Niagara Falls

26th April 2012

We drove from Fredericton to Kingston and arrived at the really bad 'Super 8' motel in Kingston at near enough midnight. The room had two qween size beds but had little else going for it. The breakfast in the morning was served on polystyrene plates, bowls and cups with plastic cutlery.. even the worst hostels Ive been to were better than this place and cost a lot less! oh well.

In the morning we drove just a couple of hours to Toronto where we dropped off one hire car and picked up another and continued the drive to Niagara Falls where we stayed at the Backpackers Internation Hostel just a 10 minute walk from the falls.

When we got to Niagara Falls the weather was awesome, great sunshine and blue sky. We went and saw the falls and walked around the whole place and had dinner at a diner which was an interesting experience!

On the 28th we went back to the falls, donned a trendy yellow rain coat and went in the tunnels behind the falls, where you can stand maybe 6 feet behind the crashing water. I enjoyed moching those who posed with the beautiful flowers and trees, and was amused by those who thought I was serious and waited patiently until I had finished before having their girlfriends copy my poses as I left!

Afterwards we drove to Niagara on the lake, a small village 15km up the road. Niagara on the lake seems like a wealthy place, lots of nice houses and cars around, very well kept and picturesque. There are lots of wineries in the area and we thought it would be rude not to buy a bottle of the local produce, which we shared in the evening back at the hostel with our dinner.. not that I really like wine.


View Larger Map

Giant Lobster!

25th April 2012

We had hired the car until the 27th of April, our intention was to drop it off in Toronto after visiting Niagara Falls, but faced with the fact that we would need to drive pretty much all day on the 26th to get it back on time we decided to try and extend the time we would have the car.. unfortunately the rate for extending for a day was much higher than the rate we paid originally so we decided to do the drive after all, drop the car off in Toronto and then hire another one from a different company for a couple of days to go to Niagara Falls.. I dont think I mentioned before that I had forgotten to bring my driving licence on my trip! Which means that Theres has been doing all the driving and faced the mammoth drive tomorrow all by herself! eep!

So we left Halifax and headed to Fredericton where we would spend the night. We had to drop Liz and Franzi back to the C'mon Inn at Moncton on the way and decided to drive through Shediac as there is a giant lobster statue there which Theres wanted to see. As we drove through Shediac we saw a giant chicken statue and giant dolphins statue, but no lobster statue and it looked like we had almost driven all the way through the town so we stopped and asked an old lady where it was and had quite an amusing exchange, I dont think she really understood my accent;

Me: Excuse me, we are looking for the giant lobster statue..
Old lady: Lobster?
Me: Yes, the giant lobster statue..
Old lady: Statue?
Me: Yes, the giant lobster statue..
Old lady: Oh the giant lobster statue.. yes you drove right past it (assuming we had driven the other way through the town) - its just over the bridge on the left hand side of the road!

It was just the way she said "lobster?" and "statue?". As soon as I wound the window up and we started to drive off we all burst out laughing in the car.. probably one of those "you had to be there" kind of things but anyway..  :D

We dropped Liz and Franzi off at Moncton and made it to Fredericton in the early evening and had wander around before crashing out early so we could get on the road as soon as possible in the morning and start the 1170 km drive to a motel we had booked in Kingston!



View Larger Map

Rain, fog and scenic drives

23rd April 2012

We left Moncton heading for Halifax, just about 3 hours drive away. Liz and Franzi who shared a room with me at the C'mon Inn decided to join us and we split the petrol even more. On the way there we passed a place called Truro.. woohoo.


Theres not actually a whole lot to do in Halifax really, we went to the harbour and looked around the city when we arrived. The next day it rained really hard pretty much all day and we just drove out of the city and went for a "scenic drive" around the coast line to Mahone bay and Chester.. but since it was rainy and really foggy it didnt turn out to be that scenic, but we had a laugh on the drive and it wasnt really raining in Mahone bay when we got there and Chester was a nice place.


View Larger Map

Sudden realisation!

I was probably deep in denial about the fact that I would have to go home to England soon. I've been checking my funds regularly but it wasn't until a certain point in the road trip that I admitted to myself that I simply will not make it much further! Having rinsed all my savings, hammered all my credit cards and overdraft over the last 9 months the bank owns me now and I have to think about going home!

So I rescheduled my flight back to England from the end of July to the 5th of May and planned to finish the road trip and then go to New York for 3 nights before my flight home.

My blog is slightly behind as usual, and today is actually the day I fly home.. Its a bit lame that I cannot see more of the USA but I've had an awesome trip and I am looking forward to seeing my friends again and being able to eat a pasty (nom nom).

Where did the last 9 months go! :D

Fundy national park

21st April 2012

We wanted to go to Fundy national park and the nearest place to stay would be Moncton, a 9 hour drive from Quebec city. We spent all day in the car but we were rewarded by the fact that we stayed in a really nice hostel called the C'mon Inn, its a small family run one and its really comfortable and the people were ace. Moncton was voted the friendliest city in Canada a few years ago, just thought I'd throw that in there. And the people there are all bilingual, switching from French to English mid sentance sometimes which gets quite bizarre if you dont speak one of the two languages!

On the 22nd we went to Fundy national park and a couple of French guys from the hostel came with us. It was raining on and off all day and it was really cold but we didnt let that stop us from checking out Hopewell rocks and going for a stomp around Fundy.

In the evening we went to a place called the pumphouse for dinner, I had an great pizza and tried the beer sampler tray from their in house brewery.. 10 beers, 7 of them were pretty good!



View Larger Map

Quebec city

19th April 2012

We picked up the hire car today and drove from Montreal to Quebec city. We arrived late in the afternoon and went for a walk around the old city, its kind of like being in a fairy tale and I wondered where the nights in shining armour were.

I tried poutine for dinner, its the local cousine.. basically chips with chicken gravy and cheese curds, its pretty tasty but when everyone tells you that you need to try it you imagine something a little less like hangover food (no offense!)

The second day in Quebec it rained all day and after getting wet looking around the citadel and seeing the "unique panaorama" (which turned out to be a pretty industrial looking town called Levis) we spent most of the time trying to find things to do inside including a look in the chocalate museum which turned out to be a massive let down too.. just a small room adjoined to a chocolate shop.

In the evening we met up with some of Theres' friends, the two Christinas, at a pub called Oncle Antoine where they have their own micro brewery. We tried the beer sampler tray which was pretty cool.

View Larger Map

How do people in Montreal deal with parking tickets?