Last Free Weekend

Today is Saturday February 6 and it is the last Saturday I will have until March. My parents were catching a shuttle this morning from their hotel in the village to head to Vancouver to catch their flight back to Charlotte, NC. It was a little sad to see them leave because I had missed them and had a lot of fun with them being here but it ultimately makes me look forward to being back home after all the games. Having said that Monday things will be in full throttle and I'm anxious to see if the Olympic games live up to all the hype. This past week, since my last blog, I worked Wednesday and Thursday and spent Friday with my parents. Wednesday and Thursday were fairly easy days, the number of help desk calls increased slightly and everyone was a bit on-edge since Kylie's supervisor Hughie was on-site managing. Thursday was the first day the work force break area was up and running with food being served during meal times and coffee and snacks provided in-between. I did not eat lunch on Thursday on-site because I met my parents but I was told by several of the guys the food was pretty good. Each worker for Cleanevent gets a meal voucher each day for lunch in the Work Force Break Tent. Yesterday I had the day off and I met my parents for breakfast in the village at a place called Ingrid's. It is near the visitor's center and I highly recommend it to anyone because of the variety on its' menu as well as its affordable prices. After having breakfast my parents and I were off to go snowmobiling. We were picked up at 11:15 and to our surprise we were the only ones scheduled at this time to go snowmobiling. Actually we had the same driver from dogsledding and he would end up being our guide. On the way to snowmobiling we noticed the excessive number of police stationed almost every half mile along Highway 99, the main road going through Whistler. I assume this is only with anticipation for the games. Also I have noticed military helicopters flying over patrolling all the backcountry and have been told many soldiers are stationed all along the areas surrounding Whistler. Once we got to snowmobiling we got a brief explanation of how the machines worked and we were off on our adventure. The machines operated very similar to a jetski or atv, but were a little bit harder to control because of their tendency to slide on the melting snow since the temperature was above freezing. Since the tour just consisted of the guide on one snowmobile, my parents on one and I on the other, we moved at what I considered a pretty fast pace. The tour was gradual just like that of dogsledding but moved much faster because we were riding machines. About twenty minutes into the run my parents were approaching a turn and because of their speed and the weight on the back their snowmobile, the snowmobile turned over with them on it! I was having a hard time believing my eyes, I figured I would flip it over before my Dad would. Immediately I parked mine and jumped off to see if they were okay and they were fine and laughing about what just happened. I helped my dad flip the snowmobile back over and we were back on our way. The tour was gorgeous, so much scenery to take in though it was foggy for much of the ride. Our guide showed us different sides of Whistler and Blackcomb Mountain as well as the creeks in the area. Also he showed us the backside of what used to be a volcano that had not erupted in some 2000 years. The view of all of it was unbelievable. After getting back from snowmobiling we all took a short nap before eating and heading into the village. Yesterday (Friday) was when the Olympic Torch was coming into Whistler. There were musical performances from local groups on two different stages along with lots of pictures being taken as the torch was brought in and through the village. I have been in Whistler for four weeks and I saw more people at one time in the village than I have seen the entire time I have been here when the torch arrived. It was really cool to see the actual torch and the runners dressed in white olympic suits bringing it in. After taking several pictures and enjoying some of the music my parents and I went to dinner, shopped around the village and headed in for the night. I caught a bus back late to camp, told them my farewells and I am now enjoying my last two days of freedom for awhile. It was sad to see them go but the time I had with them up here was a lot of fun but I was ready to rest after a week of getting up at 6am every day.