Bonjour, Quebec

Being primarily English speakers, as we entered Quebec we realized it was uncharted territory for us. We vowed to try our best at French and to enjoy our time exploring the major cities and visiting with good friends – and Hazen couldn’t wait for the poutine, Montreal Smoked Meat, Queues de Castor (Beaver Tails for the Anglophones) and crepes!

Our first stop was the cultural hub of Montreal. First off – what a beautiful city! Montreal is a mix of old and new, and is filled with both corporate influences and a younger college feel so the people appear to always be on the go, except when they’re eating or drinking. The first place we noticed this crazy rush was on the streets! We can safely say that Montreal has some of the most aggressive drivers and pedestrians in the country. Couple that with the French street signs, the winding roads, tangles of highways into and out of the city, and you begin to fear for your life every time you start the car. Hazen set aside his normally courteous driving attitude and quickly began to lean on the horn like the rest of the motorists. Our savings grace was the lovely people who saw the confused looks on our faces while trying to figure out things like where we were and how to read the parking meters and came to our rescue with translations and friendly advice.

Montreal was an exciting city for us for reasons other than previously stated. Before leaving Victoria we had gathered all the loose change we had been collecting in jars and counted it up, agreeing that the sum was to be spent on a night out on the town in Montreal. We spent our first day doing a hike up the beautiful Mont Royal, followed by cleaning up at a hotel and then out for dinner at Gibby’s Steak House, an amazing restaurant set in an equally amazing 200 year old building in old Montreal. Some of the wooden beams were so low that Hazen had to duck to avoid supplementing his projected hangover with a throbbing goose egg – luckily neither came to fruition. We followed Gibby’s with drinks on a patio on a street of bars – one fondly reminding us of Victoria’s own Strathcona Hotel, where we met almost four years ago.

The following day we had a very exciting visit from one of Autumn’s best friends! Tara and her new baby boy, Noah, showed us around the cobblestone streets and famous eateries of old Montreal. For those who have been holding their breath since the intro to this post, breathe easy, Hazen began to enjoy the culinary delicacies he had been craving!

Tara invited us back to her new home in Mont Saint Sauveur to spend a few days with her, her Fiancé Matt and the beautiful Noah to get to explore the cute town and catch up. Hazen also got to check the authentic Queues de Castor off his culinary bucket-list.

A few days later, we reluctantly left Tara, Matt and Noah to head to Quebec City. We wandered around Vieux-Quebec, the walled part of the downtown core that is North America’s only fortified city, and marveled at the steadfastness of the several century old construction. We were happy to experience an authentic crepe with a glass of red wine while we sat in one of the oldest portions of the city. As we departed Quebec, we stopped off at the Plaines of Abraham and Battlefield Park, now a football and track field, but once the site of a battle that was pivotal to the formation of what is now Canada. Quebec is rich in heritage and culture and we supremely enjoyed the food, wine, sights and people – even if it is sometimes a bit difficult to order off a menu! If you’re ever stuck in a small town in Quebec and you’re starving, just say “je veux prendre” **point to item while brutally sounding it out** and follow it with “s’il vous plait” and a smile.

A lot of ground to cover

ODO: 371776

We left Kenora driving east along the Great Lakes with Toronto in our sights. We drove for hours...and then we kept driving...and then we kept driving. And. Then. We. Kept. Driving - ONTARIO GOES ON FOREVER. We tried to pass the time spotting moose; however, we never did see one, thus the time passed slowly.

When we finally reached the Toronto area we spent our time catching up with the many old friends that live in this area. From Mississauga to Toronto to Waterloo we spent our days at the beach and nights on the town.

(A shout out to Ahmad, Ishtar, Barrett and Ye for putting us up and taking us back to some of our sweet memories).

After a few tearful goodbyes we winded our way to Niagra in search of the ever popular falls. We soon discovered that wineries are in no shortage (including one owned by Wayne Gretzky). It would have been rude not to stop in at a few, so we did. They took a liking to our cross country traveling ways and we received tastings for free at each! Hazen was so excited when he heard that one of the wineries specializes in mead - you know, that drink they are always drinking in olden time movies and books, i.e. Robin Hood, Beowulf, etc. For those who don't recall it's a wine-like drink made from honey instead of grapes and delightfully tastes like champagne. Fun fact of the day - the term "honeymoon" is derived from the tradition in olden days when the father of the bride was supposed to supply the newly married couple with enough mead to last 30 days. The new husband and wife were to drink the mead every night for this 30 days in order to help them procreate; thus, the term honeymoon.

When we arrived at Niagra we were taken aback by the awesome falls accompanied by the gorgeous, ever present rainbows arching overtop. For those of you who have not been, the falls are amazing and the town has been aptly coined Canada's Vegas. We can testify that this is very true. We wish we had photos of the tacky streets lined with haunted houses, amusement park rides, ice cream stands and chain restaurants accompanied by an overdrive of lights, sirens and horns for your senses delight, not to mention the many screaming children and people pushing past you through the crowds. Sorry Niagra, we wanted to like you...

Our next destination was up along the Ottawa River near the county of Renfrew - it's ok if you don't know it well, apparently neither does TomTom, our GPS. We were heading to visit Hazen's headmaster's family at their cottage along the river. They kindly offered us a relaxing evening complete with a swim, a sauna and a beer - except we got a bit side tracked on the longest day/night of our trip. We set out on a 5 hour drive that quickly became 8 hours when we hit Toronto's rush hour traffic on a long weekend, but we got through it and headed off into cottage country.  We started to get a bit puzzled by the directions TomTom was giving us when we began transferring from highway to dirt road to highway to dirt road, all within 10km of our final destination. We drove down little paths such as Lover's Lane, Pleasant Valley Drive and Gore Line Road - yes, GORE! As it neared dusk and we began to feel a bit like we were in the beginning of a horror movie, we started down a little gravel path that was a mere 2km from their haven in the woods. 1km down this road, the path suddenly veered away from what TomTom was telling us to do (he was telling us to head down an overgrown goat-trail that hadn't been used in 25 years). We took the veer, instead of pushing the van through the woods, and wound up at a clearing with a bunch of old farm cottages - complete with rusty pitchforks and sickles everywhere. Remembering the big, menacing "NO TRESPASSING" sign at the entrance - obviously painted by a one eyed, inbred, chainsaw-wielding giant with a thing for travelers - we quickly determined we had gone the wrong way and went back to find cell service to call Eva, our friend, for directions. At the original confounding point in the path we got one bar and pulled off the path to take advantage. While calling, Hazen shut the van down to let the motor cool from the sweltering summer evening. When Hazen went to get out of the van to cool himself down, he tried pulling the key out of the ignition to avoid the loud annoying buzz it makes with the door open - we wanted to avoid waking the giant! To our dismay, the key refused to come out. 'Never fear', Hazen thought, 'I'll turn the car back on.' Nope. It wouldn't do that either. Ok, so beyond starting the chainsaw for him, we had made it as easy as possible for the horror film to begin! After an hour of frantic directions, an emotional break down or two, Eva finally saved us and took us home in her armoured vehicle - a blue minivan! After a good sleep and that promised river-dip we returned to the van in the morning to call CAA for a tow.

We found an amazing mechanic who diagnosed it over the phone and agreed to hold up his long weekend to help us out. A big shout-out and thank you to Frank Condelli (frankcondelli.com) an international guru of the Westfalia, who not only had the broken part (a melted key-switch) but also knew exactly how to fix the problem by re-wiring the headlight circuit onto it's own set of relays, instead of running all the high-beam power through a rinky-dink little plastic part. Safe and sound, we got back on the road, headed for Ottawa.

We happened to be there for the buskers festival and took in a few different street performers as we explored Canada's capital city.

This city made our top picks with its big city opportunities and events but it's little city vibe. We felt very at home while we were there, mostly in thanks to our family friends, Marty, Linda, JoAnne and Jean Marc who showed us around and put us up.