66 days, A celebration of half way through "the good life"

Its been a really amazing 66 days into the program. On Friday March 16, we reached the half way mark in our program. We celebrated the day with a hike up Mount Finlayson, followed by a Lunch at Jacks up Bear Mountain. It was the perfect day, we can all agree with that. The day started off with meeting the coaches for an activation session at Goude field. Now not only do we have an amazing team, but we definitely have personality. The personality of the day awards go to Andrea Burk and Barbara Mervin who showed up in their Friday best. Andrea Burk looking like she had just parked her skies and strolled onto the field in her very dated two toned fuchsia and purple wind breaker, dressed with a head band and tights. Barbara Mervin graced us with her presence wearing a very flattering Blue with Yellow trim and print track suit, worn by the Kazakhstan team at the 2010 World Cup.
There was talk at lunch the day before of wearing tight and bright as a theme for our hike, but those two decided to get the day started early, and practice that theme for our activation session. Defiantly put some light on what started out to be a very rainy and miserable morning!
After the activation we had a video session in the board room. The video session was followed by a compilation of a lot of our success's in the past year. It was a great compilation made by Sandro. He did a very good job, we truly appreciated that, thank you.
For those of you who may not know Mike Chu, he is the High Performance Director for Rugby Canada. He joined us at the end of our video session to say a few words. You can often find Mike coming around to lunch or a session asking "how you are doing, are you enjoying everything, is there anything we can help you with?" Mike is a very genuine person and we are all very pleased to have him with us, sharing his vast knowledge and driving us forward. Your kind words sending us off to Hong Kong were greatly appreciated by all. Thanks Mike.

Meeting adjourned, and we are off! All wearing tight and bright. Well most of us! It was cold...ish.
We were coming to the end of a tough week physically and mentally. We had done testing the day before, a blow out that morning. Thinking that what they had organized for us was a nice chilled hike up Mt Finlayson, we were all pretty stoked. Then...it began. We all started as a group, chatting away, sharing stories, laughing. Not far into it we started to slowly pull apart and become silent. I know I found myself taking every chance I could to appreciate the beauty, a great excuse for a breather! I think there was alot of mental talk going on. I don't think anyone really wanted to vocalize how they were really feeling, for fear that they might come off as the weakest link. We were all, if not most,  caught our selfs thinking what's with the climb? I really don't know how we didn't see this coming, a hike, up a mountain, just seems obvious. But then again maybe obvious isn't obvious at all! You could hear people saying My calfs are burning, I wont be able to walk tomorrow, I can't decide what on my body was going to be the most sore. Aside from all those thoughts we made it up the Mountain! As tough as it was, it wasn't that bad at all. After a long week, we all welcomed each other one by one with smiles on our faces, to the top of Mount Finlayson!
Up at the top we took a quick minute to take some pictures and take in all that mother nature had to offer us. John lining us all up to take a picture, "not to close to the edge" he says. Then John has us saying macaroni and cheese. What?! Ya, "macaroni and cheese" he says louder. I forgot to mention, 1 hour earlier John had warned us of bear warnings up the Mountain, "stay close, and don't go off alone" he says. Right after he takes his first shot, he takes another, and another and wait...another. Then suddenly we find John pointing behind us telling us there is a bear! We turn around, shrieking and bolting,  to find what we had been startled by, a man in a gorilla suit. A man in a gorilla suit!? "Who is that!?" Taking off his fake mask, Morgan Williams the master of disguise. Morgan had been waiting for 45 min, at the top, dodging dogs and couples, as he hides in the bush avoiding any sort of domestic that may occur if he was to be seen. Morgan calling John about 3 or 4 times "where are you guys?" And the secret word we figure, was macaroni and cheese. What a sport! Thanks Morgan for making that experience extra special!
Here are a few pictures we captured at the top.

Canada on 3...1, 2, 3, CANADA!

It has been a really great 66 days. We have all taken on this challenge and embraced it. This hasn't been easy in the slightest, but a process we are all willing to buy into.

I'm very proud to be apart of something so special.

Here are a few pictures of us going through the process, and taking the time to have a little fun every now and again.

Thank you guys for supporting us through this journey! It has been amazing so far, and in the next 4 years building towards one goal, we will all as a collective do this together. We wouldn't be able to do it with out everyone behind us, so thank you! We are off to Hong Kong on Tuesday so wish us the best. We will be defending out title. Hard work pays off, and we know nothing less.