Monday was our last full day in Quebec and a feast of opportunities were offered to us, visits to museums and historic sites or the local 17 flumed water park. Needless to say most of the party wanted to go to the water park and +Mark realised that he would have to join them just to make sure we were all safe of course!
The park was great but the temperature was really high, so high that walking on the paths in barefeet was really painful, but the flumes and slides were brilliant and we all had a great time. All to soon it was time to return to the city and catch up with the intellectual part of the group.
In the evening Aidan had arranged a ceilidh and in the bishop’s chapel we danced and sang. The band consisted of one piano and two fiddles with a guest appearance by our own Jamie. We taught and danced all the usual dances and managed a two set eightsome reel before a final song and Auld Lang Syne. Then lots of hugs and the beginning of the farewells.
The following morning everyone gathered in front of the cathedral and a last group photograph before we piled into the cars and headed for the airport. The flights home were long and started with everyone being a bit quiet but by the time we arrived in Edinburgh, the sparkle had returned and the excitement of being home had begun to show.
Jamie left us at the airport, Hannah and Clare at Haymarket to catch the train up the east coast to Aberdeen while the depleted team headed via Stirling to Inverness. We arrived home and after greetings and farewells we left +Mark at the station still counting us as we drove off.
“I have returned home to Bishop’s House with an intense feeling of pride in our group of young people, they were wonderful ambassadors for this diocese and for the communities they come from. At no point on this journey did I have to raise my legendary cross voice, well only once at the waterfall. I listened to the people we were living amongst and they were all so impressed with the behaviour, manners and complete involvement of our young people in everything we did.
So to Claire who kept them all in order at Jill’s house, to Matthew, Sean and Jamie, Alexia, Alex, Mara, Hannah and Beth, thank you from Jane and myself, you made this trip s very special. I would also like to thank the congregations they come from for the help and support they gave them and the fundraising they undertook. I also thank the congregations who raised funds even though they were not sending a delegate, and fianllly the Provincial Overseas Committee that gave us both financial and spiritual support .
Finally, thank you to all the people of Quebec who opened their home and their hearts to us.”
