Vernon

It was the weather that chased us away from Vernon when we left in 1998. Not as cold as northern Manitoba, to be sure, but often the Okanagan valley was clouded over and winter days were wishy washy, no brightness, the incredible darkness of being. It was also the time of morning sickness, clambering up icy driveways with bulging tummy, labour and childbirth. After a trial year working in Cape Town (1997), we decided to move to sunnier climes, back to South Africa en route to Australia. As it turned out, we settled back in East London and gave up the idea of Australia for 9 years.

Those last 4 months in Vernon in 1998 were quite something! Jeanne-Marie, pregnant with Chloe, was unwell – sinusitis needing draining. Gabi had her 18 month immunization and had a fairly prolonged seizure the following night; was paralysed on one side for a day. Michelle flew over to give us a hand. Two weeks later, was Gabi dragging the one leg when she walked? MRI and neurologist in Vancouver booked – 2 days before departure. All normal. The flight back to Kelowna was delayed by snow; would we get there in time for her flight back to SA? We managed to get there, the family said goodbye to Mark – he was to remain behind to pack up house, and sell practice. Jeanne-Marie had to get back while still allowed to fly in her advancing pregnancy.

Fast forward 9 years. The children are now 13, 11 and 9 years old and we’re on our way back to Vernon for a month, en route to Australia. We get off the plane in Vancouver, rent a car for the month, spend a night at the Vancouver Coast Plaza, and after Mark has an interview at the College of Physicians and Surgeons of British Columbia to re-register his medical licence, we head off to Vernon. As we get closer and closer, memories of places, faces and names resurface. The first sign that things had changed was the hour long stop-start traffic hold-up to get over the bridge in Kelowna; both Kelowna and Vernon have grown tremendously. It was also the summer holidays, so there is a huge influx of people from other parts of Canada, particularly the neighbouring province, Alberta. The economy is booming – people with second houses, boats, caravans, motor homes are everywhere to be seen.

Vernon has not missed out on the boom. The huge departmental stores, previously only in Kelowna, are now in Vernon. Middleton mountain, where we stayed, previously had houses about a third of the way up the slope; now there are more than double the number of houses. There’s a large golf course and vineyards being developed on the side of the hill going towards Lake Okanagan – friends of Phil and Michelle’s from South Africa are working on it. Together with the influx, though, there are also the homeless and panhandlers. The Emergency Department of the hospital is a hive of activity, late into the night now. “Crackheads,” the one ER doc told Mark, “fill up the place at night.”

We stayed in the Murphy’s house for the first 12 days: they have a lovely house on Middleton mountain overlooking Lake Kalamalka. They were away so we had the run of the place. When they returned, we moved to another house a few blocks away – belonging to Michael Cooke, one of the paediatricians I was filling in for. We met him for a short while when we got into Vernon then he went off to get married, honeymoon and holiday for the rest of the month. He was also kind enough to lend us his car, so we had 2 vehicles for the month.

Mark started work with a bang – 7 calls in 10 days, and then only 3 in the remaining 20. Because we now get paid an on-call stipend (plus regular billings), he was quite keen to do lots of call; after all this month was to help pay for the trip over! Fortunately the jet-lag was not too bad for any of us, as we’d spent the previous week in Florida.

If the work didn’t keep us busy enough, the socialising surely did! We’d made many friends during our time in Vernon, and catching up with them after so many years was wonderful. It was very hot the first few weeks, and joining friends at the members-only Kalamalka Country Club on the lake’s edge in the evening was great.

The second weekend we took off, pointing the rental car in a southerly direction, for the 3 hour trip to Naramatta, just outside Penticton, to spend a weekend with the Paisley family in their condo on Apex Mountain. Dave organised bicycles, loaded all 11 of then on his trailer, and we all drove up the mountain. He and Sandy have 4 boys of similar ages to our 3 girls and we had a lovely day exploring the mountain on bikes.

One of the highlights of the trip was linking up again with Sayo who helped raise our older two girls while we lived in Canada. She has now been childminding for another family – 2 doctors with 4 children in Vernon. We saw a lot of her, she took the children out a few times, and joined us for a whitewater rafting expedition on Clearwater, about 3 hours north of Vernon, on one of the weekends. We wish we could take her with us to Australia!

The month passed by in a flash. The evenings were getting quite cool already by the time we left. Michael and his new wife, Joan, arrived back on the last Thursday of the month and we left soon afterwards. We spent 3 nights in Vancouver, meeting up with the Smiths for supper at the Spaghetti Factory. We cycled around Stanley Park, went to the Aquarium, poked our way around the Science Centre, went to the Imax theatre. Also had a wonderful evening catching up with Mark and Nat Rosengarten – friends from back in Thompson days!

It was wonderful to be back for the month, visiting with old friends. We do think, though, that we’ve made the right decision in moving to Australia.