Boston, Canada and Seattle

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  Seattle, Washington, United States
Thursday, October 30, 2008

Hi All.

Apologies for all the delays etc  - still suffering from the fact the USA and Canada expect everyone to have a laptop. I've also tried about ten times now to upload photos but have admitted defeat - will have to try again in New Zealand I think. Since last writing we have been into Canada and have now headed back into the USA - currently residing in Seattle. To bring you up to speed....

We spent three nights in Boston after heading up from New York. It was a really nice city, though due to accommodation difficulties we were out in Everett, a town just north of the city. It was a nice few days and was actually uite nice to be out of the city for a while. On our arrival in Everett we found ourselves invited to the annual pasta dinner in the local town hall - quite an experience and it felt very small town Americana! We had a potter round Boston and headed to Beacon Hill for a drink in the original bar from Cheers - i'd show you a photo, but oh wait, no, no I won't.... The next day we took the train up to Salem which was nice and pretty cool what with halloween fast approaching. It was very quaint there and seemed a ice little town. We headed to the Salem witch museum and got the background on the 1692 witch trials and hangings which was all very interesting and good fun. Next day more looking around Boston itself and then the bus to Montreal.

It was a seven and a half hour journey to Montreal on the greyhound but it went pretty quickly - some stunning scenery in New Hampshire and Vermont. After the Canadian border stuff we were soon in Montreal. Our hostel was pretty central which was good and we headed out for some dinner and drinks - a couple of streets were full of bars and restaurants which boded well. Noticeably colder up in Montreal so got some use out of the coat... We scouted out some cool places for the next night - were both feeling pretty knackered from the bus journey so took an early night. Felt pretty refreshed the next  morning and went for a big explore....was amazed by how many shops Montreal had. It was a really quirky place what with the whole French/Engligh language thing going on. Its also got a very nice 'old town' part that flet very much like France and was a nice stop for a coffee and cake during the day. In the evening we put our  previous nights scouting to good use and hit a few of the bars with some of the guys from the hostel - the favourite for the nice being 'Brutopia' on Rue Crescent. The next day involved a walk up to the Park for some awesome views over the city and some fresh air - another seven and a half our bus journey was on its way so was nice to be in the open. The evening was going to be chilled but we once again found ourselves in Brutopia in the evening.

Took the bus to Toronto (21/10) - drove through a blizzard on the way there which was interesting. When we arrived in Toronto it was actually snowing!!! Very glad I took my coat by this point. Enjoyed our time in Toronto but not our favourite city - seemed to be lots of buildings and shops and not much else so a bit soulless. We did however take a trip up the CN tower (worlds tallest free standing building) which was pretty cool and and had a really good day at Niagara falls - which included some wine tasting in the morning. We got to try an 'ice wine' - a wine produced when grapes freeze whilst still on the vine. Pretty nice. The falls were incredible, got soaked on the maid of the mist but was defintely worth it. Our hostel in Toronto (the Canadiana) was quite interesting - we were lucky enough to be sharing a room with somone who decided to get up at 6am every morning, making loads of noise. only to then go back to bed a couple of hours later, as well as someone who would speak very loudly in his sleep. Didn't equate to four of the greatest nights sleep of my life thats for sure....

On the 25th Oct we took an internal flight over to Vancouver. Would have prefered to have gone by bus/train but couldn't face 2 and a half days on a greyhound so took the easy way out and a five hour flight over to the Pacific. Got some nice views of the Rockies on the way which was nice. Got to Vancouver and grabbed a bite to eat and that was pretty much it for the first day as was feeling exhausted from four days of being woken up early in Toronto! The next day we went for an explore round Vancouver - it was absolutely stunning. Its a really 'green' city in all senses of the word and we had a nice walk around Stanley Park. We spent the rest of our time in the city doing pretty much the same - its such a lovely place. The one down side was a trip to Hastings Street - which apparently is the poorest street in the whole of Canada. Its where the homeless have congregated - Vancouver gets a lot of people head there due to the more temperate climate, after spending some time in Toronto and Montreal I can completely understand this - and they seem to cluster around this street. I cannot really compare it to anything in Europe. That was defintely an eye-opener, especially seeing how green, clean and generally nice the city was....

We left Vancouver with a heavy heart - if we had more time would have loved to take a trip up to Whistler and out to Vancouver Island. We were however, excited to get back to the US just before the election and our trip to Seattle. Its somewhere i've always wanted to visit, I adopted the Seattle Seahawks as my American Football team when I was a kid + loved (well still love) Nirvana, Soundgarden and the whole grunge music scene. It certainly didn't disapoint - a really lively place, with quite a European feel in parts. The rain had finally caught up with us, though we used this as a good excuse to to visit the 'Experience Music Project' - defintely the most awesome museum i've ever been too with a really good exhibition on Hendrix (who grew up in Seattle). We also got to experience Halloween US style with a big party at our hostel - was certainly an experience and nothing like I have ever experience in the UK!
Running out of internet time so have got to go - next stop Portland!!

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