from blistering pace to just blistering

My blister full of blood and puss

well its Wednesday the 31st of January. After a mamouth lay-in this morning i woke to find piece and quiet. I am the only one in my dorm (It should hold six). The other guests are part of two big groups. One Quebecois and the other is from Toronto. They filled the kitchen with food and boxes and bits and pieces. There was mayhem in there last night as both tried to cook what looked like a three course meal at the same time! They both stayed for a few days to do the ski trails around Val-David. The french lot didnt speak any english but i had a few partial conversations that involved a lot of pointing and gesticulating. Both groups left today and so i am the only guest in the whole place!!! The next guests check in tomorrow. The trip out here was well worth it. It feels so isolated. Its nice to not do anything and have a break from frantic city sight seeing. The cabin creeks and hums with the noise of the heating. The place is full of windows that give you a brilliant view of the mountains and the little forest we are in. It has been snowing today. There are open fires here and they warm the lounges nicely. The bedroom was a bit cold last night and so i christened my sleeping bag. Although ''sleeping bags are STRICTLY FORBIDDEN'', i risked it and although the bag rolls up into a handfull - it is suprisingly warm and snug. I have been drinking heaps of coffee and eating loads of biscuits while i laze around and watch my i-pod. I'm off to Toronto tomorrow and i'll be there for 5 nights. I plan to take a day trip to Niagra falls though. Not looking forward to the coach and then the train. I arrive in Toronto after 9pm and i plan to leave here at 1pm. I have a massive blister on my little toe. It looks absolutely disgusting but at least its the only thing wrong me with so far... Appologies for the spelling, the computer i am on is set on French and so i am having to type and post. Its a bit hit and miss actually. I nearly pressed what i think was delete earlier!!!

From ville to val

Trees

Mont Beau
More trees Lounge
Fleur de Lis
My feet slightly toasting
Fire

bar in the chalet

View from the back of the chalet

Walking around the town

My bedroom - the beds are 5ft long!!

View from my window at dusk

From the bridge over the river in Lovers Park

Partially frozen river

Chalet Beaumont - my lodgings in Val-David

Empty

Restaurants in town

Outskirts of the town

Chapel - full of wood
Carving
Pulpit
Notre Dame's famous organ

Ceiling of Notre Dame - didnt come out very well
Notre Dame
Notre Dame
Chapel in Notre Dame

The feeder
solemates

P-P-P-P-P-PICKup a........
...Penguin St Lawrence area
St Lawrence area
Bright birds
Shy Porcupine
St Lawrence river zone
Tropics area of biodome
Monkey
Cayman
Parrots
In the ruins of the old city (under the musuem)
More ruins
Part of the tropics area of the biodome
roof of the biodome

Its Tuesday the 30th of January and this is my latest report. I'm posting this from a hostel in Val-David in the Laurentides, Quebec. It's in a rural area full of small ski-ing towns. Val-David is very close to Mont Tremblant a popular skiing town. I decided to jump on the bus and explore the countryside a bit.

Sunday 28th - I bought a museum and metro pass and so i decided to visit some of the local museums to learn about Montreal. Montreal was founded in the 17th century and there are many museums each telling the story of Montreal's founding in various ways. The old city is between Mont Royal (where the city's name comes from) and the St Lawrence river. First off i visited the site used for the Olymics in the 70's. The velodome is now a biodome. It has basically been split up into four areas to recreate the environments around four areas of the world - forest, st lawrence river, artic and the dry praries. Each has walk ways around the area which is full of plants, animals and information plates. It's a pretty amazing place with birds flying over you, monkeys climbing up trees metres from where you are... There is little glass seperating you from the animals. The place absolutely stunk of fish though. Think that was something to do with the penguins!!! It was pretty strange walking through the different habitats having to take of jumpers/jackets as you go. My favourite animals were the brightly coloured birds busy hunting for food under the trees in the tropics section.
Next to the biodome is the main olympic arena. It has a really ugly looking upright next to it that is attached to the roof and is supposed to lift the roof off. It never actually worked and so they built a fixed roof but made it look like it would work. French engineering. Montrealers are still paying for the olympics, apparentely. Shocking. Walking back I found $20 on the floor - result.

I then made my way to the musuem of montreal. It tells the story of the city through multimedia exhibitions. On the bottom floor is a number of galleries with artifacts, sound booths, and stuff to touch and look at. They focus on the period between the city being founded and when the british took control. Upstairs are a number of rooms each kitted out with various objects from recent periods, e.g. 1920's, 1950, etc. You sit on a period chair/sofa from the period and watch a short film of montrealers discussing the period from their perspective and what it means to be from montreal. It was pretty interesting sitting in a period kitchen listening to people talk about what foods evoked Montreal to them. Glad i went it was really interesting.
On the top floor there was a temporary ehibition. The idea was that you went through various rooms of exhibits each providing evidence on a specific crime. You then have to make your mind up as to who was actually guilty. The crime concerns a fire that ran through montreal destroying around 40 houses of wealthy businessmen (who all lost a lot of merchandise). Because a maid spread a rumour that a slave had set the fire (on purpose) the authorities arrested the slave and found her guilty under the law of "common knowledge". She was hanged and then her body burnt and ashes spread to remove any trace of her exsistence. Now the evidence shown (records from the time, testimonies from the trial, backgrounds of those in the vacinity at the time etc) doesnt necessarily point to the slave having done it. Walking around the rooms there are sounds, artifacts to explore and open (with clues in them), lights etc and you could easily spend 2-3 hours in this temporay exhibition on its own!!

Monday 29th - Most of touristville Montreal seems to shut down on Mondays. I headed for the Old town to explore some of the architecture. I then moved onto the Famed Basillica Notre Dame. A pretty amazing church that is covered in stained glass, frescos, lights, and chapels. They hold a light and sound show on Tuesdays to Fridays which i missed out on. It looked pretty amazing. I finished the day walking down the main shopping strip (again a lack of clothes shops??). There are many homeless/down and outs around. Every underground has 2-3 people sleeping on the benches. There are people holding the doors for a tip, people coming upto you on the street, etc. It must be extra hard being homeless in this weather.

Tuesday 30th. I got up early and caught a bus from montreal to Val-David. It took about 2 hours. I'm staying in a converted log cabin that is set atop a small hill in the forest. It's a 20 minute walk (mostly up hill) from where the bus stops. It's fairly cold here - around minus 20 degrees centigrade. The condensation from my mouth crystallises on my moustache meaning that i constantly have a frosty moustache - attractive.
I had a walk around town and it is really beautiful. There are lots of small little wooden houses dotted around, each painted brightly. It reminds me of the images on Christmas cards. Because it's so cold this seasons snow hasnt melted and so walking along the roads everything is covered in about a foot/metre of snow. The people here are really nice. Most don't speak English and my French is really rubbish. I have attempted to converse in French but i cant quite get the Quebecois accent. Apparently Quebecois is like a 17th century version of French with a strong accent. It sounds like a constant blur of noise to me.

Montreatal

First church in montreal

first church in montreal

Botanical gardens
Botanical gardens
Botanical gardens
Ants
View of old montreal

Olympic arena
botanical gardens - giant corn
botanical gardens
stream in botanical gardens

My last day in Quebec wasn't very eventful in the end. It was far to cold to spend any amount of time outside and as i had exhausted most of the sight seeing i spent some time in the hostel before heading out for a meal. I got a recommendation from a member of hostel staff for somewhere Quebecois (que-bec-qua). He suggested a little cafe near the river. I headed down there and was amazed at how American it felt. They served burgers, steak, french fries etc. The most novel dish was pie with beans (heinz baked beans that is!!). It was kitted out like a retro diner (chrome, leather, chequered tilling, etc). Pretty disappointed really. (I opted for the steak chef special - in the end it wasn't special at all, just with peppercorn sauce!!). I was expecting some local treats.
The next day i jumped on the huge coach and left Quebec city for the arrow shaped island that is Montreal. I found it a bit jarring at first. I had left a small, pristine, old city for a sprawling, dirty, spreadout, high rise city. I eventually found the metro. It runs on plastic tires (like the one in Paris apparently). 20 minutes after leaving the Metro, I realised that i was lost and could find the hostel!!! I was freezing and i couldn't turn the pages of my map as my fingers were so sore (it was minus 30 degrees centigrade). After the intervention of a man that saw i was in distress, I realised that the map was wrong and that the Hostel opens facing a completely different street!! Lonely Planet don't start letting me down - i have three books to get through!.

The hostel is okay but the bedrooms are downstairs and there are no lockers in the really small rooms. The people i am sharing with seem nice though. I spent my first day exploring the underground city. It is a warren of tunnels that connect with the metro system and the bigger buildings of the city. It is nice and cosy, and there are complete multi-level shopping centres, swimming pools, food courts, opera, theatre etc. I had a wander and walked around basically the whole thing!!! The shopping centre was weird as there was practically no clothes shops - not even girls clothes stores!!
The next day i had a whole itinerary planned as most things close on Mondays here, so i have to make the most of my time. I visited the botanical gardens and insectarium first off as it was open from 9am whereas everything else seems to open at 10 or even 11am. It was a pretty amazing experience walking around these huge greenhouses feeling really warm (most of the greenhouses had temperatures maintained at 22 degrees) whilst you could see snow outside!!! Its not as cold today - only minus 16 degrees. They had a complete greenhouse full of orchids and it was filled with the sweetest scent. Very relaxing. Note: I know that one of my rules is not to do anything that i could do at home (i.e. i could go to kew back home, but these are the biggest and best outside of Europe (Kew and Berlin) and its all inside.
I then headed for the Musee McCord. It is basically a story of the city through personal artifacts and stories collected over the years by Mr McCord. It was an interesting way to find out about the City. I then moved onto the Museum of Architecture and History. This was basically a preserved excavation of one of the first buildings erected in Montreal. The musuem is built over the site and so walkunder the basement and suround streets. I walking around the ruined walls etc with displays showing what was found and the various layers dug up. There was a seperate exhibit on the native peoples in the area. That was really interesting as it showed that the local peoples were extremely well adapted top their surroundings. I ended the day by walking down the huge shopping district.