Amish Flashback

I've delayed this post for a long time. I'm a bit fascinated by the Amish and their culture, but I don't want to present them to you like some circus act because they are just people trying to live a good life in their own way and I respect that immensely.

We stayed at a campground in the small town of...well, near a town in the heart of Amish country in Pennsylvania. Okay fine - the town is named Intercourse. Let's get on with this.

We took a buggy ride through some farm land and our driver, an Amish teenager, told us about all things Amish. Our buggy meandered on small country roads past Amish farms - an idyllic way to spend an afternoon.


As we passed a small white building, a big gaggle of Amish children suddenly exploded from it and into the fields, going in all directions. School was out for the day! We progressed down the narrow road towards a farm near the schoolhouse, and behind us we noticed that a little girl, probably eight years old, was rapidly gaining on us on her push-bike.

Okay I have to interrupt myself. Amish people pick and choose different types of technology according to their interpretation of the bible. They deemed bicycles taboo because of the machinery involved with the gears, the chain, etcetera, and instead they get around on push-bikes that are very much like scooters.


So...our driver noticed the littler girl behind us and told us she lived at the farmhouse we were approaching. Ruthie, dressed in a dark dress of plain cut, shiny black shoes and a bonnet, was the youngest child in the family.

Kicking furiously on her push-bike, little Ruthie quickly caught up with us, realized she did not have enough room to pass the buggy on either side, and shot us a withering glare. She weaved back and forth behind the buggy until we passed her farm, and then she was past us like a shot, homeward bound up the driveway. I suspect little Ruthie was tough as nails and not one to tangle with.

The town itself was a disconcerting mixture of Amish folk, non-Amish locals, and pasty tourists. Horses and buggies mixed in with motorized traffic on the roads and highways, and the stores all had hitching posts in their parking lots.

We wandered around the community for a couple of days and I fell in love with an Amish furniture shop. I was very upset when Mark refused to allow me to buy huge pieces of Amish furniture and magically fit them into our already-full pickup truck. Stupid practicality, always trumping my fantasies with its uppity "reality checks".

Anyway we had a glorious time in Lancaster County, and if any of you are ever anywhere near Pennsylvania I would highly recommend you stop in and learn a bit about the Amish communities there.

Still Homeless

We've been criss-crossing the province looking at properties. Some have been total disasters, like the old farmhouse with fire damage, massive water damage, rats, and an outside door that was held closed with wire. Oh, and the property was just flat fields - no trees, no streams, no nice stuff at all. Except for the tiny falling-down outbuildings that wild foxes were living in. The kicker is, the listing described the place as "solid needing cosmetic repair" and called it "a must see". Trust me, no.

We did see a very nice little place yesterday that might fit the bill. The back of the property borders a beautiful river and the house, although small, suits us. The owner has done work on the house and he did it intelligently.


If we bought the place we'd put an addition on to the house, but that's alright with us. 123 acres. 3 outbuildings in good condition. Possibly one more outbuilding down near the edge of the property, but nobody - including the owner - knows whether that building is on the property in question or on the neighbouring property. I'm beginning to sense a very casual idea of boundaries and ownership around here.


The search goes on, though. We might put an offer in on that place, but we're going to see another one around the middle of this week so really anything could happen.

Ugh. This is fun but not fun at the same time. It's exhausting, actually.

We're also getting used to rural Nova Scotia life. Things move slower and total strangers expect you to have a minute just to shoot the breeze. The biggest grocery store in town has a teensy little soy milk section half filled with expired soy milk, they were out of zucchini, and the kids that live next door to my parents have never heard of falafel. Ah well. This is life in the country, I guess.

Rejected by Losers

So, remember that offer we put in on the first property we saw? The offer was low, but I consider that fair enough since the buildings have been neglected and were embarrassingly filthy, and also since the property has been on the market for five years. The owners countered by basically re-asking for their original price. Well, no, they took off a very, very minimal amount. The agent also told us they were quite firm at that price, which was tens of thousands of dollars away from both our original offer and the final amount we would be willing to spend on that particular property.

Now we know why the house has been on the market for so many years!

Alright then, moving on...

We're off to see two properties today. Now that we are no longer considering the first place we will be in the right frame of mind to carefully consider these next two candidates.

Wish us luck!

what will happen?

My life has been a bit crazy lately. We went to the wedding of a close family friend on the weekend, and my sister flew into town from Ontario to attend. Since she's here we've been traveling all over the province visiting family, and even though I'm trying to find a property, how can I NOT go visit my sick grandmother at the other end of the province if everyone else in my family is going?

So while I was out of town, Mark went to look at a property in the valley. I was very scared that we would like it exactly as much as the first property we saw and then we'd have to hem and haw and dither and make some sort of decision and second-guess ourselves, but that was not the case!

He didn't like it. He showed me the pictures and I didn't like it either.

By the way, we've got three different real estate agents working for us and I feel like I'm cheating on one of them with the other two, but I can't decide which one. We actually put in a conditional offer on the first property (yay!) subject to a second viewing (among other things), which means no commitment necessary on our part. It says we can go look at it again on the weekend, and if we decide we don't like it, we can walk. Seems like a strange offer but the agent suggested it when we asked to see it again just so that we'd be guaranteed to have the first offer on the table if anyone else decided they wanted that property. We're also going to see two places near Truro on Thursday.

SO...it won't hurt to see these places, and if we really really want one of them , we can still walk away from the first place without too much trouble.

Our lives have become a little bit consumed with house-hunting. We're getting advice from every person we speak to, and while that's nice, it's a bit overwhelming.

It was nice being on the road without a care in the world, not knowing where we'd be the next day. Back to reality, though!

Property #1

So you're not supposed to buy the first property you look at, are you? Well, we might.



We booted out of Bridgewater convoy-style with the high-speed realtor leading the way in his car and high-speed Harvey (Mark's stepdad) keeping up very nicely behind him, into the back woods of rural Nova Scotia. As we neared the property in Queens County near Kejimkujik Lake, we were pleased to see that the roads were paved the entire way. Before we arrived we had to slow down while a very large porcupine made his leisurely way across the road. I don't even think he noticed us.

We got there and the house and property looked very cute. It was kind of tragic though - it was obvious that whoever lived in the house had not put a single penny into any sort of upkeep of the place. the steps to the deck, where the main door is located, were so rotten looking that we were scared to step on them. The place was FILTHY and grimy and piles of assorted junk were found in every corner and on every level surface. the sinks and toilet bowls in the bathrooms were black with filth. Someone had broken the inside window pane in one of the bedrooms and left it that way. Jagged glass lined the window frame and cobwebs were visibly blowing in the breeze that the closed window was letting in. The demented little pack of Chihuahuas that lived in the house had left evidence of their lack of housebreaking, and the upstairs floor was simply sub-floor with a thin coat of varnish over it.

Outside, spent shotgun casings abounded starting from about 30 feet from the house and continuing down the property's dirt road into the wilderness. The gigantic garage was filled with old batteries, gas cans, electronics and general run-down junk, and last year's harvested hay crop was rotting in the fields.

BUT...

The frame of the house is solid, and the layout is logical. The unfinished basement is sturdy-looking. The three barns are in decent condition even though daylight can be seen through the shingles.



The land is beautiful and at one time the front yard had absolutely gorgeous landscaping and flower gardens. With just a little bit of work the gardens could be in wonderful shape again, and we found a perfect area behind the house to start a large vegetable plot. There is a dirt road into the woods and we walked down it for about 20 minutes before we turned around. The woods had been logged at one point but are beautiful now and as they continue to mature they will only look better and better.



Hmm... how desperately do they want to vacate the property? It's been for sale for five years, simply because nobody but loggers really buy large tracts of land in the middle of nowhere, and this forest has already been stripped of much of its hardwood, so loggers are not interested. We're thinking of making a low-ball offer and seeing whether they get offended or sell. The house just has to be cleaned to be livable, and then we can fix and change things entirely at our own pace.

We did go see a second property that day, but just as a drive-by. We got lost in the middle of nowhere and asked a local for directions. When he found out which house we were trying to find, he shook his head and told us what a shame it was about that property. We understood what he meant when we saw the place. The lovely farmhouse sat atop a hill with a nice big barn nearby. Surrounding it was a devastation of clearcut ex-forest. Here and there a lonely tree still stood, but it looked like all 87 acres of the property had been completely logged and destroyed. We have learned that the wood is actually more valuable than the land it stands on around here. Whoever bought that property made a killing in more ways than one, and now they want to cut their ties with the land they have ruined. Sigh.

We've got a list of potential properties to slog through, but I'd honestly be happy buying that first one... with a clause that they remove all their garbage!!

yay for family

We're still in Bridgewater with Mark's mom and her husband. She took us out today to have a quick look in the storage space she has kindly rented for us AND filled with furniture. She recently got married and they needed to combine their belongings so she saved a bunch of the extra stuff for us!

We rolled the door of the storage place up, and I stared in wonder at beautiful armoirs, desks, and lamps that were all antiques. The unit was full to the brim with pretty much everything we needed. After so long having nothing but cheap garbage for furniture, much of which was either found on the side of the road or worn out hand-me downs, it will be absolutely amazing to have quality furniture...remember our garbage couch, anyone? I could post a picture, but I refuse to. Even Value Village would not take it when we moved.

I also have to mention that my own parents had an entire table set up full of brand new household items they've been collecting for us. Funnily enough, out of all the impressive things on the table, the things I like the best are the oven mitts made fabric with a really neat texture, that my mom found for $0.25 each. I kind of feel weird that all these people are being so generous to us. Yay for parents!

Anyway, we are contacting a real estate agent tomorrow morning about a property we've found near Kejimkujik. BC people, read and weep:

• just about 200 acres
• new-ish, 4-bedroom, 2-bathroom house
• three barns (with power and their own well), one with 5 horse stalls
  
• pasture land as well as mixed woodland, and a pond

...how much does it all cost?

$165k.

In Victoria, this kind of money might get you a "meh" studio or one-bedroom condo.

BUT...I probably shouldn't sounds so smug until we've actually bought something.

I've bored you with all the details of my life long enough today. We heard from Heather and there is now a far-out theory that Bill is in Copenhagen. It's a very slight chance. They are slowing down the searches and his body may be found once hunting season is underway, due to the increase in people who will be in the woods at that time.

Wish us luck looking at that property. You will hear all about all the gory details until the search is successful!

...and back again

We're not murdered. Sorry for the delay in updating - we've been crazy busy and have not had the greatest internet access for a bit.

We left Heather's farm very reluctantly last Sunday. I'm sorry to say that at this point, there is still no news about Bill.


I don't know how we became such good friends with Heather in under three weeks, but it almost felt like we were leaving a family member, or even our own home, when we left. We will certainly get back to visit her and we are hopeful that she will make the trip to Nova Scotia so we can show her around. She is a new life-long friend and we're very glad and very lucky to have met her.

We stopped Sunday evening in southern Maine and had a lobster dinner, just to say we'd had lobster in Maine. It was very good, and so was the peanut-butter pie that followed:



mmm....

Then we slept in a Walmart parking lot overnight (which sort of made up for the expensive dinner) and then drove to Canada on Monday! The customs officials searched our truck and trailer at the border, but I don't think they were serious about it. They kept snickering and pretending to hit each other on the head with their night sticks and a wooden beating stick we have in the front of the truck. I was kind of glad they weren't taking it seriously. There we were; two scruffy-looking people from British Columbia, who'd been to Mexico in their vintage travel-trailer and wanted to re-enter Canada on the other side. I was sure they'd rip all our stuff apart. Guess I was wrong!

We drove through New Brunswick and saw some interesting views of the Saint John River completely flooding everything around it. Here's an exit off the highway:


The water was so close to the road for so long that I was not certain we'd be able to get through to Nova Scotia. (We did though.)


Then we got to my parents' house, chaos ensued, ONE MILLION details and pesky administrative things to do with our life for the past three months that had been ignored had to get done, and since my parents are on dial-up that left little time for blogging.

We met the neighbour kids, who seem to have adopted my parents as their grandparents. The next afternoon, both my parents were out of town when the school bus pulled up. A few minutes later the doorbell rang, and there were the neighbour kids again. Mark answered the door and said "Charlene and Noel aren't here". The kids said okay and kind of stood there. It was not a good scene. They BOTH hung around until supper time, then they went home to eat. Then the little girl CAME BACK. My parents were still not home and I was starting to feel a little edgy. What exactly were we supposed to do with these kids?? Around a quarter after eight my parents got home and the little girl was still there. I have not yet devised a stratagem to deal with this situation but I'm sure it will happen to us again. Suggestions? Also, has anyone got any ideas about what exactly these kids might want with us?

It's not a problem this week as we've gone to Bridgewater to visit with Mark's family. The resident dog hates our dogs (oh yeah, our dogs are with us!! It's awesome!!) but I think she's slowly settling down. She injured herself trying to bite Arlo the first time he came through the door.

Happy Mother's day to all you mothers out there, and I think I've suddenly run out of things to tell you. We're back in Nova Scotia and we're not leaving, and it's not Christmas time, and that's strange.

More Nothing

Still no Bill.

Heather left around dawn and I don't expect to see her until after dark today. Today the search party is doing one of those things where they all walk in a big line next to each other, covering a grid of land completely. All the police and dog teams and search and rescue and scary looking swat team guys are gone, and it's up to the local fire department from here on in to keep the search organized.

We might leave tomorrow, as today is probably the last day that as many people as possible are needed at the search all day. It's been a pretty intense place to be for a few days and we've been trying to be helpful in our own little way by at least taking care of the animals for Heather.

If we leave tomorrow we will just head north with no plan. Here's all the planning we've done for between here and Nova Scotia:

• eat lobster in Maine,
• stop at a particular duty-free store to get rum for my dad. (Hi dad!)

That's it.

The plot doesn't thicken

Yesterday Heather went out to join the search party for Bill and the police wouldn't let her. Instead they questioned her for three hours. They also came up to the farm here and tried to question me but fortunately I've only known these people for two weeks and I was useless. I asked the cop if he wanted me to take him up to Bill's old cabin in the woods. He looked at his clean shoes and asked me how far into the woods it was. When I told him it was only a ten minute walk, he declined. I love it. I actually forgot to mention that there's a dirt road he could have driven on that goes most of the way, further down the property.

Mark and I did go up to look at Bill's cabin yesterday, just because it made sense to have a peek. Once we got up there we kept on feeling obligated to look for "clues". It was a bit foolish.

I had a big post written, but Mark said not to post much more about all this stuff in case it turns into a criminal investigation. Then I'd be like, hey, check out my personal blog! I've been talking all about everything on it, like an idiot!

Unfortunately, despite all the rigmarole (and there's a lot of it), Bill has not been found yet.

When Heather arrived home after dark yesterday, we tried our best to distract her from her own thoughts. The three of us ended up in front of the computer looking at rural Nova Scotia properties for sale. Heather was absolutely overwhelmed that you can get giant pieces of land for cheap, cheap, cheap in Nova Scotia. There were about twenty that we looked at that we all said, "oh my god, look how good this one is, this is the one WE HAVE TO GET". Then we'd find a better one. Heather was blown away! She is half convinced that she needs to go live in Cape Breton and fall in love with a Canadian man.

That's really all there is to say right now. It would be amazing if Bill turned up alive, but at this point people are just hoping he turns up at all. It's sad. We still don't know when we're leaving here. I'll wait and see if there is any news today, and we'll see what Heather's plans are for the next few days. How long do search parties search? What if they don't find anything?

Lost in the Woods

Last night Heather found out that a man who used to live at this farm for many years walked into the woods for his daily walk five days ago and didn't come back out. We will not be leaving the farm today. We are holding down the fort and Heather has already gone to join the search party - Bill lives only twelve miles from here and Heather knows these woods very well.

Mark and I will take care of the animals today, and I think we will go take a peek at the cabin Bill lived in when he was a farm-hand here at Porcupine Hill, to see if anything has been disturbed.

We will delay our departure for a day or two and hope that Bill is found. This will not throw us off our schedule since we luckily don't ever have a firm traveling schedule. We had planned to go slightly south after leaving the Berkshires to see what Rhode Island looks like, but maybe we will scrap that now. Is Rhode Island really that exciting? I'm guessing no. No big loss in our books.

I am sending hopeful thoughts out to this community and to Bill of the Berkshires! I will keep the rest of you updated as best as I can.