The Travels of WAKWIR

If there’s one thing my parents could put on the “Parenting Board of Success,” it would be traveling. Traveling is one of my parents' most treasured values, and I am very fortunate to pick that value up. I love traveling. Whether it’s just a small trip to the Twin Cities or a quick, lovely dash to the East or West Coast, I love it. Bonus points if I have to fly at all, too.

This year, I’ve racked up quite a few travel trips. I went to the Twin Cities six different times, traveled to Texas, Oregon (and Washington), and now most recently, Massachusetts. Still yet to come with big trips this year is a family ski trip to Whitefish, Montana. And I can’t forget the small trips either. (Trips to places less than 5 hours away.) I’ve taken so many trips that I’ve lost count. 

Now you might be thinking: “That’s great and all, David, but since when were you in Massachusetts? There's no time! You have school!” 

Well, I’m glad you asked. You are absolutely correct about the fact that I have no time and have school. You see, many people may not know this about me, but I’m actually quite the crafty person - when I say “I,” I mean my parents - when it comes to time. 

For ages now, I had been wanting to go see my sister in her own apartment at college. My original plan was to go over MEA Weekend. However, due to inconsistent planning and expensive plane tickets, we decided to postpone the trip to my Thanksgiving break. The timing was better, and overall, the plane tickets were better, too. The best part about it all, was that I was a.) flying by myself, and b.) flying the more fun way to Boston, which was through Canada and more importantly, Toronto.

That's right. Instead of flying the boring way to Boston (Minneapolis to Boston), I got to take the fun way. I started in Winnipeg, flew to Toronto, and then flew from Toronto to Boston. The reason why I thought it was actually better to fly through Toronto rather than MSP was because, again, I like big places. Toronto Pearson International Airport is literally a HUGE maze and playing the “Follow the Signs” game only adds to the fun. Not to mention that seeing Toronto from the airplane is also extremely super, super, super cool. My only complaint though, was that my flight got delayed a lot, which isn’t always the funnest thing when you already have a 4-hour delay. The 7 gate changes in Toronto weren’t exactly the most satisfying either.

The first day of my trip was nearly all flying, and after many hours of waiting and flying, I finally made it to Boston. My sister picked me up at the airport, and then we took the train to Worcester. From there, we drove to her apartment. The next day (Friday) was a lazy day. My sister and I bought frozen pizza and some snacks, and then parked in front of the TV and watched Star Wars, some other shows, and the World Cup. Now that I look back at that day, that's really all we did.

Saturday was much busier than Friday though. My sister gave me as much of a tour of her college as she could since it was the Thanksgiving break, and we wanted to still keep up with the World Cup. I enjoyed it nevertheless. That night, we got calzones for dinner because I had never had them before. They were AMAZING. That same night, I also got my first live rock concert experience. That night, the Trans-Siberian Orchestra (a rock orchestra-type band) was supposed to have a concert that was only 1 mile away from us. 

It was awesome. And loud. Very loud. There were these cool laser lights that were shining and pulsing to the beat of the music. And then in some songs, there was FIRE. 🔥🔥🔥 In another song, there was a floating platform that spun, and then the platform shot out fire as well! The fire was also conveniently timed to pulsate to the beat of the music, which I thought was also super cool. Once the concert was coming to an end, I was getting pretty tired and the fire was starting to get a bit repetitive. The smell of gas and smoke was also becoming more and more distasteful. Then there was the finale. That caught me off guard. It started once again with fire, but what was different this time, was that the fire was RED! Not orange like fire usually is, but RED. The laser lights were going crazy and there were so many floating lights and spinning platforms and more fire, and then there were spark showers coming from the ceiling, and then with one final chord, it was over.

To reiterate this one more time, the concert was awesome. 

It was a great end to my short trip because, by the time I got back to my sister’s apartment, I had to go to bed so I could get as much sleep as possible. Why? Since my flight back home was at 6 in the morning, I had to be at the airport by 4 am because it was an international flight. To be at the airport by 4, I had to leave by 3 or 3:15 because we had to drive to the airport. To leave by 3:15, I had to wake up at 2:30 or even as early as 2 to account for my slowness. By the time we got to my sister’s apartment after the concert, it was almost midnight, so I had to hit the hay very hastily.

In short, I did end up (accidentally) sleeping in till 3, so we had to rush so my sister and I could leave on time. We got to the airport well on time, and we said our goodbyes at the drop-off spot. From there, it was really smooth sailing. Only a couple of delays this time, and no gate changes at any of the airports, which was nice. Taking off from the airport was especially cool, as Logan Airport in Boston is literally on the ocean. Slowly rising above the ocean was the coolest thing ever. 

Toronto was a breeze, too. Since I was by myself, I got to take the short line at many checkpoints, which was pretty nice. My favorite part though was playing the “Follow the Signs” game again. In such a maze-like environment as the Toronto Airport, the signs were also helpful as much as they were fun. I made it to my gate and was gifted with yet another small delay. At this point, I was beginning to think flight delays were almost mandatory while flying. A flight is too good to be true if it contains no delays. 

Flying back was cool, too. When I was almost in Winnipeg, I was able to see Lake of the Woods and even Warroad from the airplane! I thought this was pretty cool, so I told the person next to me that I lived on the other side of the lake, and she thought that was really cool, too. I think at that moment, I was actually closer to my house than Winnipeg, as we still had 40 min left of the flight. 

Anyways, I finally landed back in Winnipeg, and my mom and her friend picked me up. I’ve got to say, it was a fun trip. I got to fly by myself, watch movies and shows and sports with my sister, I got a free college tour, AND I got to see a super cool concert. I’d say that’s a good ten out of ten. It made a good Instagram post as well.

Now trips like this are always fun, but I almost never have to pay for them, because I don’t have nearly enough money to pay for major things like plane tickets or other big costs. However, soon I’ll have to start paying for my own trips because (to no surprise) my parents are kind of sick of spending money on me for travel. Such is the same for a really cool trip I’m planning on going on in Summer 2024. 

See, out of pure interest and love for travel, I decided to join a trip with our school's travel club to Europe, specifically, Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. (Switzerland means the Alps which is on my bucket list of places to go which I think are pretty cool.) The not-cool part, however, is what I mentioned above. It kind of costs a lot of money, which my parents made clear is not coming out of their pocket. It makes sense when you actually think about it.

Now I’m going to try to say this as quickly and as smoothly as possible, without sounding…needy. To put it shortly, I’m working on raising the money for the trip. I've already started selling chocolate bars as a fundraiser. My mom likes to remind me that I need to sell 9,000 chocolate bars in order to reach my goal. That's a lot of chocolate bars. (I've sold 90 so far.) Which is why I am asking YOU, lovely reader of this lovely blog, if you would be willing to assist me in my efforts of raising money for this lovely trip. Through EF Tours, we're also encouraged to do crowdfunding, and here is a link to my fundraising page if you would like to support me. 

David's Fundraising Page on EF Tours: https://account.eftours.com/donations/Q0jrB0

Here's a link to the itinerary for my Germany, Austria, Switzerland trip: https://www.eftours.com/educational-tour/austria-germany-switzerland?query=germany%2c+austria%2c+switzerland

Even single dollar would be a massive help in my efforts. But if you decide not to, I of course understand, as I have a job as well. :)

All right with that out of the way, I hope you all have a great Saturday and a great week after that. I’ll keep you all updated on the ski trip my family and I will be going on, because so far even just the details are making it all sound super fun. (Spending Christmas time on an Amtrak train???). 

Farewell for now, 

David

AKA: WAKWIR

AKA: Wanaskan Almanac Kid Writer In Residence :)

PS. Huge thanks to my mom for giving me the idea to advertise my trip in the blog. She really is the whole brains of the operation.

PPS. If you’ve been following my music, I’ve also got some great tunes coming up. The next release is coming in January!! I've made eight cents off my music so far!

My music link: https://share.amuse.io/track/n4ti0n-fallen-allies?fbclid=PAAaZv7vn-hTcdYZYZS62GLbMULmlwwWOUV5_pYBWut8r4REPrCo7Bcc2ZSrU