Band trip

A cruise on the Rhine. Gazing at the Alps. An outdoor concert in Austria.
Whether the moments were planned or not, the Fort High senior band’s trip to Austria and Germany over the March Break turned out to be “a great experience for all,” said band president Brendan Cumming.
Some 70 students and their chaperones left here in the wee hours of March 8. After more than a day of travel via Winnipeg, Toronto, and Frankfurt, the weary travellers arrived in Vienna around 2 p.m. that Friday.
“It seemed like a long time,” said Alyson Rob, whose mom, Karen, also went on the trip.
“But I think people knew what to expect ahead of time so it wasn’t so bad,” noted Cumming.
It was not just a vacation. The band had two scheduled concerts–one each in Austria and Germany. But an unexpected moment came early in the trip when the band’s first concert in Salzburg, Austria on Sunday almost didn’t happen.
And it ended up being, in some students’ opinions, the most memorable moment of the journey.
“At our first concert, things hadn’t been set up and it looked like we might not be playing at all,” noted Sarah Hebert, who was accompanied by her parents, Brian and Jean.
“Then two people were playing their trumpets, and I and Cara Coran started singing, and everyone joined in,” she recalled. “It really cheered Mr. Dutton up, because at that point, nothing seemed to be going right.”
But the band did end up playing after a delay.
“The kids performed superbly,” noted chaperone Bill Gushulak, who went on the trip with his son, Steve, and wife, Mary Jane.
“For me, the best part was when we were in the downtown square in Salzburg. It was 500 years old, and the atmosphere was just really cool,” remarked Cumming.
Salzburg was popular for student Erika Fagerdahl for another reason. “The Sound of Music is my favourite movie. To walk where they walked during the final scene (in the tombs) was great,” she enthused.
“I still go back and watch the movie now, and can see where we walked,” she added.
After the weekend, the group took “The Romantic Road”–a bus tour of many castles, such as that of Ludwig II at Neuschwanstein–on their way to Munich, Germany.
Fagerdahl’s father, Eric, also had gone on the trip as part of a family holiday with his wife, Caren, who acted as a chaperone, and son, David. It was his first time “over the pond.”
Fagerdahl admitted it was hard to pick his favourite sight.
“Going to another country, with a whole other history–you really can’t describe it,” he said. “You can read about the land in books but then there it was right before you.
“There were lots of moments but it really hit me when we were in the Alps. It was like a fairyland–like Disneyland,” he recalled.