August 1, evening

Waking up at 4:30 during the summer is hard, but it's easier when you can look forward to time spent with amazing new friends, and a destination like the arctic tundra. Today was full of travel. We spent 9 hours in the car and are currently 3.5 hours into our 17 hour train ride. This morning we all met in the Kelvin School parking lot, arriving at different times, all before 5, and from different host families. We split into our two vans, each one sure to have a mixture of Park and Kelvin students. We stopped for breakfast at Tim Hortons, a new experience for some of us Americans. What followed was an amazing car ride, full of naps, laughter, mafia, and poorly drawn pictures. (We played a van-wide game of pictionary.) The ukelele Jessica, our Global Explorer's “lady”, for lack of a better word, brought was played and songs were created and forgotten, most notably the refrain “it ain't no Pisew falls!”. Pisew falls is the spectacular water fall we visited on our journey. The day continued, and we bonded and talked in the van, playing multiple rounds of mafia. Unfortunately, one of our new Kelvin friends, Chloe, was killed in the first round every game. After lunch, more driving, and roadside identification of black and white spruce, we arrived at the train station. We waited, ate, and finally boarded the train. When we wake up, we'll be in Churchill, the destination worth waking up for.-

Nina Olshan, The Park School