Road Trip

City Lines

I'm back!

Once again it has been far too long since my last post. I honestly haven't had too much to talk about lately and the prospect of dedicating time every Sunday to updating has become somewhat daunting. However this week I do have something to talk about, so put the kettle on, rest up and prepare for a long read!

Rob and I finally got to take a break and left the shores of Nova Scotia on a road trip bound for Toronto to visit our friends there. We started our journey on June 5th, we picked up our rental car in the afternoon and drove 6 hours to Grand Falls, New Brunswick. It seemed the most convenient place to stop overnight as it is close to the Quebec border. Grand Falls is pretty small and it's main attraction is the Falls and Gorge. Rob and I had been there before years ago, but the last time we visited there didn't seem to be much water there, so it was great to re-visit them this time on a sunny morning (June 6th) and find tons of water and rainbow! After a quick stop we headed on, we had a long drive of 8 hours to complete to reach our next destination, which was the town of Gananoque which is situated in the heart of the 1000 Islands. If you have never heard of the Islands, let me tell you, it is an absolutely stunning area and a must see. Here's some info on them from Wikipedia:

The Thousand Islands constitute an archipelago of 1,864 islands that straddles the Canada-U.S. border in the Saint Lawrence River as it emerges from the north-east corner of Lake Ontario. They stretch for about 50 miles (80 km) downstream from Kingston, Ontario. The Canadian islands are in the province of Ontario, the U.S. islands in the state of New York.

The 1,864 islands range in size from over 40 square miles (100 km2) to smaller islands occupied by a single residence, or uninhabited outcroppings of rocks that are only home to migratory waterfowl. To count as one of the Thousand Islands, emergent land within the river channel must have at least one square foot (0.093 m2) of land above water level year-round, and support at least two living trees.

We checked into our motel in the late afternoon having driven along the parkway which was such a pretty ride in. After the lovely scenery on route our motel was somewhat disappointing to say the least, it was very musty and what was advertised as a steak and pancake house at the front of the motel on the website was now a Chinese restaurant. The motel was run by a Chinese family, the rooms were old and small, the WiFi was non existent and out front there was a rancid old swimming pool. Needless to say I wouldn't recommend a stay there! However, they are renovating and I found out later that it had been closed the whole of last season. (I can only assume that is why everything smells musty). Aside from the accommodation we had a lovely time in the 1000 Islands, we took a boat trip the following day which takes you around the bulk of the islands including millionaire's row and Boldt Castle which is one of the main highlights. The weather was gorgeous and we got a little sun burned that day. After the boat trip we drove out to the observation tower which is on an island half way between the US and Canada. From there we drove up to a small town called Delta where we visited The Old Stone Mill, which is an Historic site and one of the best preserved Stone Mills in Canada. We rounded off the day with a lovely dinner on the water's edge in Rockport, which is just gorgeous.

The next day we were up and on the road again, heading to Toronto. We stopped on route at Kingston to visit the Penitentiary Museum which is located in the old warden's quarters of the recently closed (2013) Kingston maximum security prison. Now being a huge Prison Break fan, I absolutely loved this museum. It was fascinating, the history of the place is very interesting as are the exhibits, including some rather evil looking, crude, home made weapons (which are pretty scary to say the least). You can read about the ingenious escape attempts and the people that run the museum are all ex-correctional officers who have some great stories to tell. I would absolutely recommend a visit to this museum if you are ever in the area.

Having stopped there, I didn't factor in the traffic and road works that we would encounter as we got nearer to Toronto, so the drive took us a lot longer than expected. As we got nearer and nearer to the city the traffic got heavier and heavier The lanes on the 401 (which had started of as essentially duel carriageway) ended up as 16 lanes of heaving traffic (8 lanes in both directions). Now being from Nova Scotia and barely seeing any cars on the road, this came as quite the culture shock for us...I found myself wincing quite a bit and hanging onto to the overhead hand gripper, poor Rob had to figure out where and what we were doing as the Sat Nav decided to have a fit on us, and couldn't work out that we had ended up on the express way. It seemed to take forever to get off the bloody thing, but we did eventually and arrived around 4.30 pm at Eunice's house in Royal York.

It was so lovely so see Eunice again, it had been 7 years since I last visited and longer since Rob had been out there with me. We spent the evening catching up with her and (son) Tim, and enjoyed the best roast beef dinner we have had in a long time. The following day we took the subway down town and went up the CN Tower (always a favourite of mine), the price to go up these days however is shocking. $35.00 per person to the observation decks, and if you want to go up to the sky pod, you can add on an extra $12.00 per person. It was a bit grey in the afternoon, so the views could have been better, but it was still enjoyable, afterwards we had a late lunch on Front Street and headed back.

In the evening we enjoyed a night out with Tim, Paul (his brother) and their nephew Blake. We went to see the Blue Jays play Miami at the Rogers Centre (which to me, will always be the Sky Dome). 

Tim and Paul, had a method to getting in. They bought tickets after the game had started outside from a tout, the idea was them to take these 'nose bleed' seats in the 500 section and then sneak our way into one of the lower preferable sections. As their were 5 of us this didn't prove so easy. I think we got booted out of 3 sections before finally finding a spot. It was a gorgeous evening but a little too hot for me as I was sweating like a horse after all the running around. The roof was open in the dome and the view of the CN Tower from there was as always, excellent. The game was pretty exciting (even for me who, as you know is not a baseball/sports fan). It was looking doubtful the Blue Jays would win, but then in the final moments of the game, they pulled it back and won by one run. Which is just as well as Paul and Tim said if our presence there made the team unlucky they would never take us again :o)

The next day we bit the bullet and drove down town, the Sat Nav did us proud and we parked  the ferry terminal that runs over to the Islands. We headed over to Centre Island and walked 4 km to Hanlan's Point which has the best view of the skyline. Halfway along the sky got darker and darker and the heaven's opened, it was quite the down pour and just for good measure there was some thunder and lightening (poor Rob). I am terrified of storms so I wasn't at my best.

We took cover at the Art Centre near the lighthouse and fortunately it didn't last long. Afterwards the sun came out and it was as if it had never happened.

Later that day we said farewell to Eunice and headed to Georgetown to spend the next two nights with Eunice's daughter Lisa. Lisa made a fabulous meal for us upon arrival and we had a good catch up that evening, she has recently moved to a new house, so it was nice to see it, it a lovely town house with 3 levels and 2 walk out decks. So neat and tidy. The following morning she cooked us a lovely breakfast and we headed off to Niagara. We stopped briefly at Niagara on the Lake on route, it was so busy with tourists and parking was a nightmare. At Niagara, the amount of people was again staggering, but we parked and then got the hop on, hop off  bus to the Skylon Tower for my favourite views of the Falls.

We got back around 7.00 pm to Lisa's and were hoping to meet up with Paul again for dinner, but sadly he couldn't make it so Rob and I ate out in Georgetown. The following day Lisa had to be at work early and we had to be on our way to Montreal, so we said farewell and headed off at around 6.45 am. I wish we could have stayed longer but time just didn't permit.

The journey to Montreal was long. It seemed to take forever, I miscalculated the time it would take.

We were heading to see a friend of mine (who I have known online for many years, but had never met in person). Rosy and her hubby Edwin live not far outside of the city (although you would never know it), in LaSalle which located in the south-west portion of the Island of Montreal, located along the Saint Lawrence river. The area is mostly English speaking and looks very English. It is a Gorgeous area, I was instantly enamoured with the location.

As soon as we met, Rosy and I clicked, I always new we would and we enjoyed a wonderful evening chatting, we stayed in with Chinese food, and what a feast it was, such  a great night. Even Benny their dog, who is 'mature' and can't walk so well these days, got so excited to see us that he even made a huge effort to make it up the stairs when we took our bags up. Rosy and Edwin are writers, but they have been renovating upstairs into a photographic studio as Rosy is moving more towards the photographic side of things, undertaking newborn shoots and glamour photography.She is extremely talented. I have no doubt this new venture will be a roaring success. I just wish she lived nearer, as I know we would pretty much be inseparable. The next day we were up fairly early (although to be honest I could have stayed in bed). Rosy cooked up a storm with breakfast  and then took Rob and I to her happy place. A migratory bird sanctuary/park on the river near the Lachine Rapids. A truly beautiful spot, where you can commonly see Blue Herons (although we didn't that day). We did see river rafters on the rapids which brought back a few memories for me!

Sadly we had to leave at around 2.30 pm. Our time was brief and I really didn't want to leave, but we had to get back to Grand Falls (6 hours driving). So off we went. Of course we lost an hour in time as we crossed back over from Quebec into New Brunswick so we finally reached the motel at around 9.30 pm. Our last leg was the 6 hours home the next day. All in all we did around 2,500 km.

It was tiring but such good fun!

I have only really just begun to edit images, but here are a few for now. Don't forget to click on all the links in this article to see where we went and what we did.

Oh and finally here's what you need to know about the origins of 'Thousand Island Dressing' in case you were wondering:

A fishing guide's wife, Sophie Lalonde, gave the recipe to an actress, who in turn gave it to another Thousand Islands summer resident, George Boldt, who was building Boldt Castle in the area. Boldt, as proprietor of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, instructed the hotel's maître d'hôtel, Oscar Tschirky, to put the dressing on the menu.

Grand Falls

View form the 100 Islands Parkway -
Nice little crib with boats houses and bridge

Rockport Island Lighthouse

The Old Stone Mill, Delta Ontario

City Heights - My favourite Skyline view from The Islands

Long Weekend

So Victoria Day weekend is upon us...Hooray for 3 day weekends.
The weather was spectacular yesterday So Rob and I drove down to the South Shore and visited Mahone Bay, Lunenburg and Blue Rocks & Stonehurst. Definitely my 'go to' places especially when the sun is shining.

I think we discovered the best fudge ever in Mahone Bay, we bought a box of different flavours including Root Beer, Maple Nut and Orange Cream to name a few.
We had a spot of late lunch in Lunenburg at The Grand Banker, our favourite restaurant along the waterfront. All in all it was a lovely relaxing day in the sunshine, something much needed!

Robert has been busy in the garden, as everything is starting to sprout now. We got some new neighbours recently next door, obviously we didn't get to see them much over Winter except when they were behind a snow blower! But now they too are our in the garden most of the time. Cindy is not a big plant fan, something that surprises me, since she and her husband bought a bungalow that was owned by a keen gardener. I have been eyeing up a dwarf weeping willow in that back yard for a while, so I made her an offer, and the deal was done. It is now planted in the front garden where we dug up a rather sad rhododendron bush last year. We also gained a rambling rose. When Cindy said she didn't want it, I jumped at the chance of taking it, as I knew it was the previous owners pride and joy and the colour is my favourite shade of pink. Rob and I are thinking of moving in on her compost next :o) The lawn is looking pretty awful after the all that snow and ice. Not sure it will ever look right this year as there are so many bald and dead patches. We had an area to fill that has no grass at all, the previous site of a kids swing set. So a new flower border is now in place...Now all I need are some plants.

We now have a BBQ thanks to Anne and Smiffy who were getting rid of theirs. So far we have cooked up a storm on it twice, and it's so good to finally have one. I suspect if the sun is back out again tomorrow we might be heading for our third.

Big Brother UK has started....So apologies to those of you who are following me on Twitter as I am tweeting quite a bit about it and also on BB Canada as that is still running for another two weeks.
For those of you that know me as a reality TV junkie, I hope your read the article in the Daily Mail recently which finally vindicated me, as it said that watching reality TV is good for you....I know, weird huh, but apparently it is good on a social level. People that watch are able to analyse people much better in real life, and it keeps the brain sharp tactically.

Here are some images taken yesterday...Click to view large!

Lunenburg Panorama

The Three Sisters, Mahone Bay

My Favourite Place...Stonehurst

The Sun is Shining

Finally all the snow has gone, Robert has started to pick away at the grass and even I ventured out in the yard today to clear some dead foliage and do a little weeding. Nothing blooming yet, but it's shouldn't be long!

Anne and Smiffy gave us their old BBQ, it needed some TLC but it's back up and working, we just need gas now and a quick paint job and it will be good as new. It will be great to finally have one. I think we must be the only people living in Canada without one until now. Canadians BBQ all year round, not just the Summer...Oh know they are out there in all weather?! Now that is something I will never quite understand as a Brit.

I finally caught up with Racheal yesterday, and we took a brief ride out to Eastern Passage to try and get our photo mojo back. Linda (our Mortgage Broker and Tax filer now) popped round with out Tax paperwork. What with one thing and another, being first time home buyers in Canada, costly reno's on our house in the UK and some other factors, we did actually get some money back this year, which is much needed. Some of that money is going towards a Cordless Dyson...OMG I cannot wait to get it! How sad am I to get so excited about a vacuum.

Robert has got himself a second (part time) job. It's only a couple of hours cleaning on the weekend (very early in the morning), but it should help us when his work drops off in the Summer.

Will leave you with a favourite Your Tube vid and some recent pics.

The Colours of Fisherman's Cove

Spring at Prospect

Makes a Change from a Fish Supper

A Ropey Collection

Coming out of Hibernation

It's been yet another long spell without an update for the blog. I really have had nothing to say as I have continued to hibernate due to the cold weather and the dreaded snow hanging around for far longer than it should have.

I am however pleased to report that due to a few nice days of above zero temps and some much needed sunshine we have turned a corner here and the snow has all but gone. The lakes are still mainly still just frozen on the surface, but I think even they will once again look like lakes but the end of this week.

Today I felt it was time to start easing my way out of hibernation. I finally left the house and it felt strange! Robert and I took a late afternoon drive along to Peggy's Cove via Prospect on route, the light was inviting, even if there was a distinct chill in the air especially at Peggy's. It feels like I am taking baby steps back into the outside world, As the weather improves I feel and hope my mood will improve too.

I actually managed to pop round and see Nancy one day after work last week, I haven't seen her in the longest time and her birthday gift had been gathering dust on a shelf. It was nice to have a catch up. I have yet to see Rachael but I feel we should be out with the cameras (fingers crossed) in no time now.

I have of course been totally immersed in all things TV, Netflix is a general staple of every day! I am currently watching Bloodline, which is very intriguing and addictive. Plus shock, horror I have actually started reading a book this week 'Behold a Pale Horse'. Probably not an obvious or easy read, but something that I am pretty fascinated by.

Until my next entry, I will leave you with one of the images taken earlier this evening.

'You can never 'tire' of Peggy's Cove'

Spring has NOT Sprung

I felt I should make an update, but I am finding it somewhat difficult to sit at the keyboard and remain perky about anything right now.

I have been pretty ill for the last 3 weeks. I got very bad bronchitis again, which resulted in a trip to the doctors, a round of antibiotics, and two inhalers. I missed some work because it  and ended up in bed for 5 days. Since then it has abated, but I am still coughing and have found it very difficult to deal with the heavy cold cold like symptoms which followed.

I have only been out of the house once socially since my last update and that was a trip to a local salon with Anne. We treated ourselves to some pampering, a facial, pedicures and a manicure in Anne's case. The particular day in question was a rarity....It didn't snow, the sun was shining and I believe the temperature reached 1 or 2 degrees. Since than it has all gone down hill again. We have had yet another storm, with a huge dumping of snow which effectively put Nova Scotia out of business last Wednesday. The snow banks are so high now everywhere there is really nowhere to put it now. I have never seen so much snow in my life. There are only two good things to come out of this....Number 1, People have almost stopped talking about 'The Great Storm' White Juan. Number 2, I got a day off work on Wednesday! As I sit here typing it is snowing yet again and the wind is howling, it is all due to flash freeze later after we get some rain. My mood is literally at an all time low, I am utterly fed up with the weather and a few other things besides.

For those of you interested, I have given up smoking once more the day the coughing started I knocked it on the head. Of course last time I crept back to it, so this time I am not making promises I cannot keep, just taking it day by day, but it will be a month on Tuesday.

The only thing that is keeping me remotely sane right now is TV. Big Brother Canada starts tomorrow, I have Dancing with the Stars just started again, The Voice USA and Survivor to keep me going in the world of reality TV. I have also been watching The Voice UK...and if you are you have vote for Vikesh to win...An unlikely star perhaps, but what a voice. He tweeted me back the other day, as did Michael Van Schoick, who you might better know as Dave form the Money Supermarket Ad...I so love that ad!!!

I have been following the British politics in the lead up to the Election with much interest. What a am finding particularly hard to tolerate is the slanted media bias that has been heaped on UKIP. Now I am not saying that they don't have some dubious followers, but at every given opportunity the media make the whole party out to racist and homophobic, which I do NOT believe is the case at all.
I can only assume that the powers that be are that afraid of UKIP that they feel the need to constantly bash them and belittle them. I also noted that the Tories are in some do-do thanks to Afzal Amin and his cunning (or as it turned out, not so cunning plan)...And and lets not forget (although we really want to) Clegg and his donation scandal. This could be an interesting Election for sure.

I will leave you with images from the back and the front of the my house, my favourite ad of the moment and a NEW 22 Minutes Halifax Tourism ad/Skit.

Our Driveway

Looking towards the driveway from Front Door

Our Road (worse since this was taken)

View from my front room window of the garden

View from the kitchen of the back garden

Another Storm

Here I am again with nothing much to report except the dreadful weather.

I celebrated my birthday on Feb 10th, I say celebrated in the loosest of terms, it was possibly the most lack lustre birthday to date. I would like to thank all of you that sent cards and gifts, much appreciated. I found birthday wishes from my work colleagues on a big poster they made in the loo....Commonly known now as my second office. A customer bought me in a cake, which was sweet and Rob brought back a Chinese takeaway. My birthday wish was that it didn't snow that day, but sadly that wish didn't come true and it was yet another messy day on the roads, however that was nothing compared to the weather today. We have had more snow, followed by ice pellets and then a load of rain as the temperature rose for about 2 hours, which caused some melting of the massive amounts of snow everywhere, that in turn has and is now flash freezing again as the temperature drop back down to around minus 15.

The last few weeks have been relentless, almost everyday it has been a struggle to go anywhere and try and keep on top of snow clearing. Just leaving the house requires a good extra ten minutes just to get extra layers of clothing on and boots of course. This Winter really has turned into possibly the worst one yet here for me. I hate it! My mood is bleak most of the time, I cannot be bothered with anything. So if I haven't written back to you recently, it's because even the computer holds no interest for me. I am pretty sure I am not alone in feeling this way, most people I know seem to have no energy and sleeping way more than they normally do.

I am hoping upon hoping that this weather ends soon and I can begin to get out of this funk.
One good thing in amongst the weather gloom is that we have a new Stat/Bank holiday tomorrow. Many other parts of Canada already celebrate a day off in Feb as Family Day. Nova Scotia have called it Heritage Day and tomorrow is the first one. I am thrilled to be having a day off as it means I don't have to try and get into work. I find it funny that most other Provinces call their holiday 'Family Day' yet Nova Scotia has to call it something else.

I will leave you with a couple of snowy images - On the left a view of the front garden and driveway, on the left a car buried in snow out the back on of the units next to where I work. The image was taken last week. Good job they left the windscreen wipers up to stop  them getting snow covered!!!! I actually saw the lady owner digging it out Thursday but by Friday it had more snow on it. I am also posting my favourite viral cat video of the week.

Spot the car in the right hand image! Click to view larger!

Still Here

It looks like Winter proper has kicked in now, after a relatively snow free December and half of January, we got a first 'full on' Winter storm last week. It moved up the Eastern Seaboard affecting NY and Boston the worst as no doubt you will have seen in the papers and on the news, it was a pretty messy affair for us and as usual it was a battle to get to work, I luckily grabbed a lift in with a colleague and we were sent packing at noon as the roads were terrible. Since then it has snowed more, thawed, frozen, chucked down some freezing rain which took Rob and I 20 minutes to chip a thick layer of ice of the car, then it snowed some more and has now frozen again and guess what...we are due another winter storm on Tuesday...Yay!...NOT!

In case you haven't spotted it yet I hate the snow and winter in general and it has literally sapped any life out of me, I go to work I come home and I don't do anything. Just getting on the computer is proving an enormous effort as you can see from my lack of updates.

Rob has been pretty busy in and out on call his colourful language appears to be getting worse every time he has to go outside to empty the bins, shovel the driveway, open the shed or go out in general. It's been so cold that the lock keeps freezing on the shed door which maddens him to the point I think his head is going to explode, I watched him earlier doing a Basil Fawlty and kicking it relentlessly.

Although I maybe inside more than out, it has certainly given me plenty of time to watch lots and lots of TV. Something I missed in the UK but have now watched on Netflix is 'Last Tango in Halifax' What a fantastic series that is, I loved it, and it has to be right up there with my all time fave TV series now. I have also finished watching the latest series of Lilyhammer, which is a series that so shouldn't work in theory but just does, it too is one of my favourites. I could list so many more but there are way too many of them. I have been engrossed in Celebrity Big Brother and loving it. I am torn as to who I want to see win it but I think as a beacon of calm in a sea of Chaos, Keith Chegwin should win it. I have been sharing many tweets with the BB fans and Interact quite regularly with Judi James the Body Language expert on Big Brother's bit on the side, I have also been interacting with Chris Wright one the contestants from last Summer's Civilian BB (he was my favourite to win it but sadly evil prevailed over good). I should mention that I have also in the past had Twitter one or two interactions with Keith Chegwin (when he was on Dancing on Ice). I love Twitter and interactions like these make it so much more interesting.

I will leave you with my favourite viral video that never fails to put a smile on my face...I love it even more as he reminds me of Hank from Breaking Bad!