Canada - the final EPIC blog entry!!

Friday 14th August 2009

11.30am
Well our flight was delayed this end but only by 15 minutes and there was no hassle at all from check-in right through to takes-off.

I got up at 6.30am so that I would have time for a relaxed shower and breakfast before we had to go out. As I expected, when I went down pat was the only other person awake. I had my breakfast of raisin bran with banana as I intended and shortly after that my mum got up. My mum only had a yoghurt for breakfast and even that she gave the end of it to me! I then remembered that I had my own yoghurt in the fridge but when I went in search of it I couldn’t find it. Pat was looking as well and then she suddenly realised “oh I had kids here yesterday”. She asked Patty but she didn’t know if anyone had had it. Pat said in her house the grandchildren know usually if the see something and want it they are allowed to just take it – she forgot to tell them to stay away from the yoghurts, oh well.

Lesley dropped off some clean clothes for Patty at about 8am and by 8.30 we were all ready to leave. As we were driving to the airport somehow the conversation got onto church and serving on the altar etc. Pat asked Patty if Michey was still serving on the altar and said she felt sorry for the priest. Patty said Michey is actually well-behaved on the altar and then said “Maybe she should stay on the altar for the rest of her life and then she’d be good!”

When we got to the airport the Air Canada drop-off point was right at the end. We had a very brief goodbye – Pat says she doesn’t like goodbyes cos she cries and I think I might’ve done too if we lingered – in fact I can feel myself welling up as I write this (17,000 ft above ground level)

We joined the (very short) line near the desk for Air Canada and when we were at the front one staff member told us to come forward to the screen. We didn’t even need tickets, it was an automated system where you scan the picture page of your passport and all the information pops up on the screen. Once we’d done both passports the person on the desk had to issue boarding passes and stapled the little green visa waiver slip onto them. Then there was a place in the middle of the hallway where you drop your checked luggage before going through security.

When you do go through security they don’t have just a normal metal detector for you to go through, it’s a funny machine where you have to stand with your hands above your head with fingertips touching and you have to look up. A vertical bar then goes round and scans you.

After security we headed to our gate and the previous flight going from our gate hadn’t even boarded yet!!:-o we just found a couple of seats and parked ourselves there to sit for the next 90 minutes :-o It had taken us just half an hour to clear everything and arrive at our boarding gate :-o :-)

We’d been sitting about 10-15 minutes before they started boarding the Chicago flight which was the one going before us. We were watching them board and there was an old bishop (or someone equally important in the church) sitting in a wheelchair waiting to be boarded, he looked pretty relaxed, I’m not sure if there was anyone with him. Also on that flight was an unaccompanied minor, (presumably) his mum was with him in the gate area and she seemed a lot more nervous than he did. I heard the mum telling one of the staff he’s flown with them many times but it was the first time he’d flown on his own.

Because we were sitting in the gate area and not making any moves to get on the plane one of the staff asked us where we were going. When I told her we were on the next flight to Toronto and we were early, she and I both laughed and she said “we like early”.

Obviously there wasn’t a lot for us to do so we basically sat and chatted, and I filled our water bottles from the drinking fountain. We also ate some of the food we had with us. We had a banana and half a packet of cookies each.

When the plane landed that we would be getting on I went to the window to try and get a picture but it was round the other side and I couldn’t even see it! As we went through the tunnel to get to the plane I got my photos then.

As on the way out, the lady came round with drinks and snacks – lemon chilli corn sticks again *rolleyes*

Well we’re now on the way down – an hour, perfect time to write up today’s events so far!!


Saturday 15th August 2009

1.40pm
I was intending being in the pool right now but the lifeguard hasn’t turned up so the pool isn’t open at the moment :-(

Anyway back to yesterday’s update.

When we got off the plane I decided to get another photo of the front of it and when I did a staff member asked me did I want my photo taken coming off the plane so of course I accepted his offer :-) We then had to get a bus back to the main arrivals hall, obviously the little planes take off and arrive at the far end of the airport.

When we got to customs we had a bit of explaining to do – we live in England, are arriving in Canada from the usa and only staying 2 days ;-D There wasn’t a problem, it just felt a bit silly. Once we’d come through customs we had to go and find our suitcase. The carousels were at the bottom of an escalator and there was a set of seats where my mum parked herself while I went to get the case. As I approached the right carousel I saw our case coming round so I sprinted the last little bit so that I didn’t need to hang around while it did another circuit.

My mum was really surprised at how quick I was back with the case and then we had to go and find a taxi. We followed the signs and it was really easy, there was a man at the rank, asked us if we wanted a taxi so he got on his radio and got a car sent round to us.

While we were on the way to the apartment I wondered when I would start recognising places and we actually went past the hotel, I initially saw the Canada TD building and then knew where I was :-) My mum had reckoned on the taxi fare being about $30-$35 and it was actually $29 – she was extremely close :-) When we got to the apartment I was on key / door duty cos my mum said she thought she remembered it being a bit awkward – she was right, I had to jiggle and push and pull the door before the key actually turned.

We decided to just dump the luggage and then go over to Rockwood Mall opposite. The first thing we did was change our American money into Canadian, we actually got a little bit more Canadian than American :-) We then went in search of a new suitcase / holdall cos we’ve got far too much stuff to take home to fit into the cases we’ve got. We bought a nice bright blue and black holdall for $30. they had the same one all in black but we decided we wanted the blue one cos it was brighter and would be easier to see on the luggage carousel. We also bought a few groceries and luggage straps / tags before going back over to the apartment.

When we got back into the apartment we put the stuff away and then got our lunch ready. It was 3.20pm when we actually got round to eating our lunch :-o

We were just sitting watching telly for a while and then I decided to get the bags out although I can’t remember exactly why I’d done that :-/ While I was sitting on the floor with stuff all around me there was a knock on the door, I guessed it might be Connie and Doug and I was right :-) We exchanged gifts cos they’d been to a butterfly place and brought us a magnet and me a badge – we also gave them all the bits and pieces we’d bought them from America.

It seems that AB had had to work until her proper time of 4.45 rather than the summer hours of 3pm cos it was about 5.30 when she got home. She sat and relaxed for a short while and during that time we were telling tales from America and doing a bit of a photo show too. I was showing Connie pictures of our cats as well and then we got onto Lambananas ;-D I’d forgotten just how many photos of Lambananas I actually had :-o

AB had arranged that we were having barbecued steaks with potatoes and salad for ‘supper’ so she began preparing that before she handed over to Doug to cook the steaks. When the steaks were cooked we saw how big they were – they were enormous :-o :-o I only took a little bit of salad and potatoes cos I wanted to make sure I finished my steak!!! My mum said straight away she wouldn’t be able to eat a whole steak so she cut a section off and Connie decided she wanted the other part of my mum’s steak. Doug had 2v steaks to himself :-o

After ‘supper’ we just sat round chatting for a while, mainly about the various pets that the 3 families had had. Once Connie and Doug had gone home we still stayed chatting for a while. At one point I realised I had no clothes out for the next day so went rummaging in the case. I found some clothes but couldn’t find any underwear so I went digging. I ended up putting practically the entire contents of both cases onto the floor before I found any underwear *rolleyes*

2.50pm
I’ve just been down to the pool again to see if the lifeguard had arrived – the door was locked so presumably there isn’t a lifeguard and therefore no swimming :-(

Once I’d found my underwear last night I tidied everything away and cleared enough space to get the fold-up bed out when bedtime came.

I was lying on the floor in the living room and at one point either I commented or AB noticed that my feet were filthy black and she said “are my floors really that dirty? :-o I felt like saying “well actually yes they are” but we managed to skirt past it somehow. While I was lying on the floor the time was getting later and later and I was falling asleep while my mum and AB were reminiscing about their past – grandparents, great grandparents and aunts and uncles etc. Eventually at about 11.20 AB suggested we get the beds sorted for bed – hooray!

I didn’t sleep *too* badly although I did wake up at least twice – once cos I needed to go to the toilet and another time cos I felt Ash (the big black male cat) jump on the arm of the couch by my head – he was going up onto the windowsill. I woke up at around 7.30 and decided I might as well get up. Once I got back from the bathroom my mum was also awake. We didn’t really do very much for a while until AB had got up.

My mum went for a shower at about 9.15 and once she was out we started sorting out the laundry for washing. AB gave us her keys cos you need the electric fob to get into the laundry. We ended up with 3 loads for the washer and 2 for the driers. At the time when the laundry would be ready to come out I went down to check the hours and how to get in the pool. The sign said summer hours were 12-5 and 6-8, well this was after 12 so I tried to get in but none of the keys on AB’s keyring worked so when I got back to the apartment I told her. She then rang the superintendent of the building who told her you don’t need any keys at all to get into the pool BUT the lifeguard hadn’t turned up so they weren’t allowed to open the pool. Apparently she was ringing the contractors for the lifeguard to see what was happening and as soon as a lifeguard turned up they’d open the pool.

I sorted out all of the dry laundry for packing into the case, I figured (and I hope it works) that if we fold the washing in the right way it should hopefully iron itself in the case, especially as the clothes were still warm from the drier. I folded all the clothes very carefully and have packed them into the case – I’ll find out when we get home whether or not my theory has worked!!!

AB said she rang Robin to remind him about tonight’s meal and he asked would Doug pick him up cos Agatha’s at work and has the car, I got quite excited about this and said could *I* pick him up with Doug. Obviously I’ll have to ask Doug but I can’t see it being a problem – Doug was more than happy for me to drive when we went out :-)

Now we’re sitting doing not an awful lot – I’m blogging (and have Abbamania playing on the computer) and mum’s playing word games on the DS.

Right now my diary for this entire holiday stands at just over 30,000 words and obviously it’s not finished yet!!!

AB’s just been on the phone to Renee and apparently she’s bring her 2 dogs – they’re huge :-o

Sunday 16th August 2009

10.25am
Well this is the last time I’ll actually be updating from Canada at 2pm today Doug and Connie will be coming to pick us up to take us to the airport to go home.

Yesterday Doug came down with the dogs at about 4.10pm, they had their haircuts and Duke gets a Mohawk so I wanted to see the new hairdo and take photos. After I’d taken my photos Doug took the dogs back to their apartment. Connie came down and said that Doug was going to get the car ready to go and pick up Robin so AB tried to ring Robin to say we were on our way – no answer. She tried twice with no luck – she said almost certainly Robin had fallen asleep and then nothing will wake him up. Connie went out to tell Doug and when she came back she said was all ready for me – he was sitting in the passenger seat ready for me to drive. I really wanted to go and pick up Robin :-( AB tried again a couple of times within the next hour but still with no luck so she gave up then :-(

We were also waiting for Renee to arrive with the dogs and she’d said she was on her way. I think we must’ve waited about an hour before AB decided we weren’t waiting any longer and we ate our tea. There was salad, corn on the cob and seasoned potatoes. The corn was very nice, it was really fresh cos Connie and Doug had brought it from St Jacob’s a few days previously. I actually ended up having 2 cobs of corn, I’d had my first course and was looking at the table trying to decided if and what I wanted next – Doug decided for me, he plonked a corn cob on my plate LOL

Renee arrived with the dogs at about 8.30 – she’d stopped off somewhere on the way here. Her dogs are lovely – she’s got a husky called Shy and a Doberman called Terra. Doberman’s are supposed to be scary dogs but Terra is a big softy – the worst she would do is lick you to death haha.

Renee stayed a couple of hours with the dogs and she had food that she warmed up in the microwave. While we were all here AB rang Robin again and actually got an answer from him this time so we just chatted to him on the phone. Aww I just realised – if Robin had actually come down last night I might’ve got a chance to drive in the night over here, that’s the only thing I haven’t done now – all my driving has been during daylight hours.

When Renée was leaving with the dogs we had to stop Ash going out with them – Ash and Sky spent the first 2 years of their lives together and Ash still remembers. When they’d actually left Ash sat by the door for ages as if he wanted them to come back – it was quite a sad sight to see, I’ve never seen that in animals before.

I didn’t sleep particularly well last night, it didn’t help that at about 5.15am Ash was wandering round yowling *rolleyes*

I finally got up at about 8.20 and we’ve sat round doing not very much since then. I’ve decided I’m going to have a shower at about 12 o’clock and then after that it’s serious packing time – there’s just a few bits left to pack and obviously we then have to do a scour round the apartment to check we’ve not left anything and we also need to make packed lunch for munching in the airport. AB is making us a cooked breakfast right now, as we speak. She’s doing bacon, toast, potatoes, tomatoes and eggs – sounds yummy :-)

Right I’ll update next and finish off the holiday diary probably tomorrow when I’m back in England and trying desperately to stay awake so that I can go to bed at a normal time.

5.25pm
At about 11.15am AB had got the breakfast ready

12am (English time)
The pilot came on the tannoy a minute ago and told us the UK time was 12am so now we’re working on UK time although my body doesn’t think so! It’s dark outside now, they said they’re coming round with duty free soon and after that they’re going to dim the cabin lights to enable rest – I reckon at that point I’ll be putting on the light above my head.

Anyway, back to earlier today!

After breakfast I went for my shower and got dressed. Once I was dressed I got all the bags together to pack everything in.

I had the bags packed by about 1pm so we just sat and chatted until Doug and Connie came down at about 1.45, we weren’t quite ready but it was fine cos they were early anyway. We gave AB and Doug & Connie their thank you cards and gift cards – both sets of people shouted at us and said we shouldn’t have done it ;-D

We let Doug pack the cases into the car and when we got out we were amazed at how well he’d get everything in! on the way here we’d had one fewer bag and had had trouble getting everything in, I was convinced we’d end up having something on our knees.

As we got in the car I took up my position in the middle as official seat buckler-upper ;-D AB commented it would be the last time I could do it for quite a while!!

When we got to the airport we had to find a place to park and Doug ended up going the wrong way round a one-way system LOL

We then had to find our way into the terminal which was a bit of a maze of elevators. While we were wandering round we realised that AB looked really silly cos she was wearing my hat and my mum’s hat together so I had to take photos of her ;-D

AB, Doug and Connie joined us in the check-in queue so it looked like there were 5 of us travelling rather than just the 2, we commented that if it had been all 5 of us we’d be underweight with our luggage ;-D When we put our bags on the scales the lady asked us were we aware of our weight limit and the fact that we were overweight. It turned out we were 17kg over and at $20 per kilo we had to pay $340! :-o As it happened we had already calculated that we’d probably have to pay around that much anyway. The lady at the desk on this end wasn’t as nice s the one at our end – not only did we not get any money off but her actual manner was less amiable too. We had to go to another desk a little bit further down to pay for our excess baggage and there was a man in front of us who seemed to be taking forever to pay – how long dors it take to hand over some money?!

Once we were sorted we had a brief look round the shops, there were shops at the front so Connie was able to wander round with us although she didn’t actually buy anything. I just bought a magnet and my mum bought a cuddly mounty raccoon and a magnet.

After we’d looked round the shops we figured we had to bite the bullet and actually separate – mum and I through security and our entourage to go home. We had hugs all round obviously and I had to try very hard not to cry, I wonder if everyone else felt the same? In fact, as I’m writing this I’m welling up again :’-(

AB, Doug and Connie stayed for as long as they could see us in the queue for security and every so often we’d turn round and wave.

Once we were through security obviously we were on our own. There were more shops on the other side of security – the duty-free shops. We bought a t-shirt each and then headed for the gate.

We didn’t have far to go to the gate so we found ourselves a couple of seats to park ourselves on again. While we were sitting in the gate area there was a child having a tantrum and we were hoping he wouldn’t be near us on the plane!! I also did my normal task of filling the water bottles from the drinking fountain.

We boarded the plane and it was all very efficient. When we got to our seat there was a lady in the aisle seat who seemed to be pretty miserable, she was half-asleep and seemed as though she was just going to sit and get in our way.

Once we’d taken off we had the bar service and we also bought headsets on board this time. The on-board movie was “17 Again” so we watched that but there were a couple of times I couldn’t keep up with the plot. We saw in the in-flight magazine that the movie going from England – Canada was “Night at the Museum 2” and we were sorry we hadn’t been able to see that.

While 17 Again was on they came round with the meal, the normal meal was chicken potatoes, peas and carrots with gravy. We also had our side box with bread roll, butter, cheese & crackers, a packet of crisps and a chocolate brownie. When they brought the food to us my mum asked about her diabetic meal and at first the light attendant said she didn’t think there was one on board cos she’d done the special meals and hadn’t seen a diabetic one. She went off to have a look anyway and she found it and came back with it. Mum’s meal was stew and the main difference in her box was that she had a yoghurt rather than a chocolate brownie. We did the same as last time and saved the cheese and crackers for later.

Around the time of the meal the lady sitting with us became a bit more chatty, she was telling my mum that her father is dying so she’s been getting phone calls from the UK at around about 3am Canadian time so she’s sleep-deprived. Since then she’s been ok although she keeps moaning about the screaming kids – I can’t blame her but I wish she wouldn’t go on about it.

After our meal the duty-free service came round, mum and I both bought a set of 6 pairs of earrings in a little fold-up presentation box. They were actually bigger than we expected :-)

Earlier on an announcement came over the tannoy that 2 of the toilets were now blocked because people had been putting paper towels down them so there’s only 2 toilets working now. At this point there seemed to be a herding mentality – it seemed that half of the population of the plane (including us) joined the queue so the line went halfway down the plane!

2.20am (10.20pm Canada time)
We’ve just had breakfast – the normal meal was potatoes, (rubbery) omelette and beans, my mum just got a tangerine and kiwi fruit. We saved some food from our earlier meal so mum had my beans, her own tangerine and her yoghurt from lunch / tea – what a strange combination of foods!!!!

We’ve just got into a bit of turbulence so the seatbelt sign has come on and we’re all confined to our seats – except the cabin crew who are wandering round doing their duties. We’ve just watched a boring thing about a hidden city underneath Edinburgh and now we’re watching Fr Ted :-)

Thankfully the turbulence didn’t last very long – we’re free to roam again :-) The cabin crew have been round with landing cards for people who don’t have UK passports and also comment cards for everyone.




Monday 17th August 2009

11am (English time)

Shortly after the comment cards were brought round the pilot announced that we would soon be preparing to land so we were to put our stuff away, put the seats upright and seatbelts on. The lady next to my mum really seemed to wake up and become more chatty as we began coming down to land *rolleyes*

After a while the pilot announced that for landing all of the cabin lights would be turned off but we could keep our reading lights on if we wanted. As it happened I’d already turned my reading light off cos I wanted to watch all the lights on the ground as we were coming down. I *think* I saw Liverpool on the way down cos it looked like the outline of the docks and stuff.

Once we’d landed there seemed to be a long way before we actually got to a gate. Then, once we’d got off the plane there was a great long walk before we got to customs / immigration. We joined the customs / immigration queue and there didn’t seem to be *that* many people but while we were in the queue we turned round and the line went for ages :-o We then went round to find the baggage carousel, I left my mum sitting on a seat and I went to get our cases. I collected myself a trolley and then actually sat on it until the bags started coming. I parked my trolley against a wall so that I could get the cases on it without it rolling away and when I’d stood up to get the bags a man was nearly going to take it. When the bags began coming through ours came round really quickly :-) We then went to find our way out and our taxi driver was waiting for us right by the door – everything went really smoothly :-)

On the way home we were chatting about general travel and other stuff. Some of the things he was telling us we were glad we were already in the ground! The driver said he was ex-forces and he was telling us the easiest way for a terrorist to blow up an airport if they wanted to :-o

My mum had rung Paul before we left Canada to tell him not to lock up – guess what had happened when we got home – yes, he’d locked up *rolleyes* I kept ringing the bell and my mum was ringing on the phone to get him up. Once we were in I had some toast and then went to bed for a few hours seeing as I hadn’t slept at all on the plane.

Ok I’ve just done my last save and word count for this diary and I’m on nearly 33,000 words – an average of 11,000 words per week :-o And I’ve taken a grand total of 812 photos over the last 3 weeks ! :-o

America - part four

Thursday 13th August 2009

8.55am
well there’s obviously not that much to write about this early in the morning but I decided I might as well start today’s blog anyway.

I figured out how to set the alarm clock in my bedroom last night so set it for 7am and it got me up just when I wanted to :-) My feet feel as if my feet are burning slightly from yesterday – in a way I like this cos it means I’ll get stripey / patchy feet where my sandals have been :-)

I did my normal, got up had a shower and went downstairs where, as usual Pat was the only one downstairs. By the time I’d had my breakfast my mum had got up. One of Pat’s granddaughters was supposed to be coming down for the day today but the daycare people were taking all the children swimming so she decided she wanted to do that instead – and I don’t blame her at all!!

I went out and took some pictures of Pat’s house cos I promised Connie I’d show her what Pat’s house was like cos we’d had trouble describing it.

We’re having a ‘cookout’ later this afternoon so most of today will be spent preparing food for that. We still want our American souvenirs so we’re going to ring the visitors’ centre at some point to see if they have them or at least if they know where to get them.

2.40pm
Well we didn’t ring the visitors’ centre – frank said he wasn’t going there.

Just before we went out I went into Pat’s bathroom (I usually use the one upstairs) and she had a set of scales in there. I decided to try myself on her scales to see how much damage I’ve done on this holiday. I didn’t believe it cos they said I was about 125lbs (not even 9st) so I asked Pat if they were right – she said she’d like to believe so but everyone else who tries them tells her they’re wrong LOL

Pat said she wasn’t coming with us – she was busy making food for tonight’s cookout. I actually think she was probably glad to get rid of us for a couple of hours so she could get on with her stuff uninterrupted hahaha.

We went out to a few different places in Lorain trying to find souvenirs, we did find a few bits but we weren’t really very impressed with what we got. A lady in one flower shop did tell us about a shop in Amherst where we could probably get some stuff but that was a bit of a drive away.

When we were driving round looking for souvenirs I was thinking I needed a ‘bathroom’ (I obviously drank too much water before I left the house) but was hoping we’d be stopping for food soon. It didn’t look like we’d be stopping so I had to ask, but it seems I asked at the right time cos we weren’t too far from a McDonald’s. I hate having to admit to needing the toilet before anyone else, I don’t know why but I just get embarrassed.

Anyway, we got to Amherst and found the shop the lady had told us about – Ben Franklin’s and it was in there we got all the stuff we wanted – I got some more paper plates as a joke for Katie, a windchime, a toy windmill, some placemats, 2 magnets, and some stars and stripes pencils. That shop also had some pets for sale including baby mice, in the cage were some really tiny newborn mice that didn’t even have any fur yet :-o I was trying to get a picture of the babies but the adults kept getting in the way LOL

Once we’d got stuff we were pleased enough with we headed back towards home. Frank asked us if we wanted to eat so we went into Rosie’s restaurant. We got quite mixed up when we were ordering food, I initially thought I was ordering a chicken salad sandwich but when it came it was basically a plate FULL of lettuce with some cucumber, tomatoes and 5 chicken strips on top :-o It was quite nice and of course salad is healthy but there was FAR too much lettuce and I left a lot of it. My mum did similar, she thought she was ordering a veal cutlet sandwich and she ended up with a meal with a salad on the side. Frank was the only one who knew what he was getting and got exactly what he’d ordered LOL

Once we’d eaten we had to go over the road to get some groceries for this evening, my mum and I also bought a few bits and pieces to take with us for snacking on the planes tomorrow and Sunday. When we got back Pat shouted at my mum for buying food – I knew she would hahaha.

Every so often when we’re getting in the car Frank offers me his keys – whether he’s being serious or not I don’t know but what I do know is that I don’t want to drive over here with Frank. Apart from anything else, although his car is automatic his gear stick is on the steering column and it doesn’t appear to have anything on to tell you what each position means, obviously there must be at least Drive, Reverse and Park – I’m guessing there may be other positions but I don’t know and even if there are I don’t know *what* they are. Also at one point today we were turning left and Frank was asking me was it clear at my side – I had to tell him there was a red light in front of us :-o :-o

9.20pm
Well the cookout is over, little Patty is still here, Frank’s gone out to his poker night and I’m sitting here doing my last update that will go online before we get back to England.

Denise arrived with Julius at around 4pm and they sat on the deck outside, I didn’t actually join them until after 4.30 cos I was blogging and doing photos and surfing the internet.

When I went outside and joined them we just sat chilling and chatting. At the moment Julius has got crutches cos a big log fell / got dropped on his foot and they think he might’ve broken his big toe – OUCH!!!!

I think Lesley arrived at about 5pm with Michaela (Michey), Tom and little Patricia (Patty). We’d been warned that Michey was hyperactive but she wasn’t too bad today, her and Tom went into the woods for a short while and then she mainly stayed indoors on the computer.

There was plenty of food, we had burgers, wieners, bratwurst and a variety of salads. There was a fruit salad that Lesley had made but it had vanilla instant pudding in it so there then ensued a discussion about what would the English equivalent be cos Lesley printed out copies of the recipe for us. I’ve just googled and done a bit of research and my mum came up with the idea it might be Quick Gel – I’ve looked online but we don’t appear to have any other than red :-/ We’ll have to see properly when we get home.

We spent the whole evening just chatting and laughing, the parents were telling stories about the children, we were discussing the differences between English and American and generally just having a nice easy time.

Patty is staying with us tonight, she’s sleeping on the couch in the other room. Frank is out at the moment cos it’s his poker night tonight but apparently he’ll be home not too late and he knows we need to get up for the airport.

Right, this is the last time I’ll have the opportunity to be online before we get back to England. I’ll still be typing my blog but it’ll have to stay on the computer – ttfn (wavey)

America - part three

Wednesday 12th August 2009

10am
I’m now on my own computer attached to the internet in Pat & Frank’s house :-) Neil had already suggested that but I didn’t know if it was possible so I didn’t say anything, this morning Frank had the same brainwave and realised he had a spare Ethernet cable attached to his computer which wasn’t actually doing anything :-)

I didn’t sleep particularly well last night, sometimes I was too hot, sometimes too cold! I also had another odd dream. I was with someone (presumably my mum but I don’t know) and we were waiting for a bus somewhere. We looked round and a car had come down from a kerb and the front wheel had collapsed crashing the front wing into the pavement and it looked like one of those strange pictures you see of cars where the car is almost liquid. There was a man in this car and as the front wing had crashed down one of his windows had smashed and he had loads of glass in his face. Someone had a mobile phone and told someone else to ring 911 so presumably we were still in America / Canada. The next thing I heard Uncle Tony’s voice – we literally haven’t seem him for YEARS!!! It must be getting on for 15-20 years since we saw him :-S

I woke up at 7am this morning and went straight for a shower as I did yesterday. When I came down Pat was the only one up so we went out for our little walk round the back garden again.

We were trying to decide what I was going to have for breakfast cos I don’t really like cornflakes. I had a banana and we were still deliberating, by this time Frank had got up

5.35pm
We’ve been out today and have been back about half an hour. I’m actually really tired now.

We went out at 11am and went back to Cleveland where we were yesterday. Pat has decided to sit in the back while we’re going out so that I can take photos. After being in the front with Frank I think she’s glad of the opportunity to not have to sit there with his driving. At one point he nearly drove straight across the path of another car “I thought I had an arrow, maybe not” :-o And quite a few times he was far too close to vehicles in front and he often sped up only to have to brake quite sharply cos he then got too close again. At times like this I wish I wasn’t a driver so I wasn’t aware of what is / should be happening on the road and in the car. I can understand now how Connie feels wanting a brake pedal on her side of the car – though Doug’s driving is great, I’d happily sit next to him any time!!

We didn’t even try to park at the coastguard station today, there was another parking lot nearby but it cost $8. There was a sign saying lot full but the lady waved us in – there were just 2 spaces left and we got the best one – really near where we were going.

We’d planned on going on the boat trip up the river, we got there at 12 just when the next ‘cruise’ was going out so we went to get tickets and they said yes we’d make it onto this one :-) I think we were the last to get on the boat LOL

When we got on Pat said her and Frank usually split up – he goes upstairs and she stays inside so that’s what happened – I went upstairs with Frank, Pat and my mum stayed downstairs. The cruise was through a big industrial area – we went underneath 17 bridges – some of which raised, some were already high enough for us to go under anyway and at least one bridge spun round to let us through. Each time we got to a bridge that needed to move to let us under the captain blew his horn and where we were sitting the horn was really loud. At one point he blew his horn and I wasn’t expecting it so it made me scream, the girl sitting in front of me turned round and gave me a really dirty look!

Part-way through the cruise the battery monitor on my camera started flashing so I had a scrabble in my bag to find the new batteries – though thankfully this time I knew exactly where the batteries were in my bag so it wasn’t *too* bad and I didn’t miss too much scenery on the cruise LOL

The actual cruise with running commentary was about an hour long but then we had to turn round to return to the start. At that point I decided to go downstairs to meet Pat and my mum, I’d seen all the scenery and I was starting to feel burny anyway LOL

When I went down to meet mum and Pat they were really enthralled at the trip – not LOL Pat was thoroughly bored hahaha. I went to get some crisps and when I was in the queue I wished I’d had my camera with me cos the fire boat was on the river spouting water out of all its jets and that hadn’t been there on the way out.

When we got back to dock we were talking about a funny little man we saw painted on the road yesterday and I wanted to take a picture of it but it was on the main road by the science centre. I said I’d go on my own to take a photo and the others could just stroll around. I went the long way round to get to the man cos I wasn’t sure exactly where he was on the road. When I found him I initially just took a photo of the man but then decided to put my foot in the shot too so that you could see what size it is compared to my foot. Once I’d taken my photo I went back to the car by the shorter route and met the other 3.

Frank said his plan was to take us to the new restaurant for food – and he was buying! We’d been discussing on the way there how much our hotel in Canada had cost us and Frank and Pat said they felt sorry for us LOL

When we got to the restaurant I found it was a Chinese buffet place – just like the Mandarin. Initially we sat in a booth but we realised it wasn’t practical with us wanting to get up and down different times so we asked the waitress and we moved to a normal table. It was very nice, as normal I ate too much LOL. They brought us our bill while we were still eating and I thought it was odd but I realised why later on. We got there at about 3pm and the lunch buffet (at the lower price) finished at 3.30 so we realised we’d sneaked in just at the end of the lunch price. In fact the price was really good – something just over $27 for 4 of us!

We were then going on a brief shopping trip in search of American souvenirs but Pat and Frank wanted a few groceries from the shop next door to the Dollar store. One of the grocery items was a pack of beer and as she put it through the till the girl said “can I have a birthdate please?” – Pat was the one paying and she is obviously over 18 – she was born in 1932!!! We thought it was absolutely hilarious and the poor girl on the till was quite embarrassed – apparently the till needs a date of birth for beer or it wouldn’t let it go through.

We didn’t manage to get any American presents for people but we did manage to get presents for Connie and Doug’s dogs LOL. There was a pets section and it had little squashy balls decorated with the American flag – they were only $1 each so we got one for each dog as a laugh haha

There were no American souvenirs in either of those shops so we went to another shop a bit away but there was nothing there either. While we were in that shop another of Pat’s daughters rang to ask her something – she was in Pat’s house and couldn’t find something. Pat told her to stay there cos she’d be home very soon. When we got home Lesley was there so we were able to meet her as well. She didn’t stay very long cos she was on her way to get some groceries to make something for tomorrow’s cookout.

Now we’re doing what we’ve been doing every evening – chilling and messing about on the computers :-)

America - part two

Tuesday 11th August 2009

6.10pm
Well we’ve had a pretty nice day today – I had my own bedroom last night and it felt SO good :-D

I woke up at 6.30 and figured I was probably safe to get in the shower before my mum though I sat and looked at my clothes for ages trying to decide what to wear hahaha.

Once I was showered, washed and dressed I went downstairs and Pat was the only other one around. We went for a little walk round the back garden and we looked at the trees and flowers and stuff.

My mum came down a while later and once she was down and dressed we set about getting breakfast.

We then sat round for a while, not doing very much except messing about on the computers until 11am when we went out. We went into Cleveland City to go to the Science Centre. Frank is ex-military so he was hoping to be able to park in the coastguard station for free. We got to the coastguard station and there was a big gate there which said it opened and closed automatically but we couldn’t work out how to make the gates open. There was a little box with a button to speak to a person so Frank did that and got the gates to open for us. We went to a little shop within the coastguard grounds and you have to be military to buy anything from it – mum bought 2 bottles of diet pepsi (well, Frank bought it) but that was it. Where we’d parked initially said you could only park for 10 minutes if you were going to the shop so Frank went in search of someone else to see if we could get permission to park in the main compound. He was gone quite a while and Pat said if he’d found anyone he’d be busy telling them his life story. When he came back it turns out he was right – he said he’d got permission from ‘the chief’ and he wanted to meet us. We went round for a brief chat before making our way out. As we were walking towards the gates one of the men we’d been talking to came along to tell us how to get the gates to open from the inside – there’s a little button on a post that you have to press if you want the gates to open as a pedestrian.
Once we’d found our way into and out of the car park we made our way round to the entrance of the Science Centre. Once we’d got in and paid mum and I wandered off to start looking at the exhibits and we lost Pat and Frank almost immediately :-o We just carried on anyway but we weren’t actually that impressed – quite a few of the interactive exhibits seemed to be broken :-( I did manage to get a blimp to move and we played with an infra-red camera and watched a few mini-videos.
We then went upstairs to another section and that was more fun – you could play with sounds and water and lots of other fun things. While we were up there I played on a bike you pedalled to make lights go on and there was also a Van De Graaff generator you could have a go on – the machine that makes your hair fly up. My hair was all tied up in a plait so I took it all out hoping that it would stand completely on end but it was still slightly wet from this morning’s shower so it wasn’t quite as good as I hoped.
While we were upstairs Frank came and found us to say they’d be outside. When we’d finished. We didn’t stay very long after that and went downstairs to meet them. I saw Pat and Frank just outside so I knocked on the window to get their attention. When we met up we wanted to go to the souvenir shop but Frank said they were going to watch a show that was being shown on the grass outside so we were to meet them there. We went into the shop and got a magnet and postcard each.
When we went outside with the plan of meeting Pat and Frank we initially headed in the wrong direction – yes it was my fault!! I hadn’t read the instructions properly LOL Because we’d gone wrong we missed the show but Pat said we didn’t miss much cos it was aimed at little kids.
Time was getting quite late so we were trying to decide what to do for lunch – after a bit of conflab we finally decided we’d eat in the science centre café. More junk food!!! Just for a change though I had a hot dog instead of a burger.
Once we’d eaten we decided actually we’d had enough of the science centre. To be honest it wasn’t actually as good as the Manchester Science Museum which we went to a couple of years ago and it literally took us all day to go round and I think there was still more to see!! This science centre we did in just a couple of hours and I think we pretty much covered all of it.
We headed back to the car but even then we hadn’t really decided what we were doing next. As we were driving along Frank said he would take us home on the scenic route following the lake. As it turns out Frank had decided to take us to the beach hehe. We went to West Beach and Frank suggested I should go for a paddle LOL. I took my shoes off and headed down to the beach. At the bottom of the steps leading to the beach there was a boardwalk so I made Frank take a picture of me standing on the boardwalk hahaha. I’d rolled up the legs of my (cropped) trousers so that they wouldn’t get wet but it didn’t work – I still got drenched LOL. While I was in the water a man told me not to fall in so when I replied to him no I didn’t want to he obviously heard my accent and asked where I was from and he said he was the uncle of another man who was there and he was on holiday from Germany. As I was going back up the steps from the beach I was squeezing the water from my trousers and Frank said it looked like I was peeing myself – that’s how wet I’d got:-o LOL
Once we’d come off the beach we went for a little wander round the garden that’s just above. There’s a big Easter basket that’s currently got flowers in it so Frank took some pictures of me near it. I actually left my shoes with my mum and wandered round to the garden in bare feet.
Once we got back to the car the sand was more or less gone from my feet, there was just a little bit left I had to brush off. When we were in the car I had one very cold leg with the air conditioning on my wet trousers LOL As soon as we got back to the house I put on a pair of dry shorts and since then we’ve just messed about on the computers and I’ve put today’s photos on facebook :-)

9.30pm
We had our dinner at about 7.30pm – ham, potatoes and green beans. Just as we were finishing our tea one of Pat’s children, Denise came over. She’s really nice – we sat chatting for quite a while, especially about some of the grandchildren. She’s just left to go home, we’ll see her again on Thursday for the cookout. It’s bedtime very soon.
Night Night

America part one

Monday 10th August 2009

10.35am
Well we’re still sitting in Lester B Pearson Airport Toronto when we should’ve been up in the air for exactly an hour now! Oh, we’ve just had an announcement that we’ll hopefully be boarding soon – for the 2nd time!

11.15am
Hooray we’re in the air!! We boarded at about 10.40 and we actually got up into the air about 10 minutes ago. What I didn’t expect is that we’ve got a complimentary drinks and snacks service on board! We took the snacks each but when but when we looked at them they are “Lemon Chilli Con Sticks” we can give them to Pat & Frank – frank will probably eat them even if Pat doesn’t want them.

Last night we decided we didn’t want showers this morning cos we’d have to get up at about 5am – 5.30 is plenty early enough!!

I found my alarm clock when I got up this morning cos it was in the cosmetics bag I’ve got with all my hair bobbles and stuff in – what a stupid place to put it!!

For breakfast I had a banana, a beef butty from yesterday’s roast and a ham butty to finish off the meat we bought the other day. Mum had a normal breakfast – toast with jam.

Doug arrived for us at about 6.55 and took us to the airport – we had a nice uneventful journey to the airport – it was after that the ‘fun’ started!!!

First of all we had to find the right queue and it turns out that all the USA flights join the same queue – which was about 6 miles long!! We eventually found the back and joined the line. A staff member was there and asked us what time our flight was – when we said 9.35 (as we thought it would be!) he simply nodded in acknowledgement so we figured he must know we’d get through in time. Thankfully the queue seemed to move pretty quickly (initially anyway)! When we got nearer to the front the staff were calling flight times to come forward in the queue so that they wouldn’t miss the closing time of their flight.

While we were waiting in the line we noticed people filling in blue forms so we asked the people behind us what were they and did we have to do them too. She said they were customs forms and yes we needed to fill them in before we went through customs. As we went along a bit further I saw a pile of blue forms on top of a computer terminal so I picked up 2 and we filled one in while standing in the queue – you only need 1 form per family.

Eventually we got through check-in but we had to keep our suitcase and take it with us. We then joined another queue to be given a green visa waiver form to fill in but we weren’t told to fill them in there and then. The next stage was an ‘interview’ with a USA customs official. When we got to the front of that queue he said our green forms needed to be filled in before he could process us. He told us to go back to the front of the queue area and do the forms before approaching the desk again. The forms were so involved – including address AND phone number of where you’re staying in America.

Once we’d filled them in we went back to the desk to be grilled – duration of stay, purpose of stay, digital fingerprints, and photos – without glasses, any gifts for the US. THEN we finally got rid of our suitcase and had to go through the x-ray with hand luggage and all of us had to take our shoes off, not just if you got beeped through the metal detector like happened on the way to Canada.

We were then finally able to find out if we had a gate number to go to – 264! When I looked at the board I discovered we actually had to get a bus to get to our gate – and time was marching on! Thankfully we didn’t wait too long for the bus then it was a long journey to the other side of the airport. The place we ended up in we’d already seen from the road when Doug brought us in this morning. We got to the gate with about 20 minutes before take-off (or so we thought). We’d only been there about 5-10 minutes before they started boarding.

We had to go out on the tarmac to board the plane and it’s a teeny weeny one! I counted and there’s only 36 passenger seats in total! We were sitting for a while when the pilot came on over the tannoy – he was apologising that there would be a slight delay because we had no ground crew yet and the bags hadn’t come over yet either. Because of yesterday’s storm a lot of flights were cancelled so there were extra flights on today.

We sat there, and sat there, and sat there – getting hotter and hotter all the time. The bags arrived but they still didn’t get loaded onto the plane yet. People were getting too hot so they were going to stand outside where there was a nice breeze. I didn’t actually go outside but I asked the lady for a cup of ice and then I just stood at the top of the steps. While I was standing there a lady came up to ask the flight attendant about connecting flights cos she only had a short layover time between flights and we were getting later and later.

When I’d been at the top of the steps for a few minutes we were all told to go and collect our belongings and go back into the building. Initially we weren’t being allowed back into the building properly, just the corridor we’d come through to get to the plane. The flight attendant on our plane seemed quite exasperated at this si she went in and got us permission to go back into the gate lounge area.

Since we were inside I decided to go and find the proper toilets and ten when I came back I suggested to my mum that we eat the fruit we’d brought to snack on, especially as we had access to proper rubbish bins so we wouldn’t have to carry the skins with us.

There was one man on the plane with us and he was pacing backwards and forwards all the time in the lounge area and really getting on our nerves. I overheard him talking to someone later that he’d been travelling for loads of hours, when I mentioned this to my mum she reckoned he’d had too much coffee and was on a caffeine high which was why he was so jittery. I noticed someone with a bottle of water to go on the plane and I remembered we’d brought empty bottles with us to fill up so I went in hunt of a drinking fountain.

6.05pm
Obviously I’m in Pat and Frank’s house now, we have been for about 4 or 5 hours now.

We re-boarded the plane exactly an hour later than we should’ve taken off!! When we got on, the plane was still stiflingly hot but we were assured it would cool down once both engines were running properly. Thankfully that was right and as soon as we started moving the temperature became much more comfortable.

I think the small planes fly at a lower altitude than the big planes cos the seatbelt sign went off and the flight attendant started moving around a lot sooner than I expected – and we could still see the ground slightly from there.

Because the flight was only an hour we didn’t have too long to get bored, I simply wrote my diary in my book for the time and my mum read my Paul O Grady book. The landing began a lot sooner than I expected but I just kept on writing, simply leaning on my knee. While I was doing it I was laughing to myself thinking it looked like I was assuming the ‘brace’ position.

When we got off the plane and into the airport at Cleveland we didn’t have to show passports or anything at all – we simply walked straight through :-o We seemed to be following signs for ages to find the baggage collection area but when we finally got through to the correct area Pat saw us before we saw her :-) I left my mum chatting to Pat while I went to collect the case from the baggage carousel – when I got there our case appeared to be the only one which hadn’t been claimed yet (probably because it was such a small plane and we’d gone to the toilets as we got into the building).

We went outside to find Frank in the car and he confused me cos they’d come in the big car that they call ‘Dora’ and last time we were over here she’d stayed in the garage all the time. One of the first questions we were asked when we got to the car was “Have you guys had lunch?” When we said we hadn’t Pat said that’s where we were going!!

They took us to a Bob Evan’s restaurant which is the same chain we went to on the way here from Niagara Falls last time. It seems that Pat and Frank often go to Bob Evan’s and the service today wasn’t as good as usual. They were quite slow bringing our food out and the free coffee refills didn’t come as frequently as Pat would’ve liked.

After lunch we came back to the house and we’ve basically just chilled and relaxed for the rest of the afternoon. We’ve got our own rooms here – yippee!!!! Frank took our suitcase and my mum-s carry-on up to our rooms and we got settled into Pat’s sitting room – I’ve got both my laptop AND Frank’s computer hehehehe. The big computer is connected to the internet so I’ve been chatting to friends on msn and putting photo highlights onto facebook – I’m using my USB stick to transfer stuff from my laptop to the internet via Frank’s computer :-)

7.50pm
We’ve had our ‘supper’ we had ham, mash, corn and salad and it was very nice. I’ve also just sorted out my clothes in my room. I’ve put all my outfits on the floor and found I’ve done a slightly silly thing – brought pink socks with me but no pink clothes *rolleyes*

We’re not going to do anything more of interest tonight so I might as well post this now LOL All I imagine is that we’ll sit here chatting and computering until maybe 10ish before going to bed.

Canada - Part 12

Sunday 9th August 2009

2.15pm

Just for a change I’m writing about Sunday *on* Sunday :-o LOL

I haven’t had a particularly good day today and it doesn’t bode well for getting any better!!!!

The ONLY good thing I can think of isn’t that good really. A few days ago I said I felt fat and was hoping it was because I was pre-menstrually bloated, I think I was right because I’m now no longer PRE-menstrual and my shorts seem to be fitting better. Unfortunately I’m also now in pain with it. I was really hoping it would stay away until we were in America – it’d be much easier to deal with then cos I’ll have my own bedroom and can just pop up there for painkillers or whatever and no-one needs to know and I don’t need to try to be furtive to avoid questions being asked, as I do at the moment :-( The other problem with my current condition is that I want to cry all the time and I’ve got nowhere to escape to without people asking questions / worrying etc.

Anyway, back to my moaning and groaning about events related specifically to today!

I got up and got ready to go for my swim as normal but when I got to the pool I found I’d left my keycard in the room so I had to get the man from reception to let me into the pool – not a big problem in itself. When I got into the pool area the first thing I noticed was that there were no clean towels :-( I’d actually remembered to take my tape measure with me though so that I could measure the pool – how sad am I LOL It measures 750cm x 450cm – one length of this pool is less than a third of the pool I normally swim in. Even sadder is that I’ve just worked out those measurements mean the diagonal I’ve been swimming up to now is about 875cm long.

While I was measuring the pool I noticed there were loads of bits of black stuff on the bottom of the pool so I didn’t really fancy swimming in it. I went and sat in the whirlpool for a bit but found that too hot. I had another look at the pool and considered swimming cos the black stuff is on the bottom and I stay at the top but when I looked again there was also white stuff floating on the top :-( That was the deciding factor, I didn’t want to be swallowing whatever it was!! The other problem I had is that I couldn’t go back to the room cos I had no key and mum would be in the shower so she couldn’t let me in.

At around 7am I decided it was time to go back to the room and just as I was about to leave, another family came into the pool I suggested they didn’t want to swim in the pool and the lady said she’d go and ask them to clean it.

I went back to the room for my shower and to begin packing another few bits away before we went down to breakfast. There were no bananas again :-( I ended up just having a bowl of peach slices followed by a waffle and apple cos I wasn’t interested in rubbery eggs and pancakes or little sausages.

While I was finishing my breakfast mum went to get the stuff from the security box but she came back and said they haven’t got a key at the moment cos it’s broke so they’ll get another one before 11 when we were checking out.

When we went back up we continued packing more stuff and I got back on the computer. I was thinking it was getting near 11 so I started packing the computer away, it wasn’t until I practically had the computer in my bag that mum said it’s only 10am. My computer is still on English time and I translated it wrong *rolleyes*

When it actually was 10.45 I figured I HAD to pack the computer away :-( We’d arranged that Doug would pick us up at 11 so that we could go to church but it was just after 11 when Doug rang us to say he was here. He volunteered to come up and help so of course we accepted his offer. I went down to get a luggage trolley to take everything down and we really packed it full!!! I took photos of all the stuff we had because there was sooooo much – 2 people for 2 weeks, you wouldn’t believe the stuff we had!!

When we got down to the front desk the heavens opened!!!!! There was a huge thunderstorm!!! When Doug saw the amount of stuff we had he figured he needed to put his back seat down so that we could get everything in!! Doug brought the car really close to the hotel, and he and I packed the car. I then had to go back in to give in my keycard and post my postcards. While I was at the desk the power went down briefly because of the thunderstorm. I gave my keycard in but she had to write the room number on a piece of paper cos the computers hadn’t come back online yet after the brief power cut. I asked about posting the postcards but she said they don’t actually carry international stamps and the nearest place would be Shoppers Drug Mart at Rockwood Mall – right opposite where AB and Connie & Doug live. With the way the weather was we decided not to bother!!!

By the time we’d finished faffing about we were far too late for church and we were also far too wet as well so we came straight back to the apartment. Doug and I got extremely wet again transferring all the various bags from the car to the building. When we got into the apartment we dumped all our bags and turned AB’s apartment into a bombsite!! While AB was sorting our groceries into her cupboards we had to rummage in our suitcase to get out another outfit.

Once we were more or less settled I noticed the table was set for 4 so I asked who was coming this afternoon – “just Liz” Oh Great!!!!!!

I thought Doug and Connie were coming to the roast this afternoon but they’re going to Connie’s dad’s again today, they went yesterday but they’re going again today. I wonder if Liz invited herself today and it’s that reason that Connie and Doug decided to go out again :-/

Since then we haven’t done anything really, we had a bit of lunch and I’ve sat on the floor doing my diary all afternoon. I’ve also been petting Scratches a lot this afternoon :-) She loves being petted and I sat for about half an hour at one point just stroking and petting her :-)

It’s now 3.40pm and Liz arrived about 20 minutes ago *rolleyes* What a joyous afternoon we’re in for!!!!!

It’s now 4.05pm and I’ve just realised, AB has been in the kitchen for about 20 minutes sorting out the dinner and Liz has just sat doing nothing (admittedly so have we) but if Connie was here she’d be in the kitchen as well asking what she can do to help – not Liz, she wouldn’t think of that!!!

5.20pm
We’ve just had our dinner and Liz has made a bit of a liar out of me – when we’d finished eating she got up and cleared the plates away – what a shame she managed to slightly negate my slur on her character!

6pm
I’ve been editing photos to put onto facebook and Liz has just spotted a photo of us when we went to the Mandarin and commented that I didn’t get a photo with her and Barry and then she went on to say I didn’t have any photos of her or Barry. I didn’t rush to suggest we get a photo now LOL I simply agreed with her. And I’ve just found out when we get back from America next weekend there is no way Liz will be around cos she’ll be away in “ ‘alifax ” – yippee!!!

8.50pm
We’ve got an amazing thunderstorm here right now – in fact one enormous clap of thunder has just made me jump out of my skin!!!! When you get a thunderstorm here you REALLY get a thunderstorm!!!!

It seems I’ve lost my travel alarm clock – I have a habit of doing that *rolleyes* I bought one ages ago to bring away with me but when it came to packing I didn’t know where it was so had to buy another one – the one I did bring and have lost!! I must’ve spent the best part of an hour earlier searching through all of the bags to try and find it with no luck :-( My phone was shouting it needed charging so I figured I’d charge it and use it as a phone – “Unable to charge” ggrrrr >:-( Thankfully mum’s lent me her phone and I’ll try again to charge mine in Pat’s, I’ll also get myself another travel clock if I see one I like at a price I like!

Canada - part eleven

Saturday 8th August 2009

Obviously I’m now updating yesterday’s events LOL

It was arranged that Connie and Doug would pick us up at 10am but again they were early – they arrived and rang us at 9.45 :-o When Doug rang I was only just about to put my lenses in. In fact I was in the bathroom area when he first rang and I actually missed the phone, he had to ring back again LOL

I think we got down at around 9.55 and Doug said he’d drive us to the bank and then I could take over from there :-) We went into the bank to change traveller’s cheques. The lady who was serving us wasn’t sure what to do, she said she was usually on the enquiries desk so didn’t often deal with traveller’s cheques – at first she was even writing the wrong information from the passport :-o She did my mum’s cheques first and then when she was done mum went to look in the shop next door so I was on my own. When the lady realised I was from England she started telling me how she loves Coronation Street so I had to tell her it’s literally years since I’ve seen that!

As I was going out of the mall I realised I’d forgotten to ask Doug if he’d have the car facing forward for me – luckily he did anyway :-) When we got to the car it was all change as far as seating position was concerned cos originally mum was behind Doug and I was behind Connie but Connie said she wanted to sit behind me cos she knew she’d have extra leg room with me only being small LOL Once I’d got in my seat and Connie in hers I think Doug was putting stuff in the back or getting mum settled or something cos I just started adjusting the seat myself as I knew how to do it from last time. I seemed to be moving forwards for ages (the seat moves electrically) so as I was getting further and further forward I waved and said “Bye Connie!” hahaha. By the time Doug had come round to help me get my position sorted I’d done it myself :-) and I remembered to do my proper cockpit check today and I adjusted my mirrors before I moved!!

The drive was uneventful but I felt really good :-D I really enjoyed myself, and my left foot most of the time knew it wasn’t needed!! I had to ask Doug a few things but most of the time apart from giving me directions Doug was able to sit and not do anything. We even went on the highway and it wasn’t a big deal – in fact I was actually on it before I really realised ;-D The speed limit on the highway is 100 km/h but it didn’t really feel very fast at all.

When we got to the Botanical Gardens there were quite a lot of spaces available and no-one near me so I decided to try to reverse-park, that was the first time I’d gone backwards in Doug’s car and I had a car full of people :-o I deliberately picked a space where there were 2 spaces together so I had room for error. Because everything is so much bigger here, including the parking spaces I didn’t actually need that much ‘shuffling’ space :-)

When we went into the gardens we had leaflets that gave you 50% off one adult entrance fee per party so we split into 2 groups and pretended we didn’t know each other so we got 2 sets of one full price and one half price :-)

Once we’d got past the entrance bit we joined up again and began wandering. There is LOADS to see in the gardens. There were some models and things that were for sale but they were very expensive, I think the cheapest piece was $6,000USD :-o

At one point there was a country-type path with steps at one bit and ups and downs at another place, I took the steps and all the oldies took the ramp bits LOL When they got to about the half-way point where there was a bench they were all worn out – I wasn’t haha. We walked round many gardens and I took photos of loads of different plants and artworks. There are also lots of photos of me cos Doug kept telling me to stand in front of things to have my photo taken.

Just before lunch we went to the shop and I think we all bought stuff (except Doug). Mum and Connie both bought jewellery, I bought a calendar and a fridge magnet. We then gave the stuff to Doug to take back to the car while he got the lunch

At lunchtime we found a picnic bench under a tree at the front. It was very pleasant and I think we ate more than the day before cos there was less to take back to the car.

After lunch we found there were more bits of the garden that we hadn’t seen before so off we went to see them. By this point Connie and my mum were already beginning to get tired :-o We found the kids section so I did my big kid bit and went on some of the things. There was a model of a turtle on a tricycle so Doug made me take a photo of him and Connie holding an arm on either side. When I’d taken the picture he said to label it “Connie and Doug with child” hahahaha.

We went round the Mediterranean garden which had a downstairs bit and an upstairs bit. When we got to the upstairs bit there was a sign that said there were lizards roaming free round the garden so Connie decided to go on a lizard hunt – she didn’t find any :-( By this time Connie and my mum were definitely fed up and wanted to go and sit in the little area near the shop with 4 chairs and coffee table. Doug was saying there was another bit of that same garden which we hadn’t seen so he and I went back to complete that bit of the garden. We didn’t see the lizards but we did see 2 pictures of the lizards so we took photos of the pictures to make it look like we saw the real lizards to make Connie jealous – when we went back to the lazy ladies the pictures had the intended effect hahahaha. They were saying we should’ve brought the lizards out to show them LOL

Earlier in the day we’d seen a marquee in the gardens which looked like it was being set up for a wedding, near the sitting area there was a room that was obviously going to be used for the reception. When Doug and I came back Connie said I had to go and take a photo of the room cos they wanted to see it but they didn’t want to go and stick their own heads in!!!

We then all sat chatting for a while and trying to decide what to do next. By this time it was 3.30pm and we’d actually only gone round 1 garden out of 4! We figured it was probably far too late to begin another garden if it had taken us about 4 hours to do one!!! Jokingly (I think) we’ve said next time we come back to Canada we need to do both the Botanical Gardens and the African Lion Safari again cos we didn’t get to do all we wanted to in either place :-o

When we got back to the car I asked Doug to take some photos of me near and in the car seeing as it was the day I’d done the most driving so he gave me the keys and then took pictures :-) That was also the first time I’d got to turn the engine on cos before that Doug had got out of the drivers seat to let me in.

On the way home Doug was a bit late telling me to get into the right lane for the highway so I had to ask someone to let me in – once I was in the correct place he then looked over and said we weren’t going on the highway cos it was all backed up so I had to squeeze my way back out again :-o Thankfully there wasn’t too much traffic at that point so I could get back into the normal traffic fairly easily.

At one point while I was driving and I got beeped at for sticking to the correct speed limit *rolleyes* Talking of speed limits, it’s so easy for the auto box to creep up in speed, when I took my foot off the gas it didn’t always go down in speed, presumably because of the tendency for automatic gearboxes to creep naturally. I find it much easier to keep manual cars to the correct speed than I do Doug’s car.

We were chatting on the way back and Connie revealed that before we came over and I’d said I wanted a car and / or to drive over here Liz had said she wouldn’t feel comfortable with me driving!! :-o At that I asked Doug if I could drive to fish & chips cos Liz had invited herself to that so she could see me in action!!! He said yes of course – he was quite happy about me driving and it was his car I was driving!!!! A bit later on in the journey Connie was practically asleep in the back of the car so I commented that she was obviously comfortable with me driving haha.

When we got back to the apartments there was no sign of Liz’s car so we hoped that maybe she’s changed her mind and wasn’t coming :-D Unfortunately the reason her car wasn’t there was because AB had had to work late so they hadn’t quite arrived home yet – George let us into the apartment and then AB and Liz arrived about 10 minutes later :-(

Connie and Doug went up to take the dogs out for a bit before we went out for fish & chips so about half an hour later we were all ready to go. Liz didn’t know where the fish & chip place was so Doug was trying to tell her, eventually she said she’d follow us – and she knew that I would be driving cos we’d already told her before we left the apartment and Doug had given me the keys :-D

As I was driving along I knew Liz was following ME and knowing how Liz felt about me driving over here it was a very good feeling :-D :-D A couple of times I had to change lanes and almost lost Liz – no such luck unfortunately LOL

When we got to the fish & chips place Doug said we were going in the side entrance and told me we were turning into the next opening. Because I wasn’t sure where we were going in and the opening was quite small I was slowing down but not signalling until quite late so the idiot in a little yellow sports car behind me beeped me – Doug was funny, just laughed and said “bite me” :-) Doug’s a great person to have as a co-pilot, nothing on the road gets to him, he’s so calm – and I’m sure that influence rubbed off on me :-) I spotted my space at the fish & chips and decided to go in backwards as normal, I lined myself up at an angle and went into reverse so that the reverse lights would come on and got ready to go in. Liz came along and it really looked like she was going to pinch the space I’d just lined up for but actually she was squeezing past behind me – I didn’t realise there was enough space for anyone to get past :-o I didn’t actually get in very straight but I was at least between the 2 lines hahaha

When we first got into the fish & chip shop it was pretty busy and there wasn’t enough space immediately for 6 of us to all sit together. We were willing to wait a few minutes to see if space for 6 became available but as usual Liz stuck her beak in “no I want to eat now, I’m hungry!” As it happened, just a few minutes later we could’ve slid a 4 and a 2 together but that still wasn’t good enough *rolleyes* Then Connie was ordering my mum’s and my meal for us and Liz snapped at her “they’re not children I’m sure they can order their own food!” We weren’t bothered, Connie was just being nice but as usual Liz had to have her say!! At one point Liz said “is there a problem? I can go home” I felt like saying to her why don’t you!!

The meal was nice – well, the chips were average but the fish was nice. Mum and I ordered mushy peas, not thinking about this is Canada – when the order came they were huge!!! Far too big to eat a portion to yourself!! Mum and I shared a portion and we got the other portion to take-out and we gave it to AB

Doug knows the people who own the shop and he was given a free beer after his meal!! Alright for some LOL As we were leaving Connie told AB exactly what she thinks of Liz and said she’s not prepared to go out anywhere with them if Liz invites herself along – I really can’t say I blame her the way Liz has been getting at her recently!!!!

I also drove back to the hotel, at one point Doug said “I’ll direct you onto Cawthra Rd and you can find your way to the hotel from there” :-o He wasn’t serious but Connie told him off and called him a bugger for it anyway hahahahaha

We weren’t too late getting back to the hotel so we just pottered around and we had our own dessert before going to bed :-)

Canada - part ten

Friday 7th August 2009

8.25am
I had another strange dream last night, my car had been stolen from outside the Huyton Suite but strangely enough I was quite calm about it :-S I reported it to the police and realised there would be cctv in a public place like that so I asked for that. When we watched the cctv we found the thief was Nana Mouskouri :-S :-S I then went home and found that my car was back outside my house :-S That’s about the sum total of the dream – very strange :-S

When I went for my swim this morning I decided to time how long it takes me to do the diagonal in this pool. At first I timed it across 10 diagonals and it was an average of 17 seconds but when I timed a single fast(ish) diagonal it was about 14 seconds.

Yesterday we’d arranged that Doug and Connie would pick us up at 10am so that was what we were aiming for when getting ready – at 9.50 Doug rang to say they were downstairs :-o The last few bits we needed to do were done rather more hurriedly than we intended! It wasn’t too bad though and we got down in just a few minutes.

When we got to the African Lion Safari it was really busy as we were going in – about 6 lanes of cars going in and it still took ages. There were people wandering through the lanes selling souvenir programmes so there was a bit of a squabble about who was going to pay for it and I was so quick I’d given the lady my money while everyone was fighting LOL

We’d already decided we were going on the tour bus through the park so when we got in we were going to buy the tickets – until we saw the queue – it was miles outside the door of the shop!!!!! We decided to go for a wander first and we’d buy the tickets later – hopefully when the queue was shorter.

We started off wandering round the various different bird cages and taking photos – there were LOADS!!! In some of the cages of the bigger birds there had been small squares cut into the wire fences so that you could get pictures of the birds without seeing the bars of the cages. There were also peacocks just wandering freely round the park, including a family with 5 or 6 babies :-D At one point I got really close to them and actually touched one of the babies :-)

At one point in the park there’s a small waterfall so Doug took a photo of mum and I sitting in front of it. Just past the waterfall there’s a little mist thing which is really nice to walk through – would be even better on a hot day, yesterday was just comfortable – not too hot and not too cold. When we’d got onto the other side of the mist we saw a sign and a stall advertising elephant rides but there was no sign of any actual rides going on. There were 3 staff members leading ponies through the park so we asked one of them and they said the elephant rides would be starting at 1pm :-) I decided I REALLY wanted an elephant ride – when else would I have the opportunity!!

After that there wasn’t much further to go in the walking bit of the park so we headed back in the direction we came. We found a few more cages with birds in and we also saw where the petting zoo was. Doug said he’d go and see if the queue for the bus tickets had gone down at all and if it was reasonable he’d get the tickets for us. The queue must’ve gone down a lot cos he wasn’t very long at all :-)

Doug was back by the time we got to the petting section, there were machines with feed you could buy. You could go in with the goats and there were also deer and llamas you could feed but not go into the enclosure with. Of course I had to go into the goats pen and it was so funny. I had a handful of feed and had about 6 goats round me and they were getting so impatient they were trying to eat me!!! I had cropped trousers with strings on and I had to tuck the strings inside the trousers to stop the goats eating them and then they started on my pockets instead hahahahaha I also fed the deer and llamas but they weren’t quite as much fun LOL

After that we headed back towards the start of the park with the intention of going back to the car for lunch. On the way we spotted the queue for the train ride and it didn’t seem too long so we decided to go on the train before lunch. Just as we got to the queue the next train had come in so people were moving down – we didn’t make it on that one but it was clear we would get on the next train :-) While we were standing in the queue the structure we were in had slats on the top with big gaps in between. At one point somebody looked up and realised there was a peacock sitting on the slats above us :-o Obviously nobody wanted to be directly underneath a bird so there was a general shuffling in the queue LOL

When we got on the train we discovered the seats were really small and low ;-D Obviously they’re really aimed at children.

9pm
we’ve been back about an hour so I’ll continue with yesterday before starting to recount today’s tales!

On the train ride they said it was a scenic ride rather than an animal watching ride, we still managed to see a few deer, turtles and geese. It was only a short ride and but it was very nice.

We then found a picnic bench to have our lunch, Connie and Mum sat while Doug and I went to get the lunch from the car. We sat for about half an hour – 45 minutes for lunch then on the way back to dump the stuff back in the car we went to the shop so that if we bought anything that could go back in the car too. I just bought 2 magnets, Connie bought a necklace and some chocolate sunflower seeds, and mum bought a t-shirt.

Once we’d put the stuff back in the car it was just about the right time to go and wait for the tour bus. When we got on the bus we wanted seats all together, someone suggested seats behind each other but I said 2 sets of seats across the bus so that we could get pictures from both sides of the bus.

On the tour we started off going through the lion reserve, they were mostly asleep but at least they were out in the open so we could see them – there was a baby but it was on the top of a stone structure and facing away from us. We also went through a few other reserves including the ostriches. The bus driver / guide told us that all the ostriches were female and most of them were standing or walking around. One was sitting on her legs in the middle of the bunch and she seemed to be saying “look at me aren’t I great”, after we commented on this I suddenly said “it’s Liz” and we all agreed and laughed. Doug had said we’d probably see ‘liz’ in there somewhere but he originally suggested she’d be in with the monkeys – my discovery was much better :-D :-D

When we got into the baboon enclosure there were some very brave people who had taken their own vehicles through :-o They were really good to watch. One guy had a pickup truck with an open back and at one point he had about 7 or 8 monkeys in the back of his truck :-D There were quite a few babies in there too playing around and they were gorgeous. Two monkeys actually jumped on top of our bus. Unfortunately right in the middle of the monkeys the batteries died on the camera so I was busy scrabbling about trying to find the others which I had deliberately put in my bag. Luckily I found the batteries quick enough that I didn’t really miss any of the action LOL

At the end of the baboon enclosure there was one of the park rangers who had to check our bus to make sure there were no monkeys trying to hitch a lift out of their enclosure on our bus LOL

After the baboons we went through an enclosure that had rhinos and giraffes in it, at one point the rhinos charged across the road and then had to be herded back to their correct place by a ranger in a truck.

Once we got off the bus we headed towards the elephant rides but it was beginning to rain and we got a bit concerned that it would absolutely lash down – thankfully it didn’t!! There was quite a queue for the elephant rides but I was determined to do it – when else would I get a chance to do that!!!! When I got to the front of the queue I said I wasn’t with anyone else and I was hoping to get on an elephant on my own (but I didn’t actually tell them that). When it was my turn I got on the front and the girl put 2 children on behind me, I was a bit disappointed but figured I could live with it. Luckily for me the man who was with the children did say he was hoping that it would be just him and the boys so they took the children off :-) As you’re going round the person leading the elephant will stop them to allow anyone on the ground to take photos and I was lucky – I got on the elephant who liked to pose when she was stopped – she’d lift up her trunk and slightly lift one of her feet LOL Doug got some really good photos of / for me :-D

Time was racing on by this point so we decided it was time to head for home, especially as we were going out for tea in the evening with AB to the Mandarin which is a really good Chinese buffet restaurant we went to last time we were here.

When we got back to the apartment Connie and Doug popped upstairs to take the dogs out before we went out to the Mandarin.

The restaurant was pretty busy when we got there so we had to wait about 20 minutes before we got a table. There was also another lady sitting on the bench and she’d just collected a take-out order and as usual AB got talking to her LOL It turned out she was also there on holiday from England although she was originally from Manchester but now living in London, she was staying with family as well.

We all ate far too much but I also love going to the Mandarin cos you can taste lots of different things without worrying you’ve wasted your money. Most of the savoury stuff I liked apart from a chicken thing which I can’t remember what it was LOL I tried quite a few of the desserts, some of which I didn’t like. Doug had got ice cream and he brought it back in quite a big bowl, when I went for ice cream all I could see was tiny bowls. When I got back to the table I asked him where he’d got his bowl and he said it was a soup bowl hahaha – I never even saw the soup to get a bowl from there!

At the end of the night we asked one of the ladies who was serving us if she’d take our picture and she had to stand pretty far back to get us all in. We all got fortune cookies at the end of the night and Doug nearly killed himself laughing at Connie’s – “You are an attractive and interesting subject” hahahaha

We just went back to the apartment after that and we more or less went straight to bed cos it was fairly late – about 9.30pm I think.

Canada - part nine

Thursday 6th August 2009-08-06

8.30am
I had a strange dream last night, I was doing a course somewhere with the knowsley staff but wherever the course was it was right opposite where I was staying / living. During this course I was sitting near the front and my asthma was really bad, to the extent where I had to use my inhaler and the course leader actually asked me was it helping. We then went for a break and when we came back I went to sit on a couch near the back of the room cos I was still bad and wanted to be less obvious. My personal tutor from uni then appeared kneeling behind me and the leader of the course came over, Mary (personal tutor) was saying to the leader (who was female but I don’t know who she was) “are we sending Emma home then?” and I remember not even trying to disagree – which is very unusual for me. Unfortunately that’s as interesting as it gets cos I don’t remember whether the dream continued after that or not.

Well we went out last night, we got a call from AB at about 7.55 to say to meet them by the back door in about 20 minutes. When we went down Liz and AB were in the car right by the door. We were heading off to Liz’s house first and she managed to go the wrong way!!!! Then her and AB were arguing cos Liz was saying how AB was supposed to be giving her directions but AB was saying she hadn’t asked her to *rolleyes*

Eventually we got to the house and we got the grand tour. Liz is so much ‘look at me aren’t I great’, we also had to look through the fence to next door so we could see where the guinea pig who’d died the day before was buried.

Barry was just sitting on the couch watching the telly until Liz was finally ready to go out. I like Barry better than Liz, he seems to be really laid back and has a good sense of humour (he needs it with Liz!). Liz also seems to not believe in saying the letter h – every single word that she’s said which is supposed to begin with h doesn’t – ‘usband, ‘eat,

Liz was wanting Barry to take his car cos he’s got a Toyota Prius and she wanted us to experience it. Well I’m the only one interested in cars and I’ve already been in a Toyota Prius and I’ve seen a real top of the range model with all the gadgets you could want!! As it happened we went in Liz’s car cos Barry’s was safely in the garage and her car was on the street – on the wrong side, she said she’d get a ticket if she left it there.

Barry drove cos Liz said he knew the way better. We drove to downtown Toronto and Liz was pointing out all the top brand name shops and as we went down at one point her and AB seemed to just be reading out everything we passed *rolleyes* We spent ages driving through Toronto to get to the boardwalks. When we got out of the car I expected us to be out for a while but no, we just walked a little bit, I took some photos and then we went back to the car.

When we got back in the car Liz sat in the middle at the back so that I could have the window for taking photos. I did take a lot of photos, the Toronto skyline by night is quite nice. By the time we got back to the hotel I only had 3 photos left to take on that card LOL

Once we got back we basically just had a snack before getting ready to go to bed.

This morning I went for my swim as normal but I also decided for a laugh to do a bit of jumping into the pool simply cos I hadn’t done it for ages haha.

I had a very healthy breakfast this morning :-) I had a bowl of watermelon (I’d rather have had fruit salad but there wasn’t any there), bran flakes with half a banana and a yogurt :-) While we were eating breakfast we were discussing lunch for today cos we’d made packed lunch but we didn’t have that much so we took a couple of apples and oranges from breakfast.

When we got back to the room the maid was already in, today is linen changing day so it took her a bit longer than normal.

Canada - part eight

Wednesday 5th August 2009

9.10am
I *thought* I’d slept well last night – at one point I woke up and thought I’d slept through till 5.55am. After getting hold of the clock and expecting the alarm to go off at any minute I fell asleep again, when I next woke up it was after 1am so I realised I’d obviously read the clock wrong in my half-asleep world :-( I then woke up another few times as well. I haven’t slept well at all since I got here :-( Sometimes when I’m away I don’t sleep properly the first night or 2 then it gets better, that doesn’t seem to be the case this time :-(

When the alarm eventually did go off I actually could’ve stayed asleep. In fact I dozed till about 6.20 before I got up to go for my swim. I didn’t mess about in the pool this morning, just did my 100 diagonals and got out. While I was in there a man from the hotel came in and went into the maintenance room, when he came out I was dried and had my gown on and swimsuit off. We chatted briefly before I went back to the room for my shower.

When I got out of the shower I decided for a change not to put my plait in my hair, I just combed it and left it to dry naturally.

I *was* good at breakfast this morning – well, better than normal anyway. I had a bowl of fruit salad followed by bran flakes and banana and then a plate of scrambled eggs – and no chocolate muffin. From now on I’m also going to make the healthiest choices available on a menu when we go out.

After breakfast we sorted out our washing and went down to the laundry – we filled 3 machines again :-o

We then came back to the room and we’re watching telly for a while. The maid has just come in and we need to go and swap the washing into the drier(s) soon.

2.20pm
we swapped the clothes into the drier just after the maid left and then I went to collect them later. When I did go to collect them it was over the half an hour it says the cycle takes but it wasn’t finished so I had to wait a while. We sorted the clothes out and found LOADS of them need ironing – many more than at home.

While mum ironed the clothes I went down to the gym and burnt 944 calories doing 30 minutes on each machine. I then killed the calories by coming back to the room and eating buttered toasted buns and crisps *rolleyes*

I’ve not really done an awful lot more than that, played on the DS for a bit and now I’ve gone really tired, I may end up having a nap this afternoon :-o

6.55pm
well we’re just waiting for the dreaded outing *rolleyes*

I did have a power-nap this afternoon, just 20 minutes was enough to recharge me.

We’ve made packed lunch for tomorrow – are ham salad sandwiches any healthier than burgers? I feel really fat but I was thinking I *could* be pre-menstruallly bloated, I hope so and I guess I’ll find out in a week or two. I hope it stays away till next Monday – it’ll be easier to deal with when I’ve got my own bedroom and a bit of privacy, in fact that’s what happened last time we were here – it happened while we were in America, fingers crossed the same happens again!!

I got some food earlier from the ‘social hour’, it’s advertised as macaroni cheese on the calendar but it was big pasta shapes – one set in cheese sauce and another in tomato sauce. I just got some on paper plates and brought it back to the room seeing as mum wasn’t interested. I was glad I’d brought it back to the room cos when I tasted it I found it was cold so I heated it up in the microwave.

Right I guess I’ll post this now and then update tomorrow after our wonderful sight-seeing trip to downtown Toronto *rolleyes*.

Canada - part seven

Tuesday 4th August 2009

9.05am
Well plans for today have changed, we had planned to go out to Elora Gorge but while we were at breakfast AB rang – twice!!! Neither her nor Connie are very well today, AB was starting a cold yesterday and it’s developed nicely! Connie has a migraine :-( We were planning on going to the bank today to exchange some traveller’s cheques and apparently Doug has said he’ll still take us to the mall so that’s the only thing we’re doing today in terms of going out. We’ve decided we might as well do some laundry today instead of doing it all tomorrow, I’ve just been doing to the laundry to check what coin we need and both the washer and drier take a dollar coin and 2 quarters each. Our change of plans also means I can go to the gym again – I feel as if I really need to with the amount of junk I’m eating!!!! And I can eat a bit healthier today if I want so I think the whole thing is a bit of a blessing in disguise.

We were picked up yesterday at 11ish as planned and headed out to Port Dover. It was a really long drive, about 2 hours in total :-o After a while AB declared she wanted a bathroom stop and then we hit a traffic jam :-o Eventually we got to a Tim Horton’s coffee shop for the bathroom stop. Because I was in the middle at the back I was quite squashed so as my mum decided to get out with AB I got up and wriggled about a bit LOL

Eventually we reached Port Dover and it was absolutely packed!! What hadn’t been thought about when arranging this trip was that fact that it’s the long holiday weekend so everyone would be heading out to the tourist places. We tried to park at the Tim Horton’s there but that was packed, we found a car park with a lad wandering round – they were charging $20 to park for the day!!! :-o :-o When she heard this AB practically had a heart attack! In the end we found a place to park and paid the $20 – at least we were parked!!

We were wandering down towards the beach when someone suggested lunch – when we looked at the time we found it was 1.40 :-o I was really surprised, I didn’t think it was as late as that! We’d just walked past a fast food place with an enormous queue so we didn’t fancy that, we saw another restaurant that had people standing round outside so Doug went over to check whether they were just having a smoke or if that was a queue to get in – it was a queue *rolleyes* We carried on walking and found another restaurant which seemed quite empty :-S I was saying I was suspicious – why was it so empty, we went in anyway.

It was quite nice, the food was ok if a bit small and the prices were reasonable too.

12.15pm
we’ve just been out to the mall with Doug, he came to take us to the bank as planned and then brought us back again. We arranged to be in the mall for an hour and it took us nearly half an hour just in the bank! In the last bank we were in we were told the maximum traveller’s cheques we could change was $500 so that’s how much we took with us – when we asked today the lady said $1500, if I’d known that I’d’ve taken all mine with me cos I only had $600 anyway *rolleyes* Other than that we just bought a few souvenirs from the dollar store and a few bits groceries and then we came back. We’re just having a snack now before we tackle the laundry – argh!

Back to yesterday.

After lunch we wandered round again towards the beach and the other shops. We saw a stall advertising a 1 hour river cruise and we ummed and ahhed whether we wanted to go on or not, in the end I said “yes!” cos everyone was just saying to everyone else “I don’t know, do you want to?” and things like that. Doug and AB were convinced they didn’t want to so Connie, mum and I decided we were going on. There was 40 minutes until the next boat ride but we bought our tickets then cos the lady said they get busy and fill up. Doug was offering the lady extra money to baby-sit us for the next 40 minutes as well hahahahahaha.

We just wandered round the shops that were close by until it was time to go on the boat. In one shop we saw a nice red hoody saying Port Dover that I tried on and decided I liked and was going to buy (on my credit card LOL). In that shop there were magnets of Port Dover but they were really expensive – the cheapest was $7 and that wasn’t very nice so we didn’t bother. When I was going to the till with my hoodie I noticed that the price tag said $50 but the one we’d looked at on the display said $29.98 so I checked with the lady and the cheaper price was right :-) I wasn’t going to buy it at $50.

When it was nearly time to go for the boat we found a bench near the water and parked Doug and AB on it while we went to get on the boat ;-D When we actually got on the boat we were waving frantically at the 2 land-lubbers but they were taking no notice of us LOL

I thought the boat would be a circular trip but it wasn’t – we got to a certain point and he said we had to turn round cos ahead was a low bridge and shallow water so we couldn’t go any further :-(

The trip took an hour and it was really nice – VERY relaxing, on the way back the 3 of us said if the seats had been a bit more comfy we could’ve easily gone to sleep :-) We saw quite a lot on the way round, there are LOADS of boats and big houses along the river. We were laughing and I took loads of photos saying that AB could choose which one she was going to have as our holiday house that she would be housekeeping for us ;-D At one point on the way out there were about 4 or 5 boats all lined up right next to each other and it looked like there was a party going on with all of them – the people were just walking across the tops from one boat to another :-) By the time we were on the way back the party had broken up and in fact 2 of the boats were travelling in front of us.

During the ‘nature’ part of the cruise the driver / pilot / guide whatever you want to call him was pointing out turtles basking on logs, at one point he was pointing out a big one – neither Connie or I saw it and we were the ones sitting on the outside of the boat!

Everyone on the river was really friendly – people from other boats were waving to us so of course we waved back :-) There was a little boy on the balcony of one of the houses and he was really noisy – shouting and waving to everyone that went past ;-D We waved to him on the way out and he was still there doing the same on the way back ;-D

At one point along the river bank there was a load of old rusty boats and the guide was telling us that one used to belong to a certain person (whose name I can’t remember) and Connie was telling us that he was a famous Canadian comedian – that’d be why we didn’t recognise the name then.

Connie and Doug go to Port Dover quite a lot – Doug used to be a biker and on every Friday the 13th they have a big biker rally in Port Dover that Doug loves to go to. While we were on the boat and chatting Connie mentioned that she’d always wanted to go on this river cruise but Doug had never been interested so Connie had to wait until we came so she got chance to go on it.

Our River Cruise finished at 5pm so by then the town had quietened down a lot so we were able to walk more freely and wander round the shops. We wandered back in the direction of the car but also taking in some other shops along the way. One shop we went into called itself a bakery but it was more of a sweet store really, I’ve been looking for fudge for a while over here (in a portion size that isn’t enormous) and I got it in that shop :-)

After that we went back to the car and headed back towards home. At one point Doug went the wrong way and nearly got away with it cos AB had wanted a cash machine and he found one for her, it was only as we turned back and went the way we’d just come she asked had he gone out of his way for her – at that point he admitted he’d screwed up hahaha.

We’d planned to go for fish & chips for tea last night so Doug took us there, when we arrived we discovered it was shut!! That meant then that there was a bit of a debate where to go next. Doug had gone to use the bathroom in McDonald’s so AB and Connie were trying to think of somewhere. All different names of places were bandied about until AB thought of “the something family restaurant on highway 5 and 10” which Connie didn’t know LOL When Doug came back AB was trying to describe to him where she meant and Doug appeared to know where she meant so it was decided that was where we were going.

When we got there we found it was called the “Orchard Family Restaurant” and thankfully it was open :-) AB had said we were going back to hers to finish off the desserts from the barbecue so we weren’t to have dessert and Connie decided she was only going to have a toasted sandwich cos she wanted to have plenty of room for dessert LOL Doug, myself and AB had burgers and my mum had eggs with potatoes. When the meals came Connie discovered the egg in the salad had celery mixed in and she didn’t like it so she ate half the sandwich and then asked for some toast and jam instead. When the lady was taking the other half of the sandwich away she asked was there something wrong with it so Connie explained about the celery. When the toast was brought over the lady said they weren’t going to charge for the sandwich – that was really good :-) The meals there were a lot bigger than we’d had for lunch and by the time I’d finished I was really stuffed.

We finished tea at about 9pm so mum and I decided we didn’t want to go back to AB’s so we asked Doug to just drop us straight at the hotel. All day I’d been in charge of buckling and unbuckling the seat belts for all 3 of us in the back seat and as we got out Connie said “who’s going to unbuckle me now?” hahahaha.

Mum and I had our dessert when we got back to the hotel – I had a muffin left from breakfast but I can’t remember what mum had.

Might as well keep today updated now LOL

We sorted out our washing a little while ago and we figured we had 4 loads of washing :-o Our plan was to do 2loads today and 2 tomorrow. We took to the laundry what we thought was 2 loads but when we started putting it into the washing machines we found that one of our loads was too big for 1 machine so it had to be separated into 2 :-o One of the machines had a little bit of water in the bottom of it, we didn’t think anything of it until we closed the lid and the machine started up without us having put any money in :-S The person before us had obviously not let the cycle finish so our washing set it off and we had to wait for that to finish before we could start again with our cycle *rolleyes*

When we got back to our room we discovered that there’s a big thunderstorm going on outside :-o We don’t mind cos we’re snuggled up inside the hotel. It seems Connie and AB picked the right day to get sick LOL.

I *think* there must be quite a high wind as well cos I feel as if the building is moving just ever so slightly and as we’re on the 6th floor I guess it’s not outside the realms of possibility.

6.55pm
When I went down to collect the washing from the drier it was all still damp and I didn’t have any money with me so I had to go back to the room to get money to put it on again. When I went back up to the room mum was on the phone – AB had rung. Apparently tomorrow night’s jaunt with Liz is still on – neither of us particularly want to go but if we say so Liz will get a huff on – she’s already jealous of the fact that Connie and Doug are taking us to places and she’s not in on it *rolleyes*

Once the washing was actually dry mum said she’d sort it and I could go to the gym :-) I did ages in the gym today – over an hour and a half :-o When I first got on the treadmill though I was too ambitious and ended up with a really bad stitch so I stopped at 7 minutes, had a rest and then started again. Once I realised I couldn’t push myself *that* hard it was fine – I did my normal 25 minutes so in total I actually did 32 minutes :-)

Unfortunately I’ve realised I need to start eating properly cos my clothes are all feeling tight :-( The trousers I’m wearing now I used to HAVE to tie the strings but now they’re tight without tying them :-( As it happens I think I’ve had enough of junk anyway, I WANT to go back to eating healthily – or at least as is possible when I’m not totally in charge of what’s available to eat.

9.30pm
My last update today and I’ll actually post this this evening rather than tomorrow morning – tomorrow’s update will probably be very boring.

We went over to the Courtyard Café for tea – so much for my healthy eating!!! I had a half rack of ribs with chips and veg, I also had all of my mum’s green and red peppers from her pasta dish. The food was very nice but quite expensive for what it was. For just 2 meals with tax and tip included it cos us $35 :-o When we went in the café was absolutely empty – we were joking with the waiter (or whatever his official job was) that it was so busy we had nowhere to sit – he really didn’t get it hahaha. There was another lady working who came and took our order, she was very nice. We were chatting to her and it turns out she was in England just a couple of weeks ago, she’d just recently got back from holiday. She was in Dorset though – almost the other end of the country from me! It was her who brought the food out and she nearly threw it at me LOL, as she was putting it on the table some of the chips and veg slid off – AND the waiter had thrown my water at me at the start of the meal :-o hahaha

We charged our meal to our room and came back to our own hotel straight after our meal. We had dessert here – mum had her Danish pastry from this morning and I had a small chunk of my fudge that I bought yesterday. We also had a tub of mandarin oranges each as well.

Now it’s bedtime

NN (wave)