Trip to the Grand Canyon State

5 wonderful days in Arizona. What a place and not quite what I had expected. I thought it would be just one flat rolling expanse of desert and cacti but actually it is an incredibly mountainous landscape with great changes in vegetation as you travel up from Phoenix, leaving the saguaro cacti behind as you climb into Juniper bushes and then into pine forests and snow. There were some very obvious societal differences from Maine. First, when waiting by baggage reclaim, I was warned by official signs of Arizonan offences I might be about to commit - stealing other's luggage - or be about to aid - being solicited by illegal vehicles outside of the terminal. Then when we passed a large school building, I realised something was wrong and then it clicked...there were no windows. Can you imagine being taught/ teaching in a place with no windows? It would be like being in prison. The rationale is that with windows, the temperature in the buildings would be too difficult/ expensive to regulate. Some might even argue that school is training for incarceration. Arizona is one of the worst states for investing in schools and education and one of the best for investing in prisons. Gun laws are also interesting in Arizona, with it recenty having been argued that teachers should be allowed to carry guns into the classroom...for protection obviously. I didn't see any guns but then again, I wander round with my eyes shut half the time. I did see a distressing poster on the wall of a service station offering an $1100 reward to anyone who could offer information about who had gunned down a young pregnant girl. There were also more trailer parks and shabby houses than here in Maine. To finish on a more joyful note, place names such as Bloody Basin and Horsethief Basin were way more exciting and reminiscent of the wild wild west.

Anyway, I experienced nothing but the best bits of Arizona, staying out in the suburbs of Phoenix with Anne's lovely family. We spent Sunday taking it easy, sitting out on the back porch in PJs soaking up some sun whilst having coffee and later making our way up the trails in the North Arizona Mountain park. I was reassured that the rattle snakes would all be hibernating...phew! You can apparently walk and cycle for miles around Phoenix on the vast network of paths along the hills and you get amazing views of the city down below.

On Monday we were up well before dawn for our big trip to the Grand Canyon. Anne, Jeanne, Nancy and I drove up to Williams where we met route 66 and, after a little cowboy shootout, caught our train to take us into the National Park. It was a beautiful ride with lots of antelope sightings and a slightly irritating tour guide (Amber Knows). Once we arrived, it was just a hop up some steps and there was the view of all views...Pete would have been proud as I proclaimed "I don't get what all the fuss is about!" Words can't describe it and my eyes couldn't take it all in. We headed off down the Bright Angel Trail a little way which was covered in snow and very beautiful. It also had the advantage of leaving behind most of the day trippers, allowing the silence of the canyon to close in with just the crunching of snow beneath our feet. Lovely! I just wish I had had longer as you can hike all the way across in about 2 days and get to see the Colorado river which remains hidden from the top. It was a fantastic day and I was sad to leave, but we had a dinner date in Flagstaff on our way back with Anne's brother Doug and his family.

Girls road trip: Jeanne (Anne's older sister), myself, Nancy (Anne's younger sister) and Anne

Tuesday saw us heading to a Northern Phoenix neighbourhood to the Deer Valley Rock Art Center. In a small area, it is believed that there are over 1500 petroglyphs (pictures carved into rocks by Native Americans) on approximately 600 boulders over a period of about 1000 years. No one knows why the pictures were made - Were they messages to other tribes? Do they tell a story? - but they are fascinating to see. You have to get your eye in as the petroglyphs are made by scratching off the top surface layer of the rocks so the colour underneath is revealed. However, the older the rocks get, the more the top layer regenerates so the designs will eventually disappear. We also go to hear and then see a wild coyote barking and yapping up in the trees...quite a sound.

Because it was Shrove Tuesday and I couldn't not have pancakes, I had fun making some English/French style pancakes for everyone which we ate with lemon and sugar. Jeanne caught the pancake flipping bug and took over the mantle so I could scoff too. 

On Wednesday we paid a visit with Anne's mum to the Desert Botanical gardens in Phoenix which were full of amazing cacti of all varieties and desert wildflowers. We also saw beautiful hummingbirds and a road runner which I'm told is quite rare. 

My final day was spent taking another road trip north to Sedona and the red rocks. Another truly spectatular set of vistas to feast the eyes on. The roads weave through these incredible rock formations which just seem to have jumped out of the ground. Sadly, some of the buildings around the rocks are just ugly despite the designers having tried to make them blend in.

It was an amazing trip made all the better by the wonderful hospitality of Anne's family. I would love to go back some day and explore some more...but for now it's back to the real world, one filled with sleet and yucky rain at the moment. Sigh.

When I grow up, I want to be...

Another week in Maine, several 'only in America' moments.

On Friday I went to watch the Greely girls varsity basketball team play their final home game of the season. Amy, an ed tech who works with me in the afternoons, has two very tall daughters who are stars of the team so I was assured it would be a good game and that it was, with Greely (and the Storey sisters) scoring plenty in the final quarter to ensure a comfortable win. Only I could manage to sit in the bleachers with the away team supporters, however, it was a fun game to watch and I learnt the finer points of yet another American sport.

Yesterday was Valentines day and so school was rather crazy. All of the children made their own Valentines day post box and bought or made cards for the whole of the class.

A pumpkin pie mailbox...

and a mailbox with a unicorn and pony (complete with a mohican) standing guard.

We spent a good half an hour delivering cards, opening them and inspecting other bounty...lots of candy and some lemon cookies made by their wonderful teacher. Of course the home made cards were the best. I particularly loved the origami boat complete with mini eggs. I'd go as far as to say it made my day - I'm easy to please!

 This week also saw me take my first trip on a yellow school bus. Very exciting! When I said this to my class, their response was "so what colour are your buses?" They looked very non-plussed when I explained we didn't have any buses. Anyway, the novelty soon wore off as I supervised the majority of my class at the back of the bus. No seatbelts meant if we weren't careful, we went flying when the brakes were pressed and we felt every bump. I've come to the conclusion that blaming our obsession with risk assessments on the Americans is unfair!

The reason for the journey was an outing to the WMTW news studios in Portland. Marnie, a mum of one of the children in my class, is a tv reporter who uses their office space and managed to wangle us a tour. It was great (although not that glamorous). First we met the morning news anchors who explained about the equipment they used and their daily routines, then the kids got to sit behind the news desk and read the morning's stories from the autocue whilst appearing on the TV screens around the studio.

Then we met the weather man who explained all about the green screen and showed us the tricks of the trade on how to know where to point. Children then had a go at presenting the weather with the true highlight being making one of the boys disappear and become a floating head because he was all decked out in green clothes.

Being a big kid, I had to have a go at the weather. I could definitely have played for longer!

Superbowl rookie

Well this week I sat through my first American football game, and what a game. The superbowl is the finale of the football season and many people throw parties to watch the game, drink and eat...perfect! It was made even more exciting as the New England Patriots were in the final. Cue every business in the area displaying "GO PATS!" and everyone getting very excited. I have to say that I stil didn't quite know what to expect but as we headed off to a party on Sunday night, Stuart did an incredible job at explaining the basics of the game...he should write his own 'football for dummies' book. So here goes my explanation to you...

Each team basically has 2 teams - an offensive team and a defensive team. There may be 11 players on the field from each team at any one point. When you have your offensive team on, your opponent has their defensive one on.

So when on the offensive, you have to make 10 yards progress in 4 downs. Play starts with a player throwing the ball back to the quarter back who is the star of the team - in our case Tom Brady. He then passes to another player who is hopefully in a space where he can move forward. The defensive team are trying to stop him making progress. As soon as the offensive player touches the ball to the ground this is a down. If he has made 10 yards progress, the whole process starts again with another 4 downs given to make another 10 yards. Either way, maximum play time is about 20 seconds so it is quite slow going. The defensive team can turn over the ball and intercept, then play moves to them and their offensive take to the field and our defensive. 

There are 4 quarters, each 15 minutes. The first two quarters took nearly an hour and a half to play...hence the crazy number of advert breaks that occur every time there is an injury, team switch etc. The ads, however, are a major part of the superbowl as companies pay millions for a slot and so there aren't just reviews of the game afterwards but reviews of the ads too.

The adverts are as captivating as the game...this was at a particularly nail biting point

Then there is the half time show...this year Madonna took to the stage being carried in by vast amounts of men dressed as gladiators. It was very subtle! Highlight of the show was the tight rope dancer though...incredible! 

The key to the whole superbowl experience is the food and drink and I was certainly lucky on both fronts. We went to one of Sarah and Stuart's choral arts friend's house and enjoyed some home brew (very nice) and some impressive fare...gravalax, home made nachos and guacamole, homemade tapenade and then some delicious ginger bars, ginger ice cream and whoopie pies for desert. I was stuffed!

Sampling the fare with our host...yummy sour dough bread.

Anyway, I think I made a good superbowl rookie. By the end of the game I was able to identify the Gronk and understood the importance of Tom Brady. I was even beginning to make noises in all the right places...including a groan when it was all over. Sadly the Pats were beaten by the NY Giants.

Other than the superbowl, I had another great weekend roaming the beach at Pine Point again on Saturday as it was such a gorgeous day and walking the boulevard on Sunday morning stopping for endless cups of coffee in a diner afterwards. Can't grumble!

No Troels under the New Hampshire bridge

Two weeks ago, I congratulated nyself on having avoided American germs and staying healthy...now I'm truly stuffed up and sounding like I've been smoking 40 a day for the last 10 years. At least sounding awful means people give me sympathy!

Last weekend I decided to pop down to Portsmouth, New Hampshire which is a little town just over the bridge which marks the border between NH and Maine. It was a gorgeous sunny day, perfect for a stroll. I walked down by the water along a heritage trail which described how Portsmouth was first settled in 1623. That's a lot of history for this part of the world! Being a port, it played a role in the slave trade, although slavery was outlawed here in the 1800s, and has since been a key naval town.  

Then it was out for an evening with Emily at the Great lost bear, a quirky place that specialises in ridiculously HUMUNGOUS portions of food (I had left overs for 2 days...although there wasn't any icecream left) and a vast selection of Maine beers. Shipyard's applehead was very nice. And I didn't get asked for ID. Looking forward to a night in with Troels and Sarah Lund, I popped into the supermarket on the way home on Friday evening and attempted to pick up some beers but was told foreign ID "is no longer accepted...do you have your passport or visa?" Surprisingly, I didn't. Thank goodness for being able to raid Sarah's fridge!

Sadly though I have come to the end of 'the killing'. It kept me well and truly hooked, although creeped me out on several occasions. The image of the killer, when finally revealed, in his waterproof poncho and wellies was really spooky and not the best thing to watch just before bed. I always believed in Troels though...

On a final note, today is the exact half way mark of the exchange. 6 months since leaving Heathrow for the first time and 6 months until I return. Time to get my a into g and get going with more adventures, paying attention to the glorious New Hampshire motto:

Welcoming in the year of the dragon

Well I haven't had the most eventful of weeks but it has been good all the same, with lots of time to do domesticated things like make soup and toad in the hole for Sarah and Stuart so they could experience some British cuisine!

It's been an interesting couple of weeks at school. Children did some great work last week to celebrate Martin Luther King Day and thought about their own dreams for a better world, then yesterday marked the start of Chinese New Year so we had celebrations in class. One of the parents of a boy in my class was born in Vietnam and so he came to tell us about his childhood memories of New Year celebrations. It was great. As usual I was like a big kid and had more questions than them. He brought all of the kids some 'lucky money' in a red envelope as is tradition but told us that he had spoken to his parents and they had said "How much are you putting in each?" When he replied "a dollar bill", they told him that odd numbers were bad luck and he had to put in 2...All of the kids went home richer yesterday after wishing him a long and happy life! We also did crafts, ate lots of snacks with chopsticks and of course had fortune cookies. Mine disappointingly told me "an apple a day, keeps the doctor away".

To make up for my lack of news, thought you might be interested to find out what the crime rate is like round here. Each week, the local paper has a section called "Police beat" where you can catch up on all the goings on. Here are some highlights:

In Cumberland
Reveille gone wrong
1/15 at 6:53am A person walking on Drowne Road reported hearing a blaring vehicle horn that wouldn't stop. It turned out that the horn came from a school bus at the nearby bus garage. The horn malfunctioned due to the cold.

In Freeport
Romantic late night shopping spree?
1/14 at 2:17am An employee of L.L.Bean contacted police to request assistance removing  two people from the Main street store. The employee reported seeing a man and a woman go into the men's bathroom together. When the employee followed them in, they were reportedly caught in "a romantic interlude." Police found the two people on the Bean's campus and called a taxi for them to return to Brunswick.

In Yarmouth
Spell chec
1/9 at 1:40pm Police were notified of a four-letter word painted in orange on a storage facility near the Royal River Park on East Street. The four-letter word was reportedly spelled with only three letters, the letter k was missing.

Worrying stuff!

Life in the Arctic

Well this week the cold well and truly arrived. I made a galette des rois on Wednesday night for our French lesson on Thursday so of course we woke up to our first snow day of the year. The phone call came at 5:30am saying school was cancelled. I peeked out of my window and even through the gloom could see there was no snow. Could it be right? By 7:30 it was blizzarding and continued all day so we stayed snuggled up and warm (actually being trapped drove me crazy) until it stopped and we went out and shovelled snow in the dark. 10 minutes vigorous shovelling of the drive way and I was done with snow!

By Friday morning, the plows had been out and school was back on. The cold, however, was here to stay, freezing the snow so it now looks like glass. In the dark it takes on a mystic quality and looks like everywhere is flooded, the trees bring reflected in the surface. Beautiful!

But did I mention the cold? Yesterday I went for a brisk walk around Back Bay and it was biting. Then today, Theresa and I went to Boston. 10 minutes outside and I could barely move my jaw it had gone so stiff. Without taking into account the wind chill it was about 10 degrees farenheit (-12C). Good job there was plenty to do inside!

We went first to the Museum of Fine Art where we saw "Degas and the nude". It was an amazing exhibition of his work featuring sketches with charcoal, prints with ink, pastels and some amazing sculptures. All of his work had a tactile quality - you just wanted to follow his lines. We decided we could have happily taken several pieces home, but the one we most wanted was this...


The museum was huge but we before we reached art overload we visited the collection of American contemporary art with some Calder mobiles and Jackson Pollocks hidden amongst other treasures.

Having feasted our eyes, it was on to our bellies. We headed to the North end to 'The daily catch', a tiny little restaurant (seats about 20 people) which is rather rough and ready, however, is known for its amazing sea food. The chef cooked our meals in a tiny kitchen in the corner. We were able to thank him personally from our seats. I had a lovely tuna steak with some spaghetti on the side.

Yum

Yum

Yum 

Yum 

Yum!  

Afterwards, it was a hop, skip and a jump across the road to the famous 'Mike's pastry' for Cannoli - ridiculously unhealthy pastry filled with flavoured cream of your choice but incredibly delicious.

Devouring these (sorry Grandma Nora, we were common and ate on the street), we shivered our way back towards the car. Or at least that's what we thought...we hadn't paid very much attention to exactly where we had parked, just being grateful for finding a spot close to the markets. Theresa had at least spotted a Starbucks on the corner but... Starbucks are on every corner! Cue a man with an iphone and a starbucks app. Wonderful! Nearing hypothermia and frostbite (despite thermals and layers) we made it back to the car via a warm cup of tea.

The cold is set to continue (-21C tonight!!!!!). My fault for wanting the real Maine winter to arrive. I am excited though as I have just managed to borrow a pair of ice skates from someone at work. In Yarmouth and apparently in Cumberland too, there are places flooded on purpose to create places where people can turn up and skate for free, not to mention the ponds and lakes scattered all about. Layers of padding (and health insurance card) at the ready.

New Year Zen

After a great christmas at home seeing so many friends, I needed to come back to Maine for a rest!

Christmas eve traditions were kept...

As were Christmas day ones...

Hiccup cures were needed...

as were dictionaries for adjudicating a fierce game of scrabble.

Kath knows about playing with mum!

Christmas dinner exceeded expectations and was complete with crackers, naff jokes and silly hats.

A trip back to the UK would not have been complete without getting well and truly soaked on a walk. High force still managed to look beautiful even in the gloom.

 



It was great to get to see the house in BC and go and explore the places I've heard so much about, including visiting the tip to see what bargains could be had. A pair of balti dishes as it happened and I still wonder about that chair...

Anyway, there was no time to rest. It was back to Northampton where I had a wonderful surprise. A tea party with people from Bliss. It was great to see so many people and catch up on all the news.

I loved my time at home and am glad I made the choice. Family, friends, muesli, a good old BBC period drama...but I was also happy to come back to Maine and I have fallen in love with the place all over again. Friends here welcomed me back with open arms and the weather is still holding back its worst. So much so that I went for a long walk along the beach from Pine Point to Old Orchard and back on Saturday. It was beautuful and I even paddled in the Atlantic...well, in wellies. I love the beach in winter and seeing the ghost towns that have been deserted by sun seakers. The only downside was there being no ice cream shops open.

It was great therapy!

To top off a great couple of weeks, last night I went to a pasta making class with Theresa and her daughter Lena. It was fab! We made our own dough, then were shown how we could incorporate chilli flakes, pepper, basil etc into the dough as we rolled it out or make spinach dough. Our teacher made some very yummy sauces and so once we were ready with our strings of pasta, we could throw them into some boiling water to cook, drain, top and devour. It was so good and lots of fun. I can't wait to try out some new ideas when I get home. Delish!