News from Dublin! I recieved word from the Ottawa CDA office about my fellow participants running the Dublin marathon on Oct. 30th. Here are some of the highlights;

Team Diabetes Canada was well-represented at this year's Dublin Marathon by 82 participants of whom more than a quarter were TD Alumni. The race kicked off with some sunshine and strong winds, but thankfully none of the rain that Dublin is famous for. Over 40 friends and family members were on hand to lend their support.

For the third year in a row, the Dublin Marathon had over 10,000 participants and Team Diabetes was again one of the largest foreign contingents at this year's race. Tammy Hackett of Halifax, NS finished first amongst the Team Diabetes women and was 16th overall in her category. Team Diabetes' own 'Marathon Man' Greg Andreas of Cranbook, BC completed his 100th Marathon in under 4 hours; Team Trainer Lise Edwards of Sudbury, ON also illustrated her staying power by logging over 26.2 miles to ensure that each Team Diabetes participant was well-supported and encouraged on the course.

The trip to Ireland and the successful completion of the race are a fitting end to the months of dedicated fundraising and training by these participants. In total, the Dublin team has raised more than $450,000 for diabetes research, education, service and advocacy. In addition, they have demonstrated a commitment to changing their lifestyles and themselves for the better while raising awareness about diabetes prevention and management.

Well Done Team!

It feels like in the last month or two I've been talking to a lot of new people about my experience with the Team Diabetes program. So I thought it might be nice to give a little re-cap for the newbies on the blog and give some thoughts for the future.

Re-cap. In June 2005 my roommate came home and told me about this program that she heard about from a friend. Her mum has diabetes and she had just finished the Ottawa half-marathon. This is right up her alley, well maybe except for the fundraising. It was Team Diabetes.

The Canadian Diabetes Association has set up a program that "allows participants to take an expense-paid trip to a fabulous destination and raise money for a worthy cause." I mulled over the decision to join or not to join (that is the question?) for about a month. I had been one of those kids that was the number one fundraiser - door-to-door selling $500 of saran wrap or oranges etc. So the project felt like a challenge and I felt up to it. I met with a Team Diabetes representative a month later and committed to raising $6000 for the Canadian Diabetes Association, setting my eyes on a 10 km run in Reykjavik Iceland in August 2006!

Through ups and downs I raised the coin to qualify to be a part of the Iceland adventure. Over the year I held three events and sent out numerous letters and emails soliciting donations. I definitely learnt a lot throughout the process. Although there are the work related skills including letter-writing, media contacts, business networking and so on, I felt that the number one thing I learnt was the ability to talk to strangers. I have the double trouble in that I'm shy and I have a quiet voice. I don't even like to call for takeout, I'd rather someone else do that. So the fact that I learnt to talk to random people and business owners and comfortably ask for something is a big step!

So with my new skills in tow, I joined approximately 200 other athletes from various parts of Canada to participate in a 10 km run in Reykjavik Iceland. In total Team Diabetes participants in Reykjavik this year raised over one million dollars for research and advocacy! I found the whole experience very moving; many people I talked to told me about how diabetes had affected their lives or the lives of loved ones, I watched participants run/walk their first marathon - many starting at the charity start so as to make the 8 hour time cut-off and finally felt inspired by the many Icelandic locals cheering us on and yelling "go Canada!" from the sidelines. Almost makes you want to do this again...

Future. So with this accomplishment under my belt I have decided to continue to support the Canadian Diabetes Association by remaining apart of the Team Diabetes program. With the inspiration from some of the Team diabetes participants, I've challenged myself to participate in the FULL marathon event in Rome, Italy in 2008!
Furthermore, I hope that my experience will inspire others to get involved in their community or to do something new and challenging or travel to fabulous places.

Back to the training…most likely. After a nice long break from anything that involved exercise I think that it’s time to jump back into the running shoes. Since the race back in August I also put my diet on hold. Eating while travelling, Rosh Hashanah, and Thanksgiving? Oh and a few bags of my absolute favourite ruffles BBQ chips. Luckily I’ve stayed at the same weight all this time. I find this comforting that when I do finishing counting all the points that I won’t gain all the weight back like many do, well as long as I make healthy choices.

Just to keep me honest – this is my progress so far is;


Jun 07th 2006 - 185 lbs
Aug 16th 2006 - 170 lbs
Oct 16th 2006 - 168 lbs


I don’t exactly have a number goal in mind when it goes to this diet, which is probably a good thing. Basically I just would like to fit into my clothes comfortably again. From what I remember this will most likely happen in another 10 lbs? But I don’t really have the foggiest idea.
So I will dust off my sneakers and see what 2 months with no training will do to my running endurance. Hah. Back at square one? I’ll let you know. Oh dear.

Vote for me! Today I entered the Gap Adventures photo contest. Gap Adventures is a travel company specializing small group adventures. I became interested in this company while researching tour operators in Africa for a hopefully future Kilimanjaro climb. Although it's rather doubtful that i'll be the big winner, go and show your support and check out some amazing photos from around the globe. Just enter my name "Taylor Shantz" and you'll find my pics. Cheers!

http://www.gapadventures.com/contests/photo_contest

Donation in the Mail! A big thanks goes out to B. Badalato on breaking the donation drought! Way to go! Your support is greatly appreciated.

Gobble gobble. What a great Thanksgiving weekend! On Sunday Charles and I hosted a traditional Canadian Thanksgiving meal (turkey, potatoes, cranberries, pumpkin pie, etc.) for his family. I was very excited last Wednesday when we got the turkey. My first turkey – at least I thought it was exciting. I thought it was funny that if I told anyone about my excitement for my first turkey the response was varied between genders;

Male response – so?
Female response – oh that is exciting, I remember my first turkey! Take pictures!

Okay and I keep talking about MY first turkey but in reality I completely refused to touch the turkey. I’m a vegetarian. And so really it was mostly Charles’ first turkey. The turkey came out perfect, or so I’m told. No crazy first-time horror story about leaving the plastic bag in the turkey and baking it or anything. Although I’m not a huge fan of “tofurkey,” I still had a great dinner with all the veggies. Way too many leftovers.

On Monday Charles’ parents had the opportunity to host Thanksgiving Dinner Part II – Slovak style. Ummm-handmade perogies with potatoes and sheep cheese, dumplings (veg and meat variety), goose, beef soup with matzo balls, berries, meat, meat and more meat.

Both nights we stuffed ourselves silly. I’ll have to wait until the leftovers run out before I start counting Weight Watchers points again. I love Thanksgiving!

Surfing the Net. On occasion I like to read travel journals and I came across a great one by Matt Harding. He has traveled to many of the places that I wish to go and has some great stories and pictures. I highly recommend that you check out his 'dancing' video. Yes you read that correctly - dancing video. A travel buddy gave Matt the idea of dancing everywhere he went and recording it on his camera. It's well put together.

Check it out. http://www.wherethehellismatt.com/

I sent off a box of printer cartridges today to Funding Factory. About 25 cartridges in all. My dad's company has sent in another box as well. All together we expect over a hundred dollars in total when these boxes are counted. All from empty printer cartridges!

Would your company be interested in supporting my Team Diabetes campaign? The funding factory program features free collection boxes and shipping, online accounting, and a business component that enables companies and individuals to collect cartridges and cell phones in support of our efforts.

Benefits to your company:
- Environmentally friendly disposal of printer cartridges and cell phones
- Community recognition for recycling efforts
- Continual support to Team Diabetes without extra cash donations
- Enables employees to dispose of cartridges and cell phones from personal use

Please visit www.FundingFactory.com for more information about supporting my Team Diabetes campaign through FundingFactory’s Business Support program. If you choose to register, please identify ID number 50948 as the beneficiary organization. That’s us!
If you have any questions about this program, please contact Taylor Shantz at tshantz@hotmail.com.

Pictures on the Net. You can check out all of the Iceland Pictures on my dad's website at

http://mikeshantz.com/Iceland.htm

My dad was a great spectator and took loads of pictures on race day and we took lots of pictures sightseeing along the southern coast.

Words of Encouragement. Last week my dad sent out an email to friends and family and a bunch of his work contacts about our trip to Iceland and the Team Diabetes cause. Here are some of the responses;

Sounds like you are pretty proud of her. From what I know of her, you deserve to be. She seems like a great girl.

Let me know where to send a cheque

So glad to hear you and your daughter are so supportive of the cause. It's a condition close to our family as well (hubby) and there are very few people I know that do not have a close family member or friend not affected by diabetes.

The Road to Rome?!? What? Okay so I just just posted that I was going to Rio 2008 - but things change. I was trying to register in a destination that farthest away possible from now. I think I deserve a break from fundraising for a while (it's like a part-time job!). But National is not sure whether or not they will be traveling to Rio in 2008 and will figure this out after recruitment for 2007. So Rome 2008 was the farthest into the future they would allow me to register for. So I guess I'm going to Rome!! Not a bad second choice I'd say. But just beware that I get some wiggle room if they do decide to go to Rio in 2008 (or somewhere else entirely) I can switch. Excellent.

Another catch. The Rome race has two categories; Full marathon and 4K. Ouch. So inspired by Waleah and Mike's triumphant 42.2km race in Reykjavik I've decided to attempt the full. Oh dear. Thank goodness there's an eight hour time limit and not less. I might just use all of it....

From Reykjavik to Rio de Janeiro. This past August I joined many other athletes from various parts of Canada to participate in a 10km run in Reykjavik Iceland for a reason much more important than the personal challenge completing this event represents. As members of the Canadian Diabetes Association’s Team Diabetes Canada, we participated to assist the Association in their efforts to help people with diabetes make a change for the better by raising a minimum of $6000. In total Team Diabetes participants in Reykjavik this year raised over one million dollars for research and advocacy!

With this accomplishment under my belt I have decided to continue to support the Canadian Diabetes Association by remaining apart of the Team Diabetes program. I hope to participate in the half marathon event in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 2008.

Back in Canada.

On Wednesday I woke up in Dublin at 4:30am and began my journey home. Eighteen hours later I was back at home in Ottawa. Very exhausted. The next day Charles, Tanya and I made the 6 hour drive up to Sudbury to visit my parents. I’ll be happy to relax here for about a week before school starts!

I had a fantastic trip and wish that I could have extended it more! I met a lot of people who had been traveling and working in Europe for months and I felt a pang of jealousy. I’m very happy what I accomplished in the two short weeks that I had in Europe. I think the highlights of the entire experience were;

- Supportive spectators during the 10km race; especially the guy with the accordion!
- The Glacier Lagoon (Jökulsárlón) in Iceland
- Hiking to the summit of Slieve Donard (2786 ft) in Northern Ireland

Hiking in the Mourne Mountains.

What have I signed up for? The group I was with for the day hike to glendalough was your average tourist group. A couple Americans, a bunch of swedens, some brits and me, the Canadian. Everyone was going at a normal pace. Very relaxed, enjoying the scenery and such. The Mourne mountain clan consisted of mainly locals from in and around Dublin and 5 people from France living and working in Dublin. These people signed up not for the travelling and scenery – but for the hiking. Wow - were these people hardcore. If there is hiking equipment, these people had it. Although I was questioning the logic of carrying metal hiking poles to the highest summit in Northern Ireland in a rainstorm – but maybe that’s just me. Luckily one woman was just as slow as I was and we kept pace pretty well until it came to the summiting a mountain part. I was a little slower at this part. Although I wasn’t feeling at all pressured to kept up with the insanely fit pack, I was minorly annoyed that anytime I caught up it was time to go again – that’s nice they got a break…..

The mountains were breathtaking and I enjoying the scenery very much. Over two days our group summitted 3 or 4 different mountains in the region. My feet will never be the same.

Disaster is Dublin.

I arrived in Dublin on Aug 24th at about midnight. Gatwick was a disaster. Security was reasonable but I had to wait, and wait for the screen to tell me which gate I was supposed to go to in order to board my plane. It didn’t do so until 10mins before departure along with the other two planes going to Dublin as well. This caused a mad dash for the gates which basically caused gridlock in the hallway to gates 6-10. Everyone was pushy because they thought they were going to miss their plane…..until finally someone explained that we were all going to the same place and no one is going to miss their planes. We stayed in the gridlock another 30-40mins and finally boarded the plane. Like herding sheep but badly.

In the morning I left my hostel to meet up with my tour group. I didn’t have to go far and go directions from the front desk (left, right, left and so on) except I went out the wrong side of the building and was therefore hopelessly lost in no time. And then it started to rain. And then it started to pour. Great. I asked some people for directions. Occasionally people contradicted each other sending me more off course than I was to begin with. I want to take a taxi but time and time they were all full. At least 30 of them. I was very, very frustrated and wet. I was lost in the rain a total of an hour and subsequently missed the tour. &*#$!!!!. Not a happy Taylor. Luckily they had a day hike leaving in 15mins and I could go on that but I had to arrange my meals and accommodation. I called three hostels which were full and then they called an additional 10 and finally found me a place to stay. Relief. I was to meet up with my own tour in the morning to go hiking in the Mourne Mountains. I sadly missed going to the giant’s causeway (something that I was very excited about). But it will give me reason to come back someday.

Feeling better – and hiking in Glendalough.

The day hike south of Dublin was very nice; although it did require climbing approximately 1000 steps up a mountain! It rained the entire time but I had rain gear and wasn’t bothered. The only thing is that we missed out on the view because of the mist. I assumed it was very pretty. Imagination goes a long way.

Sightseeing in London


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Hello from London!

I have successfully made it here in one piece. The plane was delayed out of reykjavik an hour, but dad's plane was supposed to leave an hour after mine so I had company.
I took the underground instead of the heathrowexpress + underground and it took about the same time, wasn't scary at all and I didn't get lost. Yay me. Saved 15gbp doing this. I had a lovely chat with a vegetarian comedian on the tube, he was coming back from spain from visiting his sister.

I'm not too sure what my plans are for tomorrow. I will attempt to figure out the alarm clock on my phone.... I would like to do some laundry *very important* and then wander the city. Its raining right now and as much as the changing of the guard and whatever else is around may be cool, I'm not sure how much touring I want to do in a downpour lugging around my bag.
Wish me luck not getting too lost tomorrow.

Very excited for Ireland

SouthEast Iceland Part 2

Yesterday was a slow day by our travel standards. Up until now we've been cramming everything in the little time that we have here in this gorgeous country. We started the day by exploring the cliffs by the ocean just outside of Vik. We have been on a search for the supposed 10million Puffins that nest along the south coast. Until this day I hadn't seen a single one. The lonely planet book said that they nest until the middle of August and then leave, almost over night. Apparently they knew the canadians were coming to town. On this day we found some! They are very cute. I thought they would be more penquin size but they're smaller. Dad was looking to eat one while I just wanted to keep one. (Puffin is a very popular dish)

Down the road aways on the way back to Reykjavik we stopped at a glacier. Disappointed not being able to touch the first one we were determined to get on this one. I went around the front and dad the side. Dad succeeded and roamed around the outer edge; he found out quickly that the dirty black ice is still slippery! My mission around the front gave me some great views but alas there was a river all the way around the front. I gave up.

We made it back to the capital and went on yet another mission: To find a restaurant that had both vegetarian options and something weird for dad to eat (whale, puffin, ram's testicles etc.). After checking out menus for a while, I had a bowl of pasta at a local pub and dad had whale shish-kabobs at a lobster shack. Not satisfied with the whale, we went and found "putrified shark" at a grocery store. From my undertanding putrified shark is made when they bury shark meat in some sand and leave it there for 6 months. Yum. Rotten Shark. Guess how it tasted - rotten. LOL I had to move away when dad opened the bag it was so bad. Two bites and that was the end of it. Gross.

SouthEast Iceland

Yesterday our first stop was at a black sand beach near Vik and a helpful dog guided us to all the good places. He followed our car from a farm about a half km away. He would run a bit and then wait for us to catch up. When we climbed some boulders he showed us where all the good rocks were.
He was my buddy. The rock formations at the beach were very cool. Like columns in the rock. I'm looking forward to seeing how they compare to the Giant's Causeway columns in Ireland. It was wonderful to be on a black sand beach but I was still hoping for a palm tree. How touristy of me.

Farther down the road at Vik we picked up some hitchhikers from France. Then we drove for hours through a flat boring lava flow. Kind of like driving to Timmins but with no trees. The lava fields were cool for the first ten minutes. When we finally arrived at Skaftafell National Park I was a bit underwhelmed. I've been to the columbia icefields in Banff and therefore I've been spoiled with magnificent glaciers before. We made a 5 km hike up the the tongue of a glacier but was unable to cross the river to go up and touch it. Bummer. There were tours available for glacier walks but we decided to take a pass. 3-5 hours seems a bit much to be walking on a glacier.

The four of us continued east until we reached the glacier lagoon. Oh-my-God. I've seen the postcards of this place but it doesn't do it justice. Postcards you figure are from some photographer who stayed at the same spot forever to get the perfect shot in gorgeous weather with the right light. Well in this place - it is always the right shot. The pictures just don't do it justice. It was amazing. Probably the highlight of my entire trip. We spent some time walking around the lagoon, stopping for lunch and taking a boat tour. Then we travelled the 2 boring hours back through the lava field desert back to Vik.

SouthWest Iceland Part 1

Team Diabetes arranged for my trip until the 20th but as many others Dad and I decided to extend our trip and travel independently. We rented a car with the plans of driving east.
Our first stop was þingiviller Nathional Park. This spot in a UNESCO world heritage site and I´m told very pretty. Today was just not the day to see it. Most of the park is only accessible by hiking trails and the combination of a 10km race on a sore ankel, hours of walking the streets and hours of dancing meant I was moving a little slower than normal today. lol So basically we drove past the national park...ooo ahhh how pretty and continued driving. We continued on the "golden circle" to the big two tourist attractions - Geysir and Gullfoss. Although major tourist traps, both were worth the drive.

Strokkur is one of the most famous and predictable geysers in Iceland. It erupts about every 5 to 10 minutes at a height of 10-30m. Geysir, from which all Geysers are named only erupts only after a major earthquake at a height of approx. 60-75m.






Gullfoss waterfalls. Very cool






From here we headed south and stayed at a farmhouse in Skögar. Unlike some "farmhouse holidays" in Iceland we were actually on a farm. The woman that ran the place was very sweet. We had a homecooked meal with from scratch cream asperagus soup, fresh from the garden potatoes (which she was very proud of) and dad had the fish. It took a little explaining what a vegetarian was before she understood. They don´t get many of those out this way.