A train, a bus, a cancelled train, a bus, a train, a bus and a train... or "Next Time I Will Fly"

Hi all from New York City! Just got in to my hostel at 10.30pm and wanted to let everyone know I had arrived safely, albeit a day late! Few transport dramas since I last wrote - 2 train derailments and a train accident have conspired to make this a rather difficult week transportation-wise but now that I am here I am so excited that I hardly care!

The rest of my time in Quebec City was very quiet and then I had a train ride to Montreal, where we were bussed to Toronto due to derailment #1... then I got back to Toronto to a phone message that my train to New York on Tuesday was cancelled so I had to frantically race around and rebook my tickets for today and change all my hostel bookings. After that I had a lovely meal out with Sharon, Alison, Natalie, Sara, Lisa, Elizabeth and Mel to say my goodbyes and it was a really nice way to end a rather frantic day! Tuesday was spent doing such exciting things as tax returns and shopping (because obviously when you can't close your suitcase what you need are more clothes... yes Clare... great logic!).

Today I got up early to catch my train to NYC to find out I was on the bus again, then a train, then a bus, and then a train (and then a taxi ride - but that one was OK!). Obviously there was also a little bit of USA Border Control action in there - not quite as bad as the Boston incident but not totally smooth sailing either sadly. I actually ended up having a fun day though - meeting loads of people ranging from a professional comedian from Vancouver to a muslim teacher from Jamica to a hardened New Yorker musician - for what could have been a frustrating day, it was actually a pretty good one!

So far (and I am basing this on one taxi ride) I am loving New York - hostel is in a great location and seems pretty cool so I am confident of an excellent stay.

Hope you are all well and I promise to write later in the week with some more tales from the Big Apple!

c

Quebec Day 3

Hi all from Quebec City - aren't you lucky getting two posts in two days?!?! The internet at the hostel is free and it is cold outside so I figured you could all get a little update...

Last night I decided to stay in the hostel and eat nachos and drink beer in the bar in order to make some new friends. Unfortunately there was only one other patron in the bar at the time and his english as worse than my french - after a very challenging half an hour discussing "Everyone Loves Raymond" I basically gave up and went to bed to read my book!

The good news is that I got a new room-mate overnight (Karin from Brazil) and we spent today checking out some more of Quebec's sights. We visited the Museum of Civilization this morning and got a special guided tour from one of the staff who was extremely bored. It was good to learn a little more about the origins of Quebec and a very nice museum, although not as many fun things to play with as Te Papa!

After the museum we took a ride to the Upper Town on the Funiculaire (basically a glass elevator going up the side of a cliff... aren't you are proud of me?!) and wandered around the city, the Chateau Fronteac and Parliament before stopping for a coffee and croissant break. After our break we visited the Citadel again (Karin had not been) and walked alongside the river on the Governors' Promenade. After that we had worked up quite a hunger and stopped for some lunch. There is not really a lot left to do in Quebec - I think this would be a great place to visit in Summer, with friends for a swish fancy dinner and wine type trip but it is a bit pricey for the backpacker and in winter so much is shut and/or covered in snow that you feel like you are only getting half the experience.

It is a beautiful city and I am glad I made it up here, but also glad that I head back to Toronto tomorrow for my final burst of farewells before hitting New York, New York on Tuesday. I hope you are all well and I promise to write more soon!

Cheers!
Clare

Viva Quebec!

Hi all from a very pretty but rather cold Quebec City - I hope you are all well!

I have been a pretty busy Clare since I last wrote - there was a lot of packing and repacking earlier in the week, and on Wednesday I said goodbye to my workmates. It was a pretty strange feeling really because i was quite sad to be leaving a job that I am pretty much hated - so I guess the sadness must be about leaving behind the great bunch I have worked with. They gave me a great send-off with chocolate cake and some ontario themed gifts, which I loved, and many great memories of Oh Henry gifts and fun pub nights.

After leaving work, I spent Thursday madly running about the city sorting out all my last minute banking and shopping needs, although unfortunately the daunting tax return documents have still not been dealt with - maybe on the train trip back to Toronto on Monday?!?!

I caught the train very early on Friday morning for Montreal, then swapped trains to get to Quebec City in the middle of the afternoon. It was sunny and gorgeous so a great welcome! Quebec City is the only walled city in North America and definitely has a very european feel to it. I have heard very few english speaking folk around me since I arrived and there are not a lot of canadian flags and the like around (everything is the quebecois fleur de lis) so really it is hard to remember that you are in Canada at times! The bone-chilling cold and perpetual images of grown men thumping each other while standing on ice-skates does help remind you though...

Yesterday I took a bit of a wander around to get my bearings and then came back to the hostel to get settled. Unfortunately it is very quiet at the hostel at the moment so other than a couple of crazies in the TV lounge (they were discussing their abilites to make rocks vibrate) there really wasn't anyone much to talk too... nothing else to do but wander down the road for a burger and Quebec-made beer - all very tasty and sent me off to an excellent 11 1/2 hour sleep!!!

Today I have been all over this compact city exploring - I visited the citadel with some great views over the frozen, yet still moving, St Lawrence river and the Chateau Frontenac - one of the most photographed hotels in the world they tell me:

The citadel was (like a lot of things at the moment) not open unless you are a group so I just took a bit of a wander around the bit of the city walls not closed due to ice, and the Plains of Abraham where the British and the French fought a couple of hundred years back. I also visited an Inuit art gallery, full of sculptures of polar bears doing aerobics just like the one my mum, aunties and I saw a couple of years back on the Gold Coast. After that I was in need of some refreshment so snacked on a beaver-tail pastry on the way down the hill to the Lower City.




Things got even more european feeling down here with cobbled streets and cute little lanes full of shops and the like. I wandered around for ages and had a little lunch before heading back up the hill to take advantage of the free internet to write to you guys, and to dry my feet off.


Tomorrow I am hoping to visit the parliament buildiings here and maybe even a museum - it looks as though I may have seen the best of the weather I am going to get here so indoor activities might be a go!

Well I hope you are all great and missing me as much as I miss you!
C