Pre-Planning for Summer Holiday

This year, for the first time since I finished High School, I'm taking the summer off! I’ve been approved to do “Income Averaging” at my job for 6 weeks in July and August and I can’t wait!! My last day of work is July 12th and I don’t go back to the office until August 28th.


For anyone who doesn’t know, income averaging allows me to take time off and still receive a pay cheque while I’m away because the 6 weeks pay gets averaged out and taken off of all my pay cheques for a full year. If you think about how much you get paid in 6 weeks and how much you get paid in one year you’ll see that it makes a very small dent in the overall pay and makes this summer break that much sweeter.

I thought about this for several weeks before deciding to submit the request. I needed to figure out all the details first; how the leave works, what span of time I wanted off, would I be doing enough in that time to make it worthwhile, can I make it work financially and is this the right time to do it? Lots of questions needed answering and in the end everything looks like it'll work out.


I’ve made lots of plans for my time off so far and even though none of them are guaranteed yet, I have high hopes. I’ll be starting to book everything really soon!


Here are some of my plans:


Nova Scotia – July 13-26
This will be my third year in a row vacationing in Nova Scotia and I’m not complaining about it at all. Unlike the previous years we are going in with no plans at all. We have a wedding to attend and will otherwise be relaxing and spending time at the many beaches, collecting all the sea glass and hopefully not getting any of those unexpected Nova Scotia sunburns!

Jasper – End of July
Ryan will be working at this time and I’m hoping to take myself to Jasper and get my Scuba diving certification done! It’s significantly less expensive to do in Jasper vs. Edmonton and who wouldn’t choose diving in the Rockies over a manmade lake in the city?! Of course, I would love even more to get my certification while in Nova Scotia but the lesson schedules don’t work for the time we'll be there.

British Columbia – August 10-16
We didn’t get to go last year and I was really looking forward to it so I’m hoping we can make this week long road trip happen this year! Though there is plenty to see along the way as well, I’m most looking forward to spending time on Vancouver Island. If I can find a rack for the car I would love to bring our bicycles to the island as well.
I had hoped to visit Waterton National Park on the way back into Alberta as well but it seems to far out of the way no matter which way we approach it.


Other than those plans I’m open to whatever comes my way! I have high hopes for a few camping trips, a few beach days, hiking, picnics and bike rides. Maybe I’ll even figure out what to do with my fishing rod and if that happens I should also learn to clean the fish.

I would like to spend as much time outside as possible and also spend that outdoor time with as many of my friends and family as possible.


This year I'm going to be greedy about my time off and I have no guilt about that. In the 8 years since I finished school the only significant break I've given myself was when I went to Europe, and to be fair I worked for 3 of those 5 months. As I still have relative financial freedom and limited responsibilities I'm going to take advantage of that!


The count down to Summer is on!!