Tag Archives: Fun

Where I Live

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Hello World!

Canada is a very diverse country! We have mountains, rivers, forests, fields, arctic, the list could go on forever! I am very grateful to live in Canada, but I truly wouldn’t want to live in any other town in this country than the incredible Comox Valley.

The Comox Valley is located on Vancouver Island, British Columbia. My city has three main ‘towns’. The Village of Cumberland, The City of Courtenay, and the Town of Comox. There’s also smaller cities that branch off of Cumberland and Courtenay, like Fanny Bay, Union Bay, Royston, Black Creek and Merville. All of these places make up the Comox Valley! We’re about the fifth largest city on the island.

If you and your family were ever to come visit the Comox Valley (nudge, nudge, wink, wink), here are a few of my favourite places you should check out:

The track! If you’ve read some of my other posts, you’d know that I love track and field. My family has been involved in track for a very long time, so I’ve been hanging out there since I was about two or three! Our track is not exactly in the best shape. The equipment shed is super small and has a leak in the roof(once there was even a person sleeping outside on top of the shed), and the long jump board is splintered and has a pit of water underneath it, so when you jump on it water squirts out. Our bleachers are really old, and once someone tried to burn them down. Our hammer cage it rusty and bent awkwardly(hopefully from my amazing throwing that went wrong and flew into the fence). But I think all those things make the Comox Valley track, our track.

The beach at Seal Bay, from the Seal Bay Nature Park site.

Seal Bay Park is an amazing place to go for a walk. Some of the trails are open to horseback riding and biking, too. The forest spreads out to different places, so you can find trails all over the valley that are with Seal Bay Park. One of the trails leads down to a really stunning beach! Most of the trails are loops, and you can take hikes for different lengths. My Mom and I love to go running and walking there. Once we even saw an owl perching in a tree!

Miracle Beach, from the Miracle Beach site.

Camping at Miracle Beach is one of my favourite things to do in the summer. We usually go with our cousins, so it’s even more fun. Camping is always really exciting because you get to leave your house, sleep outside in a tent, roast marshmallows, and play games! Miracle Beach is especially fantastic since there’s a beautiful beach just a short walk away, where you could play in the water and sand all day. Each of the campgrounds has a fire pit and a picnic table, and there’s also a really great playground near the toilets (okay, the location isn’t ‘really great’). There’s also a small nature house, which is basically a museum for nature! I have so many wonderful memories from there, like when a squirrel took one of our Doritos and faked its own death, when we created the ultimate s’mores combo, or when my cousin and I freaked out and swam away as fast as we could from a red jellyfish. Miracle Beach is basically all fun in my mind, and I’d definitely be there all summer if I could!

Thanks for reading this post! The Comox Valley has tons more places that I love, but I had to go with these three. Do you have places similar to my list in your town? What are some of your favourite places to be?

Happy blogging!

Gabi

Throw, Throw, Throw!

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Picture from Pixabay.

 

Hi everyone!

I bet lots of you have heard, or even tried some of the events in track and field, or athletics. Every year at my school, grades four to seven go to the local track and have a whole day of track and field fun, with friendly competition against two other schools.

I’m  part of the real track club, which isn’t part of school, and my Dad is the president of the club! My Dad is one of the top javelin throwers for his age in the world, and his all time personal best is 72.72. (seventy two meters, seventy two centimeters)

He is fifty years old, and this past track season broke the Canadian record for his age group. He competes in all the throws, and I’m nagging on him to try a 100 meter or a 200 meter sprint this up coming season.

As for me, javelin isn’t my best. My best is about 17 meters. But I’m getting better! But right now I’m focusing more on another throwing skill. Hammer! This past summer I went to a junior development (JD) championship on the mainland, and I threw a huge personal best (PB) in hammer, and got a first place medal, so I was ‘provincial champion’ in hammer!

I threw 23 meters, as a standing throw, and if you read my post about Anita Wlodarczyk, at the top of the post there’s a video that has a link to youtube where you can watch her world record throw. In the video, when Anita throws, she turns. I just stood, swung it around, and let go. It looks a lot more impressive when she does it.

I’m working on my turns, and my goal for hammer is to keep pace with my older sister. She is 14 right now. She threw 31 meters in hammer this past track season. Next season she’ll be fifteen. I am twelve right now. Next track season I’ll be 13. So If she threw 31 meters when she was fourteen, then I need to throw over that mark when I’m 13.

Basically my whole family throws! My Mom used to do track, and she did sprints and javelin, you now know my sister, my Dad, and I all throw, and my grandma throws in all the events and she’s eighty!

Here are all the throwing events:

Discus, like throwing a heavy metal dinner plate, where it rolls off you fingers and flies into the air.

Shot put, like a cannonball that you push out into the air.

Javelin, like throwing sticks really far.

Plus hammer, like a shot put on the end of a wire with a handle that you swing around your head and release.

Have you tried track and field before? What’s your favourite event?

Thanks for reading!

Gabi