ROBINET: On the road again … finally!
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Weeks ago, after I got the date for my second COVID jab, I decided to book a date for a much-needed little hotel getaway.
My plan was to spend a night in London and then head to St. Jacob’s the next day so I’d be well-positioned to visit the Saturday farmer’s market.
I set a date for a few weeks past the shot and made sure both reservations were fully cancellable since at that time, I don’t think we’d even made it into Step 1 yet.
That turned out to be a good thing since I ended up modifying those plans to accommodate my great-nephew’s first ever night of soccer.
The day after he donned his little Timbits shirt, Kamron, Nana and I headed for St. Jacobs, where they would spend their first night in a hotel since COVID began.
The last time we had gone anywhere together had been our trip to Myrtle Beach in February 2020, just before everyone’s lives were upended by the virus.
At that time, Kamron was a newly-minted three-year-old who could be unceremoniously dumped into a stroller whenever we were wandering around anywhere.
Fast forward to July 2021 and he’s now a (very!) talkative and active four-and-a-half-year-old who has also become quite the backseat driver, which makes for a pleasant drive (not really) if you happen to exceed the speed limit in any way or if he thinks you might not have noticed the upcoming STOP sign or red light.
Those little joys aside, we’ve also had to say goodbye to the stroller since, not only is he too big for it now, but it does seem somewhat undignified for a boy of his age to be sitting in one and let’s face it, he has to learn how to ‘stay with the group,’ which was a constant admonition whilst we were away.
Like most children, Kamron is rarely interested in doing or looking at what the grownups are doing or looking at, which meant that trying to enjoy some shopping devolved into extreme tests of everyone’s patience, and at one point, the boy being plunked into a shopping cart.
As it happened, the first night of my reservation perfectly coincided with the first night of Ontario landing in Step 3, which, most significantly for our little group meant that hotel pools were finally opened.
That said, you had to reserve a 45-minute slot, and only a maximum of 10 people were allowed in the pool at a time.
We lucked out both nights and managed to get a slot, only to discover that Kamron had to pretty much relearn everything he had been able to do in the pool previously, including jumping in from the side, once a favourite activity.
This time around, he was scared and couldn’t be convinced he’d done it before.
Eventually though he was forced to, as his love of competition outweighed his fear of the jump.
“Want to have a race Auntie?”
Since I am smarter than a four-year-old, I agreed to race, only if he would jump in.
Naturally, after the first jump, he was back to his old tricks and spent a lot of his remaining time doing just that.
While it was nice to finally be away and enjoy this taste of normalcy, we were always well aware that the pandemic is still here and is not to be trifled with.
And, even though Nana and I are fully vaccinated, Kamron and all the other children under 12 are not.
We wore our masks everywhere indoors, including the hotel lobbies, hallways and elevators and while the breakfast room was open for people to eat there, we took our food up to the room. There were other people with young children eating in the breakfast room, and this is just one example of where we all have to determine what our comfort levels are.
On our final day, we discovered a new playground made out of natural materials in London’s Kiwanis Park and Kamron had lots of fun after his initial reservations about this play area which did not look at all like what he’s used to.
Of course, outdoors we weren’t wearing masks, nor was Kamron, or any of the other kids he was running around with.
Sometimes you just have to accept that, ‘it is what it is,’ and hope for the best.
After a long walk on the park’s trail, we headed back to Chatham and in short order, Kamron was fast asleep in the back seat, no longer concerned about anybody’s driving habits and with a fistful of new-to-him Thomas cars which he found at a thrift shop.
All in all, a good time was had by all, despite the rain and the occasional cramp to our style, and we look forward to our next adventure.
Stay well my friends and enjoy your own adventures, whatever form they take!
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