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CN Tower
Approaching in a taxi So here I am - four days in to my trip and I've enjoyed every second so far. There's so much to tell you all because there has been so much happening since we set off on Friday. I think I've done more things in four days than I would normally do in six months!
Day 1: Flew from Heathrow to Toronto. Pretty uneventful flight and we landed about 15 minutes early. We were at our (very presentable) hostel by 4pm local time and we were in a room for four. We later met our first room mate of the trip, Kumar. That agternoon we went up the CN Tower where my fear of heights of heights was given a good test (I swear the tower was swaying in the wind...). Had a few beers after, wandered the city and then turned in.
Day 2: Niagara Falls. An early train took us on the two hour trip to Niagara where we saw the two waterfalls. They are very impressive, although I must admit that I thought they would be bigger. The 'Maid of The Mist' boat trip was closed due to the weather (which has been gorgeous since we
CN Tower
Looking down! arrived?) so we just took the 'Journey Behind The Falls' trip, which is basically tunnels cut behind the Horseshoe Falls that allow you to see (and hear) directly behind them as well as get out onto a platform near the base of the falls. A great experience. That night we went out boozing in Toronto.
Toronto verdict: a clean and safe city that seemed to lack a real atmosphere, but didn't lack its own charm.
Day 3: The train to Montreal. Unfortunately the train journey ate up five hours of our day, although we made up for it with a big self guided city tour when we did arrive. The trip to Montreal saw me earn $100 from my travelling buddies as I whooped their sorry little arses at poker. And I'm a novice and had to keep asking them the rules! Anyway, we arrived, got to our hostel and the room was even nicer than the one in Toronto. We seemed to acquire a room mate at some point during the evening - an Aussie called Tom. Nice enough bloke.
Our first afternoon and evening in Montreal was spent walking from Rue St Catherine, the main
commercial road via the Old Montreal region to the Old Port, where we had a nice pizza and Poutine (a quebecois special of chips covered in gravy with curd). A few beers washed this down nicely.
Day 4: Up early today as it was our last in Montreal. We went to the tourist office and mapped out our day. So, breakfast of fruity bread, maple syrup and a nice selection of fruit was followed by a walk up to Mont Royal where we got some great views of the city. We then walked off of the beaten path towards Avenue du Mont Royal, which is a funky little road not too dissimilar to the kind of street you might find in Soho. We got the train from here to the Olympic Park area where we visited the 'Biodome' that is next to the Montreal Tower (we didn't bother paying to go up as we'd had our fill of views). The Biodome had four zones (tropical, forest, marine and polar) that were full of all sorts of plants and wildlife. Well worth the fiver to get in. We then jumped on the metro train again and headed off to Parc
Jean Drapeau, which is an island not far from the mainland. Here we walked along part of the Gilles Villeneuve grand prix circuit and went into the casino, which was HUGE. There must have been well over a thousand slot machines - probably more like four or five thousand. I didn't gamble this time! After this we got the metro again to Rue St Catherine where there is a huge underground city (which is useful in winter as Montreal gets very cold). We didn't stay here too long and we went back overground and found a bar/restaurant where we got pitchers of lager for about 3.50GBP and a steak, salad and baked potato for about 4.50GBP. Yummmmy.
From there we came to this internet cafe near our hostel and you're pretty much up to date. Tomorrow we are up very early for a flight to New York. Gonna get my head shaved there as this horrible mop is really getting on my wick!
Montreal verdict: a hugely diverse town steeped in history that is very interesting and offers an awful lot of things to do. I thought before I came that it would be a Canadian town with
a french twist, but in fact it is much more French than I ever imagined. I'd definitely come back here.
Ok, time to upload some photos. You can get in touch with me on cxgcxg@gmail.com, but bear with me on the replies as time is pretty tight over the next week or two!
Missing you - not!
Chris
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anonymous
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ahole!
i wanna be there! £10 i join u real soon!i love putney not!glad ur having a wicked time and keep us posted. - Anwar