Canadian Winter Wonderland to the Irish Countryside: A round-trip adventure

If you had of told me a year ago I’d be living in Canada with my best friend, working in HR in a hotel in Whistler, one of  the largest ski resorts in the world, I wouldn’t have believed you. Not because I’m afraid of international travel or that I’m a huge home bird but because I became so comfortable with my life, working 9-5 in an office in Dun Laoghaire, with an amazing view of the sea to walk by everyday, going out with my friends every Friday or Saturday night and spending Sunday with my family. I was quite content with this routine up until Christmas 2019, I suddenly just had enough of this same old routine, day in and day out. I loved my job, I knew I was good at it and I got along great with all of my work colleagues but I didn’t feel fulfilled or challenged anymore, I wanted something more which my company couldn’t provide me with at that time. So instead of waiting 3-6 months to see if anything would change I decided to pack up and head for snowy Canada.

As it got closer and closer to our leave date I surprisingly didn’t feel nervous, unlike my friend who was beginning to panic slightly that we may not get jobs or find accommodation because as everyone knows, with Whistler being one of the most popular ski destinations it is next to impossible to find accommodation at all let alone affordable accommodation. I thought to myself, ‘When I get to the airport then the flood gates will open as I say goodbye to my family and then I’ll feel nervous like Lucy’, but it never happened. . . ‘What is wrong with me?’, I began to wonder, why wasn’t I a sad nervous wreck like other people seem to be when they leave on their travels? I didn’t quite understand why these feelings didn’t hit me but I didn’t dwell on it too much as I knew we had a great adventure ahead of us and that we’d never regret it.

As we didn’t have jobs sorted going over we decided to do some sight seeing, first Niagra Falls, then Toronto and then Vancouver. We were due to spend two weeks in Vancouver, which I was excited for as I hadn’t had so much time off in over a year so I deserved this. Then three days in to our stay in Vancouver I got a call from a hotel in Whistler about a HR job and two days later off I went to Whistler to begin the role. . . bye bye Vancouver.

The first four months of Whistler were the best memories for me, I was meeting new people every day, I was in a new work environment, going out once a week every week, going out for dinner most evenings with new friends. . .who wouldn’t enjoy that. But after those four months I suddenly didn’t enjoy things as much, I grew tired of the party scene, choosing to stay in instead of going drinking to save money, my job became very repetitive and unexciting and I was stressing about not making enough money to have savings for when I’d eventually come back to Ireland. . . all of these things led me to make the decision to move to New York for three months. As everyone seems to say, I have a love affair with New York, I don’t know what it is about the big apple but I am just in awe overtime I’m there. Its a beautiful city, with amazing sites to see but I also strongly love the hustle and bustle of it all. Those slow wanderers around the city that stop at gawk around on every street. . .yea that’s not me, I’d like roadrunner when I’m walking around, I know where I want to go and I’m gonna get there asap! And isn’t that what American’s are like in NYC, they won’t stop for no man when they’re on their way somewhere. . . I love it and I was beyond excited to be going.

But suddenly my world came crashing down a few days later. On the 17th of March I received a call from my family in Ireland informing me that all Irish citizens were being urged to return to Ireland immediately as airlines were suspending travel due to the virus, some countries were closing their borders to non-citizens and sadly in my case one of these countries was America. After hearing this I began properly researching all about COVID-19 for the first time and it was then that I realised how serious this situation was and how I’d be safer to pack up my things and move back home to Ireland and post pone my trip to New York.

So here I am, sitting in Vancouver International Airport with four exploding luggage bags, on my way back to Ireland. While I am saddened to have to leave my friends in Whistler and cancel my trip to New York it isn’t the end of the world. America will always be there and people’s health comes first. If this virus has taught the world anything it’s that material things and trips do not matter in times like this, its your family and friends lives that are the most valuable and we should make time to appreciate them more. We’re all guilty of working so hard to earn money for this, that and the other that we leave ourselves little time to spend with our loved ones because we assume that they are ‘always going to be there’, when the sad truth is, we all have a timeline. We can all leave this earth at any given time so lets make sure that when that happens we aren’t filled with ‘what if’s’ or regrets over not picking up the phone to our grandmother once a week to see how she is, lets make the most of our time on this earth and spend as much time as we can with our families because nothing and no one lasts forever unfortunately.

So I shall end this blog with saying, while the virus has cut our travels short, mucked up our plans, cost some of us money we can’t get back, in the end it all doesn’t matter really. What matters most is the health of our families, friends and fellow humans, plans can be made again, our loved ones can’t, they are one of a kind. Be safe and look after each other!