MAIACETUS: December 31, 2014: Bonfire Ziplining Into The New Year

Ahhh, New Year's Eve...every year I imagine I will spend the evening in a long, black evening gown and high heels and sparkly jewelry with my hair up in a fancy do (even though I'm rarely naturally inclined toward any of that, ha ha!). I imagined myself wearing long white opera gloves, sipping a glass of champagne and laughing with friends after a great New Year's toast.

Not me...but kind of how I imagine I would be dressed :)
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Of course, this has rarely, if ever, been the case for me because this evening of celebration has always snuck up on me which, of course, is not hard to believe considering all the holiday celebrating prior to NYE! Usually, by the time I am thinking about planning NYE, I've missed my chance to join in any well-planned festivities, either because event tickets are sold out or the price is beyond what I would want to pay for what often feels like a bit of an overrated evening.

And this vision of a NYE celebration could not have been further from the truth this year but this was one of my most memorable NYE's in a long while (although one of my fondest NYE's did involve a long black gown and sipping champagne...and winning a trip to New Orleans :). This year my good friend had invited me to one of the many wonderful bonfires her and her partner have at their cozy cabin-in-the-woods home in Langford, just outside Victoria.

Christmas lights on the cabin-in-the-woods

So, I recruited a couple of my 'townie' girlfriends, who seemed to have the same lack of NYE planning skills I have (ha ha!), and instead of a long dress, jewelry and a fancy hairstyle (we kept to the champagne tradition though :), we pulled on wool underwear, rain boots, gloves and wool hats to head to the woods. I whipped up a spinach dip to contribute to our bonfire fare which even included venison stew which my friend made from a deer she shot, cleaned, prepared and cooked herself! A true back-in-the-woods kinda gal!

This bonfire celebration was such a fun way to bring in the new year...and I think firmed up my desire to spend more time out-of-doors in nature enjoying the wonderful places of my home on Vancouver Island, Canada. We had a wonderful evening sitting around the fire, drinking local craft beers, stuffing our bellies with great food and delicious holiday treats and keeping warm by the fire.

Oh and when we were brave enough to pull ourselves away from the warm fire we went flying through the darkness of the woods. The host, hostess and their friends had constructed a zip-line in the forest beyond the fire and we all had a fantastic time zipping between the trees through the dark forest, wind whistling in our ears and the single point of light from the torch on our heads illuminated the forest to create dancing shadows of forest branches and tree trunks stretching and twisting on the dark canvas of night beyond. Then it was back to the warmth of the fire and a hot chocolate and Baileys...until the next time :)