We’re in Montreal!
Hey look at that, blogger.com is working and I can make a post. Chalk one up on the “drawbacks of blogger” side. This is the first time in two days I’ve been able to access my blog. Could have something to do with the slow internet, of course. But anyway here I am and here we are in beautiful Montreal!
Tuesday was our flight. Uneventful, long and tiring. Note: you MUST have a birth certificate or passport to travel from the US to Canada. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Lucky for us, we brought our birth certificates or it would have been a non-existant vacation. We were at the airport three hours early, and breezed through the security checkpoint. They double-checked Dan’s eyedrops but let him keep them. We watched two or three episodes of Survivor on Dan’s laptop on the flight from SD to Chicago, which passed the time nicely. In Chicago we had about 1 hour between flight. By the time we found our gate and ate a pretty-good sandwich, it was time to board. We were pretty sleepy by then (got up at 5am). I put my head down on the tray and listened to Martin’s recording of Crome Yellow. He’s got a very soothing voice and I think I slept a tiny bit.
Going through customs in Montreal was easy, though a bit stressful at the time. Then we found a taxi and got to Hugh and Christine’s house, which is narrow and beautiful, on an old and interesting street. They have a spare bedroom just for us, far nicer and more comfortable than any hotel.
Yesterday (Wednesday) we slept late, then walked around the neighborhood in search of batteries and food. It was quite intimidating at first, not knowing who spoke only French and who could help us in English, but we managed. Every sucessful transaction felt like a triumph! Then we hung around and ate our sandwiches and a wonderful apple tart on Hugh’s back patio. Then we took a long walk to a Steve’s Music Store to rent an acoustic guitar for Dan to fiddle with. And then we just relaxed the rest of the day.
Today (Thursday) we were up a bit earlier and walked out to find breakfast food for Dan. Went to Fruit Folie, yumyumyum, then a leisurely walk through the neighborhood and home. Soon we’ll go out and go to some museums!