Poor Halifax got hit with an almost-hurricane this past weekend. This, of course, triggered thoughts of Hurricane Juan. I have quite fond memories of that hurricane. I hadn’t been entirely convinced there was going to be a hurricane, it all seemed like alarmist talk to me. That was probably one of the reasons a bunch of us went diving and camping right before it hit. I actually slept through the storm itself, and I was on a work term and got 2 paid days off. It was all pretty sweet, except for the paramedic that died, and all the destruction in the Public Gardens and Point Pleasant.
Anyway, I braved the pop-ups on my old blog and found my pre-and post Juan entries to share. I realize that recycling old posts is just as much of a cop out as posting pictures and videos instead of original material. But I don’t care.
September 28, 2003 4:54pm
The pub crawl was fun. Except Dal has officially banned pub crawls, so it was a walking tour of downtown drinking establishments, and we all wore the same shirt by sheer coincidence. It started at Dooly's for pool, then on to the Split Crow for an hour. After that it was the Seahorse Tavern (home of Mullet Mondays), then on to Pitchman's. After Pitchman's we went to Pacifico, and they almost didn't let one of us in because it looked like her ID had been tampered with. She's 22! After Pacifico was the Palace, which I don't like so much and didn't go to. I had to get home and get some sleep because the next day I was diving!
The diving was ass. It was a complete waste of money and time. It was the worst dive ever! So many things went wrong. The plan was for the five of us to drive down to Lunenberg, do a couple of dives in the afternoon and camp that night at The Ovens. We didn't even leave Halifax to go to Lunenberg until after 2pm. Everyone we talked to said, "There's a hurricane coming, girls," and "It's supposed to downpour tonight." We were going to rent our gear in Hali, but decided to wait until we got to Lunenberg and saw what the conditions were. It wasn't raining yet, and it was overcast but not too dark, so we rented gear there. Except it's a tourist spot, so it was about $20 more than it would have been in Halifax.
We had to go set up our tents at the site first. We checked in and the lady said, "It's going to rain." Okay. Rain. Hurricane. We get it. We set up, then headed to the dive site. It was almost 6 by the time we got to the dive site. The sun sets at 7. It was a nice beach, but the swells were pretty big. The site had been recommended to us, and I didn't know it was a shallow dive (less than 30 feet). We snorkeled out for awhile, and for the first 50 meters out, we couldn't see anything. As we got further from shore, it got better.
At the bottom the visibility was about 5-10 feet. Not good, especially since one of the girls in the group likes to wander off by herself. Also, the waves were so big that you could feel them at the bottom as well. Generally you don't feel the waves that deep, but I guess with the hurricane and everything... After about 20 minutes Danielle couldn't clear her ears, and Monica was sea sick. They headed back to shore, and the remaining three of us went down again, and promptly lost sight of each other and had to surface again to get our barrings. It just wasn't a fun dive. On the way back in we had to swim against the waves to get back to the car. We gave up and followed the waves in, then just walked back up the beach with all out gear. It wasn't a fun dive, it was just a lot of work. It was almost dark when we got out, and it was dark by the time we got back to the site. We all felt miserable.
That didn't last long. As crappy as the dive was, the camping was fabulous. The weather was perfect, not a single cloud in the sky, we had the entire park to ourselves. Our site was about a minute away from a cliff that jutted out over the ocean. The waves were spectacular, we could hear the crash and roar all night. And it didn't rain a single drop.
We built a fire, had hot dogs, smores, and beer and just had a great time. We have vowed to go back in the spring and get more than one measly dive in.
The Ovens are beautiful, by the way. It's a bunch of undercuts in the rocks, and the waves crash against them and send up huge sprays. It's way better than Peggy's Cove.
October 1, 2003 8:09am
Juan, Juan. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways:
56 hours without power (and counting!)
36 hours without phones
2 days without work
40,000 trees down in Point Pleasant
3 luke-warm showers
3 days without Hotmail (and counting!)
More later.
October 3, 2003 7:50am
Juan, Juan. How do I love thee? Let me recount the ways:
104 hours without power (and counting!)
45,000 homes in the HRM still without power
4 candle-lit nights
1 fridge of spoiled food
x number of graves unearthed by falling trees
600 Military men in town on "Operation Splinter"
5 candle-lit showers
5 days without Hotmail (and counting!)
October 5, 2003 3:35pm
It's a crappy, dark rainy day here in post-Juan Halifax. We have power at my house now, we got it back on Friday afternoon. Now that we have power, our phone is bitching. So if you want to call me, just keep trying. It's works on and off.
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