me, mon petit choux and Guy LaFleur

Back in Montreal!

The Eastern portion of "Neysa & Ivy's Cross Canada Trip" is over. We made a bit of a change in our itinerary thanks to a leaking return line in our power steering system. So, $80 later we had finished "Mechanics 101A" (thank you, dad) and after an unplanned night in Moncton, New Brunswick, we were enroute to the land of Anne of Green Gables in PEI instead of the planned stop in Nova Scotia. We saw the famous Green Gables house, hung out at the beaches and played some football. I think I must be an island girl at heart because I loved Prince Edward Island. Our change of plans ended up being a good plan.

Tomorrow we really head WEST! I think we will both be relieved to be going in the right direction. This trip is costing too much, despite our attempts to cut costs by tenting and having a cooler in the car.

I have been in Eastern Canada for 2 weeks now. My canoeing and portaging trip in Algonquin national Park, Ontario was incredible. I had a great time with my friend Alice and her 5 korean friends, although a bit jet-lagged. I had people staring at me wondering why I was the only white girl travelling with 5 asians, it felt just like japan, language barrier and all, but it helped ease the transition back into life over here a bit i think). The lakes there are amazing and canoeing is a great way to see it all. And being a true canadian, I couldn't leave Toronto without visiting the Hockey Hall of Fame (it rocks by the way, and my puck handling skills really do suck as attested to by the simulators there).

On August 3rd, I met up with Ivy in Montreal for our car hunt. Unfortunately, after 7 years of French Immersion I have lost all my French speaking skills (but not reading thankfully), all that comes out is Japanese. So, we left everything up to our incredibly helpful host, Josh (my ex-boyfriend's friend), who we imposed on for 4 1/2 days in his tiny apartment. He was a star and I think finding a car would have been much more difficult without him there. The guys selling cars didn't really want to take two girls seriously. Once we started talking their lingo though, they started to see that we weren't some dumb chicks easliy cheated (although we are still debating that to some degree).

We ended up buying a Burgundy, V6, 1992, Chevy Cavalier to take us across Canada for $550 CDN (yep, a bit more than the price of a digital camera in Japan). He is old, dirty, rusty, and leaky...and french canadian... so we named him Guy LaFleur (famous french canadian hockey player for you non-CDNs). Some people here have called us nuts for thinking of taking Guy across 6000 km of road and lately I have been thinking that maybe this is quite an ambitious proposition, but it's got to be done now. We have some duct tape, electrical tape, and Goop that will help hold him together till we reach the far coast. He's a great car though. He runs well and we love him despite his appearance.

We hit the road on Aug. 7th for our Eastern Tour, stopping in Quebec city (definately a fave so far)just in time for a 18th century costume and music parade and the New France festival. Unfortunately, Guy has a weak battery and it died at the campsite, so we saw no nightlife in Quebec city, only the Christmas-theme disco in the Barn at the campsite, which was a sight in itself (picture french canadian pop and Shania Twain songs and 12-14 yr. olds line dancing around xmas decorations).

We didn't want to leave Quebec, and our lateness ended up attributing to our 1am arrival into Fredricton, NB. Fredricton was quaint but small. After seeing the sights in about 2 hours, we hit the road the next afternoon and drove to the Bay of Fundy with its amazing tidal changes, where we started having car problems. Stressed, and worried, we left early and crawled into Moncton about 2 hours away, refilling the power steering tank every 30 min. Moncton ended up being ok, and once the Canadian Tire (hardware store) guys knew we weren't dumb chicks, they were very helpful. (Guys and cars!)

We have now driven through two rain storms, with so much water that people were pulling over in their cars to sit it out, two thunder storms that turned the skies around us purple and royal blue, and finished off back in Montreal after a 3000km journey this week (12 hours of driving yesterday). After being in Japan, the lack of mountains on the east here is very noticable. When we are driving, the land spreads out around us and the sky seems massive, with clouds hanging above us in huge mountainous layers all the way to the horizon.

Our nights have been spent tenting and they have been COLD after the 35 degree weather in Japan. Unfortunately, Ivy shaved her head before flying to Montreal and finds the hair loss only adds to the chill. Her new nickname is "Mon Petit Choux" (my little cabbage), because she looks like a cabbage patch doll....she doesn't really like being a cabbage, but she likes being bald, and it'll grow back soon. We are still getting along after a week of intense driving and not much sleep, so I think we might last the distance and we seem to be travelling well together. We are used to car sharing after Japan I think.

Tonight, we are back in Montreal with Josh. Tomorrow, we are taking him to Club Supersex for the lunch buffet stripshow. We are very excited about that actually. Montreal has been a mix of high culture and low, with art exhibits, music festivals, parks...and now strippers. We've been to Josh's band practice and hit some seedy bars with his band on La Rue St. Laurent... and watched Big Fish dubbed in French at an outdoor theatre (I translated it all for Ivy, who had watched it before) and taken Josh (the virgin rollerblader) rollerblading in Vieux Montreal. The people here are a little crazy and they like it that way and it takes some getting used to, but I think Montreal had grown on me. I want to spend some more time here some day.

Tomorrow we head to Ottawa to visit some former JETs (dan and karin for those who know them). But for now, some well needed sleep. Hope you are all enjoying the summer. Let me know how you are doing in Japan (and elsewhere).