Although our wedding was canceled this year, amidst all the other chaos that has happened this year, Blake and I still wanted our wedding weekend to be special. I had taken off the partial week prior to our original wedding date (November 7) and with all of the banked vacation time I had been saving for the wedding, I figured that I might as well keep the vacation time off. Blake's schedule was a little trickier to navigate, but he was able to take the required time off of work, so we decided to do something special for our wedding week. We rented an AirBnb cabin in Gilmour for 3 nights. AirBnb seems to encourage their hosts to follow the public health protocols regarding maintaining safety and cleanliness for each of their available rentals, so we were confident and felt safe with our choices to follow through with going to a new place during this pandemic.
We were set to embark on our pre-pre-wedding honeymoon of sorts from November 4th to the 7th. I wanted to be back on our actual wedding day to spend some time with our social circle of friends. Paula was tasked with the responsibility of taking care of our home and our babycat Miss Lillian. Paula arrived on Tuesday so that we could spend a bit of time with her before we embarked on our adventure. That evening, Blake and I each prepared a meal for us to take to the cabin. I made mac-n-cheese and he made taco dip. I also made muffins. On Wednesday morning, Blake's alarms went off at 6a.m. and 7a.m. ... I didn't sleep past the 6a.m. alarm and was less than impressed by being woken up so early at the start of my vacation. I eventually dragged myself out of bed since Blake didn't seem too ready to get-up-and-go, so I decided to start the additional baking that we had decided to do. That morning I made cookies, as well as bacon for us to snack on during our trip. Afterwards, Mollie picked up Paula and I and we went to the mall to do some last minute shopping before my vacation. Once we returned home, I finished up with the last minute packing and Blake and I were ready to go. The cabin took us about an hour and 40 minutes to get to. We decided to take Blake's old work route through Havelock, so the trip took us a little longer than it needed. The drive was beautiful and the weather was perfect. If I'm being a little honest, I was a little hopeful for some snow, but warm weather is never a bad thing. Once we were about 30 minutes from our destination, the roads turned into quite the rollercoaster ride. There were crazy twists and turns and there were even moments during the drive that we couldn't see the continuation of the road in front of us due to the steep drops.
Once we arrived, we saw a small box on the table that said "Happy Honeymoon" and had a small chocolate cake inside. It was so sweet of our host to try to make this time special for us and the cake was delicious.
Once we had settled in, our host stopped by to show us how to use the wood burning fireplace and to discuss the available amenities including the outdoor shower - which we didn't use. I would like to add that we were all either wearing masks or face shields during our interactions. During our first night there, Blake and I were fire-masters. We had the flames roaring and the cabin was toasty. In fact, it was way too hot because Blake and I couldn't take off enough layers. At one point, we were playing this new scrabble-like game called Bananagrams in our underwear; which we felt weird about because the cabin had no curtains. We were both tired at around 8pm and desperately wanted to go to bed, but it was still way too hot to even consider it, so we ended up trying to choke out the fire, open all of the windows and wait for the heat to dissipate. It took a couple of hours and we finally gave up around midnight and went to bed. Unfortunately, and this was the only negative aspect about the place, the bed seemed to be 3/4 length, so it was too small for Blake and I to sleep without our feet hanging off of the end of the bed.
The next morning, the weather continued to be beautiful. It was the perfect temperature inside and outside. I even opened a window at one point that morning to welcome some of the fresh lake breeze into the cabin. Blake and I spent most of the morning inside reading. At around 1p.m. we decided to head outside and walk the mini trail that the host had on her property. She encouraged us not to venture off of the property nor explore the other trails in the area due to the fact that hunting season had just begun. The "hike" was only about 5 minutes and circled around, but it was still nice and peaceful. We really felt immersed in nature and were able to have a peaceful view of the lakefront. We circled around a couple of times before heading back to the cabin. Blake and I sat outside in the screened-in porch and enjoyed the view while drinking tea and chatting about everything. At one point, Blake used the term "Om nom sharks" and it was hilarious. A couple of hours later, I went inside to settle in for the evening (since it gets dark around 4pm now) and quickly checked my phone up in the loft. I had 2 missed calls from Mollie.
I had told Mollie to only call me in case of emergency, so I texted her back to ask if everything was okay. I didn't hear back, but I figured she would call again if she really needed me. Then, I quickly hopped off to the outhouse. The outhouse was very interesting by the way since it had large windows on 3 of the 4 walls; it was pretty nice in ways of outhouses though. While I was gone, Blake had told me that Mollie had called me again, but that he didn't get to the phone in time. Now I was starting to get worried, so I called her one last time.
She finally answered and broke the news that one of our close co-workers had tested positive for coronavirus. Well ... bananas! That was not the news that Blake nor I wanted to hear while we were away. We were angry, we were stressed, we were sad. We went through so many emotions. Obviously, we ensured that my co-worker was okay before we began thinking more about ourselves, but this time was supposed to be about us gosh darnit! We called Paula to tell her that she was now part of the chain of Covid and to encourage her to get tested. Afterwards, we called my parents. The time of transmission for me was only 2 days and we hadn't seen them during that time, but I wanted to ask my dad's opinion on what we should do in regards to staying in a strangers home and having the potential (although very small risk) of bring the Covid monster along with us. We, ultimately, decided that we would leave in the morning and cancel the remainder of the trip.
That evening, Blake and I talked a lot and I cried a bit. The highlight of our evening was watching Mulan. I've forgotten how awesome the movie Mulan is ... it's great! We also had learned from the previous night to not keep the fire burning too late in the evening, so I think 1p.m. was the last time we threw on a fresh log. We were warm enough into the evening and were able to sleep much better that night.
The next morning, I packed us up, called the Covid testing centre to book an appointment, we explained the situation to our host, and we headed home. It was bittersweet because, although we were sad to be going home, it was also the safest situation for everyone and Blake had already finished his book so he had run out of ways to keep himself entertained. He has no other hobbies and I wasn't about to watch him sit on his phone for the rest of the trip. So, like I said, it was bittersweet.
Once we returned, I got the good ole Covid swab and now we wait. We've still planned something fun for today (November 7th, the original wedding day), but it is now just the "At Home Edition". This day, week, month, or even year hasn't turn out the way I had planned, but I'm trying to remain positive because one day I will marry Blake, and it will be worth the wait!