Alas, I Digress…

(Written on 8/19/09)

Leg one of our trip is over. On Thursday morning, the 13th, I woke up bright and early with a dreadful cough. I was meaning to get out of Horsham at around 6:00 am, but ended up leaving around 10:00. I drove the 8-hour drive to Montéal by myself, relying on my iPod and just general boredness to get up there sanely. Did you know it takes 13 minutes to complete “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall”? Also, the Adirondacks are very beautiful, and full of very cool clouds that bounce around the tops of the hills. And thunderstorms.

I knew I had arrived in Québec because I turned on the radio and there was this French eletronique music on the radio. It was really funny. I enjoyed it.

Montréal was really cool. Everyone was laid back and, more importantly, knew English. Whenever someone attempted to speak French to me at first, I would freak out and say “English!” They didn’t seem to care so much, and they were cool with me being a little freak-outy. It’s kind of sad, though, that I completely forgot a lot of my French.

Andrew’s immigration interview (or whatever the official name of it was, I completely forget) was Friday morning, 8:00. I’d go through the nitty gritty, but really, I don’t care that much and it was nerve-wracking, so I’d rather not relive it. That being said, Andrew’s all sorts of approved, and that’s the important part. We have to go pick up his passport in Newfoundland when we get there, but he was approved and we can stop worrying about this stupid process. Except Andrew’s social security card and getting him a job. But no more immigration worries. Yay!

Montréal was a pretty sweet city. I’m calling it a laid-back Philly, because it was full of tall buildings and shops and history and stuff, but it was much more chill. Everyone walked slower which, as a typical east coast city strider, was difficile to get around at first. Andrew tended to be a little fast-paced too, so the two of us got frustrated at first with how slow everyone was going, but we eventually slowed our pace.

The other cool thing about Montréal was that there were bikes EVERYWHERE. Everyone took bikes from one place to another, which was kind of intense because there were a lot of steep hills. My mucus-filled lungs groaned in pain whenever I saw people biking up the hills. Going down looked like a lot of fun, but there were stop signs and lights and it was a little. Being that I did the triathlon in June, it didn’t intimidate me that much to be biking with traffic, but I couldn’t convince Andrew to do so. Understandable, he’s not used to the traffic of a big city. (Philly’s much worse than Montréal so I had no problem with it.) Montréal even has this bike/taxi service called “Bixie”… because it’s a combination of bicycle & taxi. They were on almost every corner and a lot of people were using them to get from one place to another. For five bucks, it would totally be worth it to use instead of a taxi or even walking some places.

Andrew & I spent most of Friday wandering around downtown Montréal, stopping in random churches (which I love to do). I was sad because I forgot my camera. Saturday, Andrew & I hopped on the Metro and went down to the Biodôme and the Olympic Stadium. The Biodôme is NOT just like the Pauly Shore movie – it’s actually like an indoor zoo with different climates for each habitat. I love animals, and I loved that Andrew knew to take me there!

We then took a tour of the Olympic stadium, where the summer olympics were held in 1976. We went up into the tower – which was not completed for the 1976 games. Our tour guide was saying how Montréal was procrastinating on building stuff for the games & didn’t end up finishing the tower in time. I assume that’s where the olympic flame was supposed to have been shining for all to see – but no one told me. Anyway, the inside of the stadium is a public pool now – there were people inside diving off of the lowest high dive and whatnot.

The stadium where the track was is completely torn apart. It’s all concrete and stands and looks kind of sad. Apparently, the Expos played there before they became the Nationals. And there was a football team that played there before moved because they couldn’t fill half the stadium. Now, it just hosts concerts like U2 and Van Halen. It looks impressive though, and the architecture is really cool.

Saturday, we packed up our stuff and headed over to Québec City aka Québec. Apparently, only Americans call it Québec City. It’s like saying “I’m going to New York” when it’s really New York City. But we all know what you mean.

Québec is crazy. It’s ridiculously old. The streets are very close together. It’s very European. I think the best way to describe Québec is to just view my pics on Facebook. Old buildings, lots of history. Too much to say here. I loved it, and would definitely want to go back and just spend a bunch of time there. Also, it was in Québec that I did finally speak French to someone to taste ice cream.

Now, Andrew & I are on the way through Nouveau Brunswick to Fredericton. The trip, which takes about 6 hours, has been pretty interesting. My GPS has been obnoxious. Right now, and for the past 50 km or so it’s been convinced that we’re driving through the middle of nowhere even though we’ve been driving on the highway. It also told us to take a ferry at one point. Um… no thanks Garmina Burana (my GPS’s name). Clearly I need to update my maps.

Other gems from the road:

*Sign says: Potato World Museum, next exit*
Me: “Potato World! Let’s go to Potato World!“
Andrew: “I’m not going to Potato World.”
Me: “But I want to go to Potato World!”
Andrew: “We didn’t go to Captain Lobster, and we’re not going to Potato World!”

Me: “Why does it say we only have 250 miles to Fredricton, but that it’ll take three and a half hours? We’re going 100 km/h.”
Andrew: “Um… that’s weird.”
Me: “*lightbulb* OH. We’re in Atlantic time zone. Alright, let me adjust my watch….”

We should arrive in Fredricton in about an hour. Atlantic time. More from me later!