The 1000 Pothole Missed Turn - May 27
I spent a little bit more time than I originally thought I would getting ready and saying goodbye to everyone in Shediac. Eventually, however I managed to leave Alana and Daniel’s house. I’m so lucky to have been able to stay there. I hope I can see them again in the future.
I’m going to go right ahead and summarize this portion of the trip because there wasn’t much that I would consider note-worthy during the drive. What happened was that I made my way to Fredericton. I drove around the downtown area, found a Tim Horton’s on the other side of the river, grabbed and iced cap, because that’s what I get at Timmy’s when I don’t want to be rude and just sit in the place using the Wifi, and a donut. I planned my trip to the longest covered bridge in the world and set out after completing the usual internet session check list. Here’s where everything goes astray. In a nutshell, I made a wrong turn or followed the road where I should not have done so. This mistake lead me down some fairly treacherous roads that contained many a pothole. So many potholes. These roads are not maintained like they should be. Long story short, I end up in Miramichi, New Brunswick, I go to the Superstore there to get some groceries. I find another Tim Horton’s, realize how off course I am, make adjustments, and try my damnest to get myself to Quebec City before I piss off my Couchsurfing host.
I get to the Walmart in Levis, close to Quebec, around 11:00pm Quebec time, which is one hour less that New Brunswick time, try, to no avail, to find the right route, fail, and send some messages to my host apologizing for being late. In the end we decided that I should just stay in the Walmart in Levis overnight and try again in the morning when I’m not tired and it’s not dark out. Fair enough. I threw up my curtains as best I could. Those clips are still the worst.
Frightened By a Lack of Language Skill - May 28
I woke up in the morning to a bunch of loud parents who seemed to be dropping off their children in the parking lot so they could go on what I assume was some sort of cheerleading competition. I got myself together, remade my car and re-read my directions to my CS host’s house. Instead of Google’s estimated time of 25 minutes, I took about one hour to arrive because I suck. That’s it. I realize I suck with directions. I get it. If at any point someone wants to buy me a new smartphone to use for the trip, let me know and I will gladly get you an address you can use to send it to me. I’ll wait around in a town for a new smartphone.
I finally arrived and my host and I spent some time getting to know each other and I planned my day. We ate some pancakes and I got my list of things together.
I spent the day walking around Old Quebec. I saw a bunch of old buildings which have great architecture to them. I enjoyed it a lot. I walked around the harbour, I saw a few acrobat acts which were cool, I walked the Governor’s Promenade, I walked along the high walls of The Citadel, I walked La Rue de Saint-Jean, I ate some poutine, and I had a generally good day. The walking tour I managed to stumble through went quite well. I was pleased.
For the night, my host and I spent some time talking about Mexico, Spanish, Mexican slang, watching Arrested Development, eating homemade pizza, and generally chilling out which is a great continuation for the nights in Shediac. It’s something I’ve missed. Just hanging out. I had a good day.
Hiking to a Lack of a View - May 29
After some chatting with Steve over our breakfasts, I got my things and plans together for a trip up north with Ivy to see some mountains and waterfalls. Though, since I haven’t seen the rockies in a while, I sort of doubt that it’s a real moutain. I saved my Google Maps as PDFs on my laptop, packed my day bag and got my ass in the car, ready for a good day.
About 45 minutes later, because every trip takes a little longer when I don’t have my smartphone for GPS, I arrived at Mont Sainte-Anne, paid my nine dollar admission few, chose and route, and started my hike. I was a little worried about the lack of mountain peak visibility, but still determined to get my ass up the thing in less time that the map I was given told me. The one thing I managed to overlook, however, was the fact that the amount of physical activity that would prepare me for a hike like this wasn’t even close to enough for me to beat the time by the margin I was hoping for. I think I got up with about seven minutes to spare, sweating, huffing, and weezing. But I did it. Check the view:
Yeah, not so great. I spent a few minutes eating a lunch I had packed and headed down, though, by accident I went down one of the steeper routes when I didn’t have to. Oh well. I was only wearing my running shoes that were improperly tied up which meant that I jammed my toes into the ends of the shoes the entire time. Those things are so going to be out of commission when I get back home. After hopping back in the car, I headed south to go to Montmorency Falls to see the waterfall. It’s cool. I heard that it is actually taller than Niagara Falls which is neat. There must be so much water going through that thing every minute. Here’s a short video that I took on my flip phone:
Aren’t I funny? After a bit of lolly-gagging I arrived back at Steve’s house to a note saying he had gone to see a movie. I spent a little time wasting away in the room on my computer and decided that a night walk through the town would be a better way to spend my time. So it was decided. I basically did the same walk as the first day but with some small variations walking down some bigger main strips and looking at restaurants and bars. The city is definitely beautiful at night. Would recommend. I got to sleep around midnight after buying some of Steve’s favourite beer as a thank you for hosting me. That’s one thing I’m not quite sure how to do with the whole CouchSurfing thing: showing appreciation properly to my host. I usually like to suggest that I can help with chores if need be, give rides now that I’ve got a car, but outside of that I’m not quite sure what to do except say thank you.
If I figure it out I’ll report back.
One More French Town, I Promise - May 30
OK, a quick one. I gave Steve a ride to work after packing everything back into the car in the morning and I headed to Montreal. I only had one directions based issue this time around and stopped off at a Tim Hortons to figure myself out. After that I struggled to find a free parking spot and caved for a spot on the street my host, Pooria, lives on. After meeting Pooria and chatting about languages, he speaks Persian, English, Swedish, French, and German, and giving me some suggestions for places to do and things to see I head out, reloading my parking for another two hours. I went to the old port, caught a glimpse of the Molson facilities, chilled while I listened to the new and new-to-me album from one of my favourite bands, Lake Street Dive, which is called Side Pony, and also some music from a new band a friend of mine posted on Facebook called Monsieur Perine. Monsieur Perine is a Columbian band that sings in Spanish, French, and English which is convenient because those are languages I wan’t to learn (English included).
Afterwards, I randomly walked around the city, stumbling into Chinatown for a bit and making my way back to my car going up through Saint Catherine Street which is quite nice and has a bunch of places to eat or have a drink. I got to my car, parked it on a different, free parking, street and went up Ontario Street to get some poutine! Poutineville is the chain I went to and it was delicious, of course. You can’t go wrong with braised beef, potatoes, cheese, and gravy. I then went up to La Fontaine park for a quick reading session to get my teeth sunk into The Prisoner of Azkaban.
I did a bit more walking around after reading, bought some real maple syrup and got back to Pooria’s place. We again chatted for a long while which is great because part of the whole couch surfing process is getting to know someone who lives in the city you’re living in. We don’t seem to have any trouble discussing anything which is encouraging.
Why Did My Camera Break? - May 31
So I woke up early as normal, had a chat with the Ukranian/Russian roommate Nick while he ate breakfast. Then after Nick left and Pooria woke up, I began fiddling with my camera to see if I could fix the error. I couldn’t get it fixed but I do know what’s wrong with it. Basically, when the mirror in the camera moves out of the way, one of the shutters stays stuck in front of the sensor, denying any light that would hit the thing from doing so. I tried to manually move it out of the way and that allows the light in as expected but the nothing worked to fix it permanently. I resolved to take it to the Nikon “store” I found on Google Maps as part of my Montreal adventure work for the day.
The walk started out well enough, I found the cross-streets that I had wrote down in on my notepad but I couldn’t see any store front of any kind that I expected. Damn. I gave up pretty early and decided to go for my Schwartz’s smoked meat sandwich as per basically everyones’ suggestion for Montreal. The long walk made me hungry so I couldn’t have been more ready for the sandwich. I got a seat in the main bar of the place and a was served. The sandwich and pickles were so tasty. I can see why people recommend the place but I’m almost sure it’s because they’re famous but not actually because the sandwich is THAT good. Fun fact, the guy serving me was from Mexico. I threw in a few phrases and got a smile out of him which is one of the reasons I learned the language. Mission accomplished.
I then headed up Mont Royal, Montreal’s namesake hill. I spent a lot of time just chilling at Chalet du Mont Royal listening to people play the public piano, watching people go by running, cycling, and chatting. It was a relaxing afternoon doing only that. I took one more look at the city below and walked down to Lac Aux Castors where I sat down in the grass and read some HP. Then I decided it was time to start heading back to Pooria’s place so I began walking around the hill the long way. I came across Rue de Saint-Joseph and remembered that there was something on that street I was supposed to see. As expected, I came across L’Oratoire Saint-Joseph, went up the staircase and into the tall and intricate building. It’s a sight to behold for sure but I didn’t spend too much too ogling it. Instead, I set off once more to try and find Pooria’s place with no help from the internet, something I’m not sure I’m improving at.
I basically took the longest, most roundabout (literally), route I could have to get back to the apartment. I went too far north, then too far east, then I found some street names I recognized and finally arrived having eaten a good portion of the food I bought at the grocery store earlier. When I got back Pooria’s Swedish friend Nicolas had arrived and we met each other with a smile. As I cleaned myself up and made some peanut butter sandwiches for dinner they spoke in Swedish about god-knows-what but I enjoyed it because they’re both polyglots. So cool. Language goals. We stayed up late talking about the backwards things Sweden is doing to accommodate Syrian refugees, Swedish culture, and the like. It was a good day but I don’t think I want to walk that much tomorrow.