Christmas Letter 2009

Bermuda’s 400th Anniversary of continuous settlement. As a result, this has been a tremendous year for our little Island. We began on 3rd January with a parade to celebrate Bermuda’s many cultures.

In March, Marisa had a class in Phoenix, AZ, so I went along for the ride. There is a lot of desert in Arizona. My favorite place was the Salt River Canyon. The first time I drove it, I did not realize there was about 20 miles of rough dirt road. A two wheel drive hatchback car is not particularly ideal for this sort of offroading, but there were very few scary moments. The views however were spectacular, so much so that I did the whole drive again three days later for Marisa. We were also able to have dinner in Scottsdale with Mandy, Bryan and their daughter, Annalise.

We also decided that this was the year we were going to improve our fitness. It was the 100th Anniversary of the Bermuda Day Half-marathon on May 24th, so we set that as our goal. Believe it or not, I actually began running! As part of our running preparation, we ran the Lindo’s to Lindo’s race (a 10K between two local supermarkets) did the Palm Sunday walk (about 5 miles of “cross country” walking and the End to End walk (from one end of Bermuda to the other, about 26 miles). We left St George’s at about 7:30 with my mother in tow and by the airport (about 2 miles away) she already had a sizeable lead (with no training whatsoever). That was the last we saw of her until the end in Dockyard, which for her included a short visit to my sister’s house. She was enthusiastically cheering when we wearily crossed the finish line about 7 hours later, having completed the course about an hour ahead. Finally it was half-marathon race day and we started at about a 12 minute mile pace. We continued this pace for about the first 8 or 9 miles, people cheering loudly the whole way. We then walk/ran the final few miles and completed with a respectable 2 hours 51 minutes.

June brought about the Tall Ships Atlantic Challenge. Hamilton Harbour was transformed as if in the 19th Century, with 20+ sail training vessels, including the Krusenstern from Russia, Cisne Branco from Brazil, Capitane Miranda from Uruguay being the largest. The Brazilians had a 5 piece band playing on board during the open day. When they all left, they sailed up the North Shore in a parade of sail.
The 400th Anniversary celebrations continued with a reenactment of the original landing on Gates Bay Beach on 28th July (400 years to the day). Two longboats were rowed ashore by actors in period costume and a Thanksgiving service was held on the beach, with local dignitaries and bands taking part. There was also a guard of honour mounted by the crew of HMS Manchester which happened to be visiting at the time. It was a bit nerve racking for me as I arranged the music for the massed bands, but it all worked out in the end. At this time Marisa was also involved with coordinating the National Dance Foundation Summer intensive with American Ballet Theatre and the Technology Leadership Forum Internship Programme, which kept her pretty busy.

In August we travelled to the Czech Republic. We flew, via Gatwick, to Vienna and then drove to a town in eastern CZ called Zlín. It was an interesting drive as it took twice the 2.5 hours I had estimated. Our GPS ran out of power and as such we stopped to buy maps. It became extra challenging as they were in German. Then we had to purchase highway toll stickers, in Slovak and Czech. I can get by in German, but Eastern European languages are very difficult to pick up. We arrived the day before the Zlín Motosport Rally and saw several of the participant cars. Oonagh & Randy Vaucrosson, who are house parents at a school in the western part of the country, came to visit on the weekend. It was great to have English speakers to help point out the way to get by. At this point “Dobry Den” “good day” (phonetic spelling) became a staple phrase. The problem was that the person whom you were addressing would then start a torrent of Czech, which led to a weak smile and generally blank look from me. We visited Spilberk Castle in Brno, which was interesting. It was used for area defense over the centuries, as a prison and as a Nazi barracks during WWII. We were also there for a rehearsal by the European Youth Orchestra. Unfortunately we could not stay for the concert. We visited Zlín Zoo. The usually elusive tiger had a CCTV camera in his den and the lemurs were allowed to roam free amongst the visitors in an electrified enclosure. We also visited the Spa town of Luhacovice, with its traditional architecture. We drove to Vienna to pick up Marisa’s mother and took some time to visit the Naturhistoriches Museum (Natural history). In Kromeriz, we visited the Archbishop’s Residence. On the weekend we visited Prague. On the way, we stopped off at the International School near Ceske Budevice to visit with Oonagh and Randy. We saw the Astronomical Clock, the Charles Bridge and visited the Prague Castle. The President still works out of an office here and they perform a “Changing of the Guard” ceremony every day at noon. Back in the eastern part of the country, we drove into the mountains and travelled on a cable car to a limestone cave. Part of the journey was on a boat on an underground river. On the weekend, we took a sentimental journey back to Durnstein and Vienna in Austria. It was interesting to visit both on our own time. We visited Schoenbrunn Palace and managed to see the view from the Gloriette. Also we attended a concert in the evening at the Musikverein, in the Golden room, the home of the Vienna Philharmonic. On Sunday we went to St Stephan’s Cathedral. The choir sang Leopold Mozart’s Missa Brevis in C. In the Kunsthistoriches museum (art history) there were many exhibitions, which included a 100kg Million Dollar gold coin. On the way home, through London, we saw Wicked and Jersey Boys in the West End and visited the Ripley’s Believe It or Not exhibition. This was particularly strange. We also visited with Roz, Alan and their daughter Elizabeth.

September and October were involved in preparing and participating in the Bermuda Tattoo. Bands such as the Scots Guards, Governor General’s Footguards and Cameron Highlanders of Ottawa and even the Banda Militar dos Açores. It was a week of hard work, but it was great to be able to mix with musicians from all over the world. Each group had a particular significance to Bermuda, the Camerons having been stationed here in 1915. I did my usual uniform changes from piper to bandsman and back each performance. Marisa also got to wear her jig uniform for the performance.

Also in October we made a quick visit to Boston for Marisa’s MBA class reunion and pre-op for surgery that she’s having there this month. We had fun visiting Babson and her colleagues an friends, including Joe, Bob, Connie, Peter and Henry. We also got to have our ‘annual’ lunch with Carrie and Peter, this time at a Cheesecake Factory in Natick.

October also brought a wonderful surprise when Marisa’s mom received a call for a kidney transplant. The surgery went well and after 6 weeks in Boston, she is back in Bermuda and doing well.

November was another busy month which included a visit by HM The Queen. The Regiment and Band provided a Guard of Honour in St. Georges for her official arrival. The following day she and Prince Phillip attended the Bermuda Cathedral and we viewed the official motorcade from Marisa’s office roof.

We now look forward to next year and see what Bermuda’s 401st will look like.