Ontario (or Onterrible as the Easterners call it)

  Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Monday, July 20, 2009

Hullo

Well, after 6 weeks of wandering around Eastern Canada I made it back to Montreal. I arrived on Friday afternoon and Kim (the chick I met at Cape Breton Island) picked me up, then we picked up her 3 surviving Grandparents (her grandfather is a bright 93 year old) and we went to Kim's parents' place for a traditional Friday evening Jewish meal - really good. Nice family and I enjoyed it (they seemed to like me too - go figure). After dinner we dropped off the grandparents and went to the house Kim is house-sitting - what a mansion! Well, that is a slight exaggeration, but it is very nice and in a very nice part of town. The house has more bathrooms (5) than bedrooms (4).

Anyway, we went out later that night with some of Kim's friends. We started at one bar where I bought a G n T for Kim and a sprite for me - $13 plus tip. Bloody hell, not only do they speak French here, they think they should charge French prices too. Anyway, we then went to a club called Rouge, apparently the girls I was with (5 of them) knew another chick who was already there, so we show up and this other chick managed to get us in via the back door - no queuing or cover charge for us VIP's. This club does what is known as Bottle Service. You don't buy a drink, you buy a bottle. I saw the price list (stole it as a souvenir) and was gobsmacked. Bottles of vodka start at $150 for 1.4litres. Plus tax and tip (15% is normal). For your money you get the bottle with pourer, carafes of your chosen mixers and glasses (well, actually plastics) and ice. Some examples of prices, Johnnie Walker Red (1.4l) $170, JW Black (1.4l) $220, and JW Blue (750ml) $500. And apparently this is one of the cheap clubs in town. I guess it works out cheaper than buying that many individual drinks but still...

So anyway, Saturday was sleep in day until lunchtime then that afternoon Kim and I headed to Burlington, Vermont to collect Kim's cousin (Michelle) from the airport and then we headed to the cousin's grandparents place on a lake for the night. Getting through US customs was easy and pleasant, the bloke was nice and chatty and not at all like the cyborgs they use at airports. Michelle's flight was supposed to land at 9.52pm and the arrivals board said so and that it was on time, so we went and waited at the gate until about 10.10 when we found out the plane had landed about 50 minutes earlier - good of them to change the flight status on the board. Anyway, we found Michelle ok. The next day we visited a Summer Camp which both the girls had attended as kids and then worked at. Interesting to see an American Summer Camp, but not very exciting watching people catch up with other people. The kids' parents pay about $5000 a month to send their kids to this camp, some go for 2 months. There are cheaper camps, and dearer ones.

So Sunday night we were back in Montreal (breezed through customs) and went to see Ben Harper play a free concert as part of the Jazz Festival (apparently the Jazz festival is no longer exclusively Jazz). We got there late (to be expected with 6 girls trying to get organised) and we ended up having to sneak in to the concert area via a hedge and were right at the back and had to settle for watching a screen. Mind you, the girls and everyone else around us just talked non-stop anyway and didn't even listen to the music. The worst thing is the way these people talk, I guess it is a generational thing (the girls are all 22 - 25) but do they really have to use "like" (as in, "it was, like, so cool, and like...) and "OH MY GOD" constantly?

Today, Monday, I am moving into a hostel. Kim, in the tradition of the North American obsession with teeth is having surgery on her gums. When my dentist told me my gums were receding he suggested using a softer brush, in Canada it seems you have gum removed from the top of your mouth and transplanted onto your gums. Sounds painful (apparently it is) and a bit daft but these people can afford it so there you go.

I had fun at the hostel - met lots of cool people. The hostel, like the one in Quebec City, organised group activities so I went along to have fun and meet some people. The pub crawl was ok, though I only did 2 bars, and the group walk up Mont Royal was also fun, if a bit too much like exercise. I was going to leave Montreal on Wednesday so I could see a band called The National play at the Ottawa Blue Fest but that was the only day Montreal was due to have good weather so I stayed and did the walk up Mont Royal instead. I also wandered around Old Montreal and it is ok, but Old Quebec is much better.

Sculpture in Old Montreal

So I left Montreal on Thursday for Ottawa and got there ok and found the hostel and settled in and met 2 other guys who were going to go the Museum of Civillisation (it is free after 4 on Thursdays) so I went along.

Totem Pole

Very good museum. Ottawa is in Ontario, but it is right on the border with Quebec, so you can walk across the bridge over the river and change provinces. The museum is in Quebec. The local teens tend to go to Gatineau (the Quebec town over the bridge) to drink as the drinking age is lower, 18 instead of 19.

Also in Ottawa I have been to see the free Sound and Light Show at the Parliament Building,

Parliament Buildings, Ottawa

been up the Peace Tower at the Parliament Building, got dragged over into Quebec to a dance club (hated it, but I was thinking with the wrong head) and been to the Blues Fest to see The Dead Weather (Jack White's new project) and the Yeah Yeah Yeah's play. The Blues Fest is no longer exclusively for the Blues it would seem, they even had KISS play the Wednesday night. Ottawa people don't do moshing. I met a couple of English guys and we were looking forward to a good mosh but it didn't happen. We ended up just taking the piss out of the people around us, including the girl in front of us who was using her phone to post updates on Facebook! For fuck's sake, you are at a concert, not an internet cafe!

On Monday evening I got the train to Toronto, found my hostel and settled in for the night. Today (Tuesday) I have wandered around town a bit (not very exciting) and bought my train ticket to Winnipeg . The Municipal workers are on strike in Toronto so no-one is collecting rubbish. This has been going on for about a month now and parts of town smell like parts of India, I guess you could call it an Indian Summer. The strike includes workers on the ferries to Toronto Island so I can't go there. When I was buying my train ticket the lady told me that the train might not run due to the engineers going on strike. We'll see. It is raining now so I thought I would do some laundry and update my blog. I did find one cool building in town, it is part of the Ontario School of Arts and Design.

The arts school

Tomorrow I am booked on a day trip to Niagara Falls so hopefully the weather is better. On Friday I join a 3-day tour to the Algonquin Provincial Park, so that should be fun, he said hopefully.

Well, that's about it really. I hope you are all well and not got swine flu, which is having an impact in NZ I see. The earthquake in Fiordland made the news here too.

Ok, see ya

Colin

ps Apparently sending me a message via the travelpod website involves answering a whole lot of questions so just use my email address.  Thanks to those who have emailed me, always nice to hear from you.

Song of the day : Turn Into by the Yeah Yeah Yeah's

Distance Travelled 21776k's by plane
7934k's by train
3445k's by road
211 nautical miles