Reminiscent....

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So, I feel like visiting the past a little bit. Seeing as how Canada is the only foreign country I've been to, and it will be approximately one month until I go to my next country, Mexico, I figured I'd rehash a wonderful trip to Montreal my family took. I only wish I had pictures to go along with this, because the story is hilarious....well, at least for those of us present for it.

So, it was back in 1995, because Jessica had to come up from UMO to join our little caravan. We took two vehicles, females in one, males in the other. My mom, my sister, and my grandmother were driving my sister's Ford Escort, and my dad, my grandfather, and I were riding in a little Ford Escort, also. Mom had made reservations at a hotel just outside of Montreal, so that was where we were heading. Probably a few hours into the trip, we decided to stop to get something to eat. No problems so far. My sister was a little tired, because even though she had just driven from Orono to Limestone, she was still volunteered to drive the first leg into Canada.

We stop at some restaurant to eat, and everyone orders something different. Strangely, the only one I remember ordering is Grampy, because he ordered a bowl of pea soup. You may ask yourself why his order is the only one sticking out in my mind, but this will become clear all to soon. After the meal, it is back in the car, as we are probably about half way there. An hour later, I am tearing through the car looking for a notebook, and once I find one, I begin writing signs on the pages to flash to the car of females. They are cries for help. Pleas, really, do to the asphyxiation that was occurring in my vehicle. Apparently, unbeknownst to me at the time, pea soup can cause some rather unpleasant gastrointestinal pyrotechnics. Unfortunately for us, it was also the middle of winter, and we were in the midst of a wicked cold snap, so rolling down the windows was not an option. We did anyway, as long as we could bear it, just for the shot at pure oxygen. My notes to the other car were only met with laughter, as were the descriptions of the turmoil we went through at later times throughout the trip. In fact, the story still gets brought up regularly at family gatherings. Go figure. I'm surprised I can even smell anymore.

Fun part number two. We get completely lost on the way to the hotel, and drive around until the wee hours of the morning searching for this place. Finally, we pull into a police station. I go into the station with my mother and father, and the officers give all the directions talking directly to me. Apparently I looked French. This would not be the only time conversations from the locals would be pointed to me. So, they are giving directions to the address we have. We are later to find out that the hotel we supposedly had reservations to burnt down a year earlier. Yippeee....

More fun? Oh you bet. The next day we do the tour, saw some churches, old buildings, etc. It was great. We stay right in downtown Montreal that night, and there is a HUGE snowstorm that drops right on us. It was great, because it started before we were in for the night....while still doing touristy stuff, and we had to cross this bridge. I have no problem with bridges, but my sister is borderline paralyzed by them. And it just so happened she was driving, in this blizzard, across this bridge that was one lane wide, but had 2-way traffic. Also, it wasn't paved, it was a grated bridge, and the water below was black, and choppy enough that the white caps almost reached up to the driving surface. Oh yeah, this little plank walk was attached to a train bridge above us, which was being used at the time, also. It was great. I wish I could have been in their car for that one.

The next morning, my Grandmother was trying to comment on the amount of snow to one of the hotel maids, who only spoke French. As I was the only person in our group that could currently speak French, I had to come to this poor woman's rescue. My Grandmother is of a rare school of foreign language, in which raising the volume of your voice makes English comprehensive across all language barriers. The waiter downstairs was on his own, though, because I was hungry, and too busy stuffing my face, so I could hopefully help avoid a lunchtime stop where pea soup might be served. We ended up stopping, but no pea soup would be touching any bowl at our table.

However, the final meal on our way home was not without incident. My sister and I see cheese fries on the menu, and think "Hmmmm....fries and melted cheese....let's clog those arteries." Well, in real Canada, apparently, cheese fries consist of French fries with some kind of crumbled nasty hard cheese on them. We were pissed. After scraping all the chunks of nasty off the fries, we decide that at least we can save them with the old "drown in ketchup" method. So, we proceed to let the red rivers flow onto these fried potatoes. And then we proceed to mow down on this pile of heart disease. But something was amiss. We couldn't quite place it, so we kept eating, slowly, trying to figure it out with each bite. Finally, Grandmother reaches across the table, snags a fry, and says "Oh, that ketchup is rancid." I look back and think it is amazing no one suffered any form of food poisoning on this entire trip.

All in all, it was great. Not realizing it right off the bat, I can look back now and appreciate all the funny stories and inside jokes that came from that trip. It is amazing how often parts of it are still brought up on a regular basis...as any good/miserable family trip should result.

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Comments

[Jessica]

A few things you forgot!!!
If you remember, after finding the hotel that had burined to the ground we drove around in many, many more circles until coming upon a retreat if you will for the night. It was a wee hours of the morning at that point when we checked in and check was at an unreasonale time. I feel that we only slept for a mear 3-4 hours and we were off again. Now let us travel to the bridge shall we. I was not driving at that point, Mom was. I recall being in the back seat saying words that neither Mom nor Grandmother had ever heard. I recall my head grabbing the headrest on Grandmother's seat so hard that I thought I was going to remove it. All the while the two of them were laughing at my expense. I also recall that the bridge was so narrow that if you had your window down you could have reached into the car next to you. One slight gust of wind, and if was windiy that day and it wold have pushed you into the other lane of traffic. I remember that once we were off the bridge, someone in my car made the statement that they thought we weren't supposed to be one that one and should have been on the "safe" bridge that was above us. Yes my friend a good time was had by all. Don't forget the teo, count them two parking tickets that we got in the city. We thought nothing of and Mom figured we won't pay then it's in another counrty, not a big deal. Then came the letter form the Canadian National Government that we had to have the French Teacher read for us becaue none of us understood it. I feel like Mom ended up paying some ungodly amount of money for these things. The "pea soup" meal happened at the Irving on the Trans Canada. Remember that we stopped again on the way home and threats were made to my poor Grandfather that no pea soup would be eaten again. Oh what a trip. We should do it again someitme!!!