religion.

Jeremia has put up some new photos on Webshots, there is also a second photo page since we filled up the other one, and as Jeremia loves to do there are more mullets up on photo page 2... crazy guy.

Well thats all for now, see you all in about a week, I can´t believe it, time has just flown by!!

cheers. Anya

123 km later...

2006-04-14T11:22:00.000-07:00

We suvived nine days in the peruvian Andes and it was Amazing! I think forsure it was the highlight of our trip! We climbed four passes, the highest being 4600 meters, or around 16000 feet... the air was thin!! and what goes up must come down... and we did! Everyday we would acend and decend almost 1000 meters or more a day!

Day 1...
It all started at 4:45 am on april 5th... we were picked up in a car with our guide, cook and driver... and statred off into the mountains. The first stop was Cachora. Along the way, about an hour into the drive, we came along a huge rock slide that completly covered the road.

There were busses full of people throwing rocks everwhere to try and create enough of a flat area so that bus could pass, we watched for about twenty minutes as our car found a diffgernt route ( which was the river...) Anyways we trampled though the crowed and caught up with our car down the road, we later asked our guide if rock slides were a frequent occurance and he said that they happen all the time... we were a little nervous for the last few hours of or drive! Once we arrived in Cahora we met the mule guides, had lunch an started the trek, we thought we were wlaking 5 km, but ended up walking 20... a little language barrier with the guide, we soon found out that there would be many more suprises like this along the way! We camped near the river the first night, had a great dinner and were sleeping by 830, with no electircity it gets dark and we got sleepy early!

Day 2...
We woke up at 5am and packed up, had some Breky and hit the trail, we climbed down to the river and then started the trek up! up up up... that was the day, it was beautiful, waterfalls, the mountains everything was outstanding! From the river we climbed about 1500 m to the pass and then came down a good bit to the second nights camp. We saw some amazing terracing this day as well, it was really neat to see how the agriculture works here, and since there is no flat open space, the terraces are all over! We set up camp and just relaxed as the sun went down, we were looking out at the river and mountains in the distance, a really cool spot!

Day 3... On this day we explored the ruins of Choqecoaraw, a Inka city that has just recently been restored. It was amazing. The terraces and the buildings taht were built on top of this mountiain were unbelievable. We spent the whole day looking around the site, it was impressive!

Day 4... Today we had another hard day, we went down down down, then all the way up again, this time we were in the joungle, we say a huge terancula and some snakes, and the path today was a little scetchy... but we made it, and slept very well, we were really tired by the time camp came at 5pm, it was a good 10 hours walking today!! more beautiful sights, and so quiet, no cars, no villages, hardly any people, Gods creation is so beautiful. The ultimate artist, what we have seen in the last few days only reconfirms this! Wow, there is not words to describe it!

Day 5... more up, today we passed 4100 m, a difficult one, but rewarding at the end of the day!

Day 6... the last pass, and the highest, 4630m, 15 300 ft

It was going ok, and slow, we were almost at the top, when I relized that my sunglasses had fallen out of my pocket... Jeremia being the trooper that he is went down almost 300m to look for them, what a guy! He found them and climbed all the way back up! Something that I could not have done! The altitude did not effect us a lot, I mean we got the light head, head ache, short of breath thing, but nothing serious, we were very thankful for that! We also passed some huge glaciers and snow caped mountains today, all around 6000 m, now thats high!

Day 7... Today we followed the river, so it was not a lot of steep hiking today, for which we were very glad! We endded up in Playa, a small village that was connected with a road to Santa Teresa, this is where we wnded up spending the night, we got into the back of a big truck with about 30 other people from the villiage and rode it into town, another suprise for us... but a good one, it was a experiance thats for sure, I´ll just say that we were glad that we made it to Santa teresa safe!!

Day 8... Today we walked to a hydro station and then on to Agua Calienties, the town which is the closest to Machu Pichu. We followed the rail road tracks for most of the day, so again not to steep, although long!! We arrived in the town and were in shock with the amount of tourists and people, I wouldn´t want to be here in the busy season!! We stayed in a hostal, a shower was warmly welcomed after all the rain and mud that we had!! We also thought we would go to the hot springs, although that was a bad idea. We payed and started to walk up, and once we say them we knew... it was not worth it! since we didnt want to completly waste 20 soles we changed and went in the springs, it was horrible!! We now refer to the hot springs as the urination springs, since that was the putrid smell that permeated the air.... I shudder just thinking about it! we stayed for 10 min, all that we could handle, 1 soles a min... and not one more! Well needless to say, that was a let down!! We went to bed early and tried to get some sleep for the early morning to come!

Day 9... Machu Pichu! We woke at 3:55am to start the walk up to Machu Pichu, it was so dark and we were the only crazy ones on the trail, we wanted to beat the hoard of busses that start coming at 6am when it opens! It was a VERY hard climb to the top... 1717 stairs and 5Km that we climbed, all Inka, all uneven stone, all in the dark! It took a little over an hour, at a very fast pase set by our guide! We made it to the top and the sunrise was beautiful! There is no dought in my mind as to why people from all over the world come to see this lost city of the Inkas!

The stone work alone is enough... I can not begin to explain! We spent the morning walking and exploring, and then set off on the last peak... Wanyanupichu, the famuse mountain that you see in all the photos of Machu pichu. It was another hard climb, but once at the top, the view was well worth it! We had beautiful weather for the day and came all the way down by foot in the ealy afternoon, to catch the train back to cuzco, we arrived in cuzco at around 830pm. It was a long but wonderful day!

Over all the trek was great, we got rained on everyday, but always at night or in the early morning, The peruvian guys that were with us were great, we had yummy food, and were really able to see how thew people live in the mountians here, so different from home, so isloated. It was a really cool experiance! We are glad to be back here in Cuzco for Semana Santa... or easter as we say, we are thankful for a few days rest before we head out to the sacred valley early next week.

Ok Thats all the writing I can do for now, Its hard to explain what we saw in words, so Jer will put up some pics on webshots! See you all soon, Only 11 short days left.

lots of love, Anya and Jeremia

Comments and Other Blogs!

2006-04-14T11:18:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone, it is soooo good to hear from home, and to read comments and emails... We just wanted to say thanks! I have spent the better part of an hour reading everyones blogs, it has been so much fun! Keep it up! We´ll see ya soon!

Lake Titicaca and beyond...

2006-04-04T13:09:00.000-07:00

Hello there. It has been a little while since we have updated, we have been pretty busy here in Peru! We are really enjoying being back in the mountians and nature.

The First stop that we had in Peru was Arequepa. This city is the jumping off point to see the famous Colca Canyon, The deepest canyon in the world... so we were told! We took a 3 day trek down into the canyon, staying the first night at a tiny little home and the very bottom of the canyon, right near the river. It was so dark and quiet during the night, and so peaceful. There is no electricity in the canyon, so it was quite an experiance! We had a awesome guide, his name was yohan, so informative and really funny!! The second day was pretty tough, we walked up, up, up out of the canyon, but we were able to see Condors which was a real treat, they were pretty far away but it was really cool, they are massive birds, up to a three meter wing span!! The are like vultures, only eating dead animals, an interesting thing we learned is that, if they are really hungry and they have not found food for a long time they will prey on llamas. What they do is fly right up to the llamas on the cliff edge, as the llamas are walking, and spook them. When this happens the Llamas will usually fall of the cliff, and bingo the condor has a dead animal to eat! Over all the trip to the Colca was well worth it, the area was so breath taking, seeing the terracing and the way of life, way high up in the Andes was really something else!

From Arequepa we left to go to Puno. Puno is on the shore of lake titicaca. We were able to see the reed islands and the people that live on them, it is pretty amazing, that in todays world there are pèople who survive completly on thier own, on a floating island, litteraly living off the reeds. The Islands are made of them, thier boats are made of them, thier houses, thier hats, they even eat the reeds! Jeremia and I both tried them and they taste pretty good!! We only stayed one night in Puno, to see the islands, then we made our way to Copacabana, Bolivia. A beautiful town also situated on the shore of lake titicaca. Copacabana is a great jumping off point to get to isla del sol, or island of the sun. This island is really important to the people of the Andees since it is where the Sun was born. There are also some pretty impressive Inka ruins on the island. We were able to spend one night in copa and then one night on the island, in the best little B&B! We had quite a hike from one side of the island to the other, and I even was able to get us lost... oops, we ended way up in some farmers terraces... but all worked out ok and we were able to get back before dark! The island is situated at 4100 meters, so the air was a little thin, and hiking in that was a challenge, although it was good practice for the trek we start tomorrow!

We arrived in Cuzco last night, after a long day on the bus, we are thankful that our bus trips are coming to a end! The buses get so full, since any pax that the bus driver picks up after leaving the station are under the table, which means the money just goes into his pocket... needless to say, even if you buy your seat, it doesn´t mean you wont have the entire asle packed with men, women, babys, guinny pigs, chicks, ect.... it truly is an experiance.

We are enjoing Cuzco, we are getting ready for the trek that starts tomorrow, we plan to meet with our guide tonight to get most of the details sorted out, we are both really exctied about it! Last night rained the whole night, so we are hoping for better weather!

Well thats all for now, a little update as to what is going on in our world, we only have 21 days left...its going by sooo fast! so we'll see ya soon!

Lots of love,

Anya and Jeremia

The Mullets have returned and SABC info

2006-03-23T08:12:00.000-08:00

I have added a few wonderful haricuts to our picture webpage, check them out and e-mail the responses to jerandanya@yahoo.ca.

Incase you didn´t know Anya and I will be directing the Fort camp at Southern Alberta Bible Camp, we are really looking forward to having 350 students from grade 2 to 9 spend a week at camp! We´re excited to see what God is going to do. SABC has a new and very COOL webpage up, if you havn´t seen it yet click on the link to the right.
Later from T-Wolf and Mrs. T-Wolf....We actually are unsure what Anya´s fort name will be. (For those of you that don´t know what a fort name is, Each year the Fort staff are given an animal, plant, storm, or mineral name, that continues forever after, mine is Timber Wolf) Any suggestions for Anya???

Valpariso

2006-03-20T14:42:00.000-08:00

Well we got off the ship yesterday morning and have spent a day and a bit in Valpariso, a neat city with old cable cars everywhere, its really cool. We found a hostal last night called Villa Kunterbunt, a chilean-german family, who are very welcoming and fun, their house is really artistic, and it has a lot of character! We bought bus tickets today to La Serenas, a town about 700 km from here. Our bus leaves tonight at around 11 pm, 7 hours through the night, so it should be an interesting experiance! Our new means of travel is going to be by bus, since our money is running a little low... but we will sure have fun doing it! We plan to head up the coast into peru for the next week or so, until we get to Lake Titicaca, and then to Machu Pichu! Anyways we send our love, and hope all is well at home, Anya and Jeremia

A Week on the Water

2006-03-13T05:46:00.000-08:00

Well you all have not heard from me in a while, Jer has been doing most of the updating, but I thought I would let you know how things are going on the ship... As most of you know since I work in Alaska one of the many benifits of the job is a practically free cruise, and so when we got confirmed for this 14 day south america cruise, we were super excited, since our normal backpackers budget would never allow us to be on a cruise! But since its dirt cheap for us we thought why not!! And so we have been on for a week and are loving it! Although we did have 30 foot seas for a cuple days and Jeremia got pretty sick... he is over it now, but prefers land to water!! We have met some really amazing people and have been doing a lot of sight seeing, one of our highlights so far has been the Falkland Islands, many of you know of these Isalands because of the very famous and horrible war in 1982.

The islands were cold, windy and only low lying shrubs were to be found, but it was spectacular, the history that was there and the landscape was impressive! We did a 18 k hike the day that we were there out to gypsy cove, were we were able to see penguins and some really intersting birds. It was also my Dads birthday so we called home to wish him a happy birthday and that was really special! Calling from way down south!! After the falkland we sailed for 2 days to cape horn, where we sailed around, and got certificates stating that we had been around the horn, that was also very enjoyable!

Today we are in the southern most city in the world, Ushuaia Argentina. We plan to hit up some of the sights and then we sail tonight to see some of the Glaciers of the Patagonian Andees. Thats all for now, lots of love, from the end of the world!!

A big ship in the wind!

2006-03-08T08:24:00.000-08:00

Today we have arrived at Puerto Madryn and as we went down to get off the cruise ship we had found out that the wind was blowing very hard against the side of the ship and had ripped the anchors of the large cement dock out from it. I guess a 13 story ship grabs alot of wind, so we had to wait for a few hours to ride the life boats into shore, pretty cool, nothing like in ´Life of Pie´ though, there were no tigers or flying fish. We are doing well, the first night I, Jeremia, got very sea sick and had to skip supper. We have met alot of interesting people, seen some cool things and today if we are lucky will see some pinguins. If they hide from us we will have another chance in two days when we arrive at Port Stanley in the Fawkland Islands. Thats all for now

THE MULLETS ARE UP

2006-03-04T11:34:00.000-08:00

Yes it is true, finally the Mullets are up, click on the link to the right and cast you vote.

Click on the pictures to zoom in high resolution, remember that some may be a little fuzzy as some shots are taken from the hip so I wouldn´t get caught. :)

Now we´re talking!

2006-03-04T11:09:00.000-08:00

This image is of me, very sad that I am unable to open my swiss army knife, I have done everything I can think of to open it, and still it is not opening. Any insight, the person that gives the advice that opens is up, will win themselves a postcard from where ever we are when it opens up thanking them, so good luck.

Now this is a taste of what will be up on our webshots page soon, I wasn´t able to spend that much time on the internet adding photos and changing things so check back soon, this is a sweet taste of things to come.

Today we went and got coffee from McDonalds, but they have their own wing in the resturant called McCafe, it was pretty good, very posh and....well all the McDonalds here are 3 stories tall or more, have wonderful tiled floors and as you can see from this picture, the tea pot, cups and nice wood framing is very nice, Greg Fraser I think you need to made some renovations to your Lethbridge McDonalds.

Thats all for now, see you soon

Today would have been a picture day but....

2006-03-03T13:27:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone at home I hope everything is going well. Down here in beautiful Buenos Aires it rained today. It gets very crazy when it rains here. Not because it is so super wet but because there are so many people walking around everywhere and most have umbrellas. If you would have seen me (Jeremia) today you would have laughed, as I bobbed up, down, side to side just to keep my eyes from being taken out. This city is truly amazing and beautiful. We are going to miss it when we leave on Sunday. Speaking of which, we will be on a cruise for 2 weeks from the 5th to the 19th, we may not be able to e-mail or update our blog but be patient as we will once we arrive in Chille.

Today I was going to add pictures to the webshots and to this blog, to make it a little more snazy, but the battery on the camera died just as I plugged it into the USB of the computer, so you will have to all wait till tomorrow to see what is new and to play the highly anticipated MULLET OF THE DAY! I am gathering a large compelation of contestants, too fun.

Also my Swiss army knife is jammed solid, nothing will come out. This is an S.O.S to anyone that knows how to fix it. I believe it is a combination of ocean water and fine sand. Lets hear your quick fixes

Well time to head out it is coffe time at 7pm and supper in about 3 hours, see you soon.

Beautiful Argentina

2006-03-02T06:57:00.000-08:00

Many of you may not have read all the info about B.A. that was on here a cuple days ago, but it was lost when Jer erased everything, and so I will begin again! We have been here for four days now, and we re really enjoying it, we are seeing many of the old buildings and churches, we visited the graveyard for all th rich and famous yeasterday... this included Evitas grave, so that was a highlight forsure.

One of our favorite things here are the cafes, there are so many of them and the coffee is really good, many men sit and talk for hours, discussing the problems of the world, and of course playing chess all at the same time!

We also feel very safe here, the streets are crowded at all times, even when we finish dinner around midnight... it is busy on the streets, people here eat very late not starting until 9 or 10 at night, it is very interesting... and we are joining in on the custom of eating late, and staying up late too, it seems here everything open at noon, so you might as well sleep in!

well thats all for now... chao

MULLET of the DAY

2006-03-02T03:11:00.000-08:00

Yes you are reading things clearly I will be creating a game called MULLET of the DAY. It is amazing here, 8 out of 10, 80% of the people under 30 have a mullet. I have been taking pictures of these mullets as often as I can. As you can imagine it is difficult to take the picture of a long flowing mullet without the person noticiing. Later today I will add the pictures of yesterdays mullets to our webshots page. I will label them by numbers, ie. mullet 1, mullet 2. What your role in the interaction of the game is this, we need you to e -mail us at jerandanya@yahoo.ca and cast your vote, just write us, let us know how you are doing and say for instance

"Wow that blond woman mullet is so long and sick, I vote hers as the best mullet"

or

"wow the bald guy with the little 2 inch pony tail mullet is so crazy, I vote for it"

So I am sure you can imagine how this will be fun. Check back often, cast your votes, e-mail us and view the results of your voting. We look forward to hearing how you are all doing.

We are moving!!!

2006-03-02T03:01:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone, today is an exciting day, we are moving!!! We have been staying at a hostel called the Lime house for the past 3 nights.

Anya will update you more on this in a series we will start called Deja View, an old posting written again.

We are moving into the Milhouse, we actually saw people walking around with Milhouse shirts, no thank you. I can´t say much as we havn´t seen the place but I imagine it will be pretty amazing, as it is an old mansion fixed up into a hosel, there are some 100 rooms and little old us, the RADS, will two of its occupants for 3 nights then off onto our cruise. With the mistake I wrote about in my past entry we will begin some new and interesting ways to make you more interactive with us and enjoy our sharing time. miss you all.

UNDER CONSTRUCTION...A Crazy mistake!!!!!

2006-03-02T02:36:00.000-08:00

Here we are in Buenos Aires and things have been amazing, last night I, Jeremia, went to update a few things on the blog and when I went to push the update button I somehow pushed the erase everthing button. It is a shame because I didn´t even know I was pushing this button as everything is in Spanish. Also I didn´t even know there was such a button. Not only did it erase the pictures and text but also that we even had a blog. So over the next few days and weeks we will try to remember what we had on the blog, re-write and update you on everything that is new. We love you all.