Montreal, Pt. 3 - Random Montreal Stuff

I suppose I should finish the story about my trip to Montreal. Days 3 and 4 were much more subdued than days 1 and 2. Largely due to how busy and how much walking we did on those first 2 days.

We started day 3 by heading to the Eaton Centre, near McGill University. After we got Michelle some new shoes, we headed over to the 2 story Addition Elle store. While we do have those stores here, we don't have them quite like this one. It had lines/clothing in it that aren't in our stores yet. I ended up with a new outfit (top/bottom) and a strapless tank top. We decided to go back to the hotel and drop our stuff off so we didn't have to lug it around town with us. We were meeting up with my co-worker for lunch since he was in town and had told us that he knew were to get the best poutine in Montreal. We were sold.

At this point, Michelle and I were very tired and our feet/legs hurt, a lot. It was also cold and had started to snain (kind of rain, kind of snow). So my poor co-worker had to listen to us bitch while he lead us through the plateau area of Montreal (which I'm sure it quite charming when you're not cold/hungry/in pain). We finally arrived at the restaurant only to discover that there was a line up...out the door. After assuring us about a dozen times that the poutine was indeed worth waiting in the snain, we relented and waited. Thankfully, we didn't have to wait outside long. Within 5 minutes we were inside and within 20, we were seated. I'm not going to lie. It was the best damn poutine I've ever had (well, ever had sober). I'm not sure if it was due to the fact that it was food after a long day or if the pogo cut up on top of mine added to it, but it was amazing. And very affordable too. Probably the best value we'd found thus far.

That evening, we venture out to an Irish pub that was within walking distance of the hotel. It was a cold and windy walk over. The pub was packed and was kind of cool. It was a typical Irish pub/sports bar, but the building was beautiful. The ceiling looked like it might have been copper and had neat designs in it. The Montreal game was on CBC so everyone in the bar was watching that. Unfortunately, Montreal started to lose very early and the bar got really quiet. I'd had 3 porn stars to drink so I was feeling pretty good and couldn't care less about the game. We headed back to the hotel after the first period. It was a sobering walk thanks to the crazy wind and low temps. The hotel was only 4 blocks away, yet Montreal was losing 4-0 by the time we got into our room. We stayed in and watched hockey for most of the evening.

On our final morning, we scored a free breakfast at the hotel thanks to a special connection I had. LOL. It was quite nice. We just rested and watched tv and then ventured out to pick up some food and snacks for the train. The train ride back was un-eventful and went by rather quickly. We played a game of "look, there's another church" to keep ourselves entertained.

All in all, it was a great weekend away and I think we both had a lot of fun. I can't wait to do it again next year but maybe this time we can find someplace warmer to go :)

Good Night!

Sarah

Ducks in the courtyard of our hotel

Montreal, pt. 2

I've been too sleepy to write the last couple of nights so I'll try to get a post in tonight.

Day 2 in Montreal started with a trip to the BioDome. It's a kick ass place that has re-created 4 environments indoors. They each feature flora and fauna native to that environment along with some animals and fish. There are lots of educational things along the way to read too. It's very cool to experience the different environments as you move through the building. The tropical rain forest is very hot and humid while the Maple Forest is like walking through a local park. I highly recommend this to anyone going to Montreal.
I loved watching the otters. They almost seemed to know that there were people watching so they were putting on a show for us and almost totally posing for photos!

After that, we headed back to the hotel. We picked up some sandwiches en route and had lunch in our room before heading back out. This time we were off to the incredibly beautiful, Notre Dame Basilica.  When you first walk in and see the stunning alter standing before you, in all its glory, it kind of takes your breath away (I had the same reaction the first time I saw the inside of the Library of Parliament on the hill in Ottawa). I've seen this church a couple times now and the beauty still takes my breath away. If I got to sit in something so historical and so gorgeous every week, I might just be inclined to go to church on a regular basis! 

We did the self guided tour and were able to take our time and look at all the fine wood work. The really big treat for me this time was getting to see the Chapel of the Notre-Dame du Sacre-Coeur. The chapel (located inside the Basilica) burnt down in 1978 but was restored and re-opened in 1982. The chapel is so bright and airy and has a slightly more simple beauty to it. I really enjoyed seeing it as I missed it the last time I was there. Michelle and I wrote in the guest book and continued our tour. The size of the church really is something else. We lit a couple of candles and then moved on out to the gift shop.

It was a crazy windy day and we almost got blown away while sitting on a bench in the square across from the church. We decided to head to the Old Port and check out the St. Lawrence River next. We were able to see Montreal Island and the amusement park during our walk along the river. After resting for a bit and once again nearly getting blown away, we headed back into Old Montreal for dinner.

Old Montreal is just that: old. It's narrow streets and gorgeous old buildings. Some of the roads are still cobble stone. Since I'm a history buff, I love the place. Even if half the shops are cheap souvenir stores. We had dinner at a rustic Italian restaurant called "The Spaghetti Factory" (not to be confused with The Old Spaghetti Factory) and then did some shopping in said cheap souvenir stores. 

We finally got back to the hotel and decided that a nice swim in the pool would be awesome. The hotel's pool is an outdoor pool. Normally, one doesn't go swimming outdoors in Canada in April, but this was no ordinary pool. It's a heated one. We went swimming in the cold rain and totally enjoyed ourselves. If your head got cold, you could swim over to the waterfall and stand there for a bit or just dunk down under the water. It was very awesome.  Michelle and I were pretty darn tired by the time we got into bed. Kind of like how I am now.

Stay tuned for part 3 of the Montreal trip!

Good Night!

Sarah

Montreal!! (part 1)

I'm back! As you may have noticed, I haven't blogged in a while. Almost a week in fact. I do believe that this is the longest period of time I've gone without blogging since I started. I actually missed it and I think I might have started having withdrawal symptoms. LOL.

Anyhow, the reason for the blog hiatus is that I was in Montreal, with my friend Michelle. We had a blast. It was great fun and I really enjoyed having some company this time around, even if she did try to get drunk on our first night there (no worries, I attempted revenge 2 nights later).

We went to the Botanical Gardens and saw the "Butterflies Go Free" exhibit, visited the BioDome where we saw the sloth this time (I didn't see him last time) but the Bobcat was hiding, took a tour of the Notre Dame Basilica (stunning and neither of us got struck by lightening), toured Old Montreal and the Old Port (and managed to not get blown into the St. Lawrence), ate the best poutine I've ever had (while sober), got upgraded to VIP status at the hotel which scored us a free breakfast, managed to not get lost in the subway, learnt that taking 4 lefts in a row will actually take you to some place different and not back to where you started from, got to swim outside (in the rain, in April) without freezing our asses off and generally just had a great time with a great friend.

Our train ride from Ottawa to Montreal was good. The train left 1 minute late and arrived 1 minute last so that's pretty good time. The guy on the train with the food/drinks cart was pretty funny. I spoke French to him and he was impressed by my attempt, so he tried to get Michelle to do the same. That didn't work. LOL. He then told us a funny story about offering "Swedish Balls" to a couple the week before instead of saying "Swedish Berries". It was pretty damn funny. Once in Montreal, we checked into the hotel and headed off to the Botanical Gardens. We'd lucked out and the hotel sold us discounted tickets to the Gardens and BioDome so we save some money. When we got to the Gardens, they were having electrical issues and all the lights/power was out. Since the green houses just use nature light, we were still allowed in. They said that the power should be fixed within a half hour or so and they were right. We were in the tropical  plants section when all of a sudden, we heard a funny noise and then what sounded like water gurgling. I looked over at the little waterfall they have and sure enough, the water came running down it again. The pump was back on. This meant that by the time we'd finished the tour and saw the butterflies, the gift shop had re-opened. That was very important. LOL.

Afterwards, we ventured back to our hotel and then out to a place called The Burger Bar for dinner. It was crazy trendy. I definitely felt under dressed. I needed to add a scarf or floppy hat (the girl beside us had one) or something. I did have a very yummy Orange Creamcicle martini though, which according to Michelle, I drank far too slowly (she had 2 double Sex on the Beach in the same time it took to drink my 1 drink). She made some comment about not getting out much. The food was amazing though. Very awesome, unique burgers. They had one that had won an award during "Burger" week. It was called "The Hangover". It had bacon, cheese, a fried egg, mini poutine and truffle oil on it. There might have been a few more things too. I skipped it and had the Wild Shroom burger instead. Very yummy. We walked around the area for a bit, hitting up Ben and Jerry's for ice cream on the way back and taking a detour to see the Bell Centre (since Montreal is Michelle's team) before finding our way back to the hotel for a much needed rest.

And the rest of this story is to be continued because I need to get my butt to bed since I have to go back to work tomorrow.

Good Night!

Sarah

Sunny Saturday and Sleep

Since I haven't blogged for the last couple of nights, I thought I should probably do so. Frankly, I've been too damn tired to Blog. After the no sleep Wednesday, Thursday night wasn't as good as I'd hoped it would be. Despite being crazy tired, it still took a long time to fall asleep. Thankfully, last night was a bit better. I'm still waking up a lot in the night but I got to sleep in this morning, so that was very nice. I also had a nice can of Pear Cider this evening so I'm hoping that helps with the sleep too.

It was a beautifully sunny day here today. Too bad it was breezy and that breeze was stupid cold. Stupid weather. We're in for flurries this evening and freezing rain early in the morning then it's going to warm up and the freezing rain will change to normal rain. Looking at the week's forecast, it appears that spring might just be here. Heck, it's supposed to be 20C with rain on Wednesday. Go figure. Weather people are predicting that we'll have a long, hot and humid summer. I'm ok with the long and hot part. The humid part I could do without.

My day was pretty good. I went downtown and cashed in my coupon for a free bottle of perfume that I got for Christmas. The lady said I could have the small bottle for free, or pay $11 and get the big bottle. So, 35ml for free or 60ml for $11. Big bottle it was. I ventured into the market and went to my favourite butcher shop. They had some lamb souvlaki skewers, so I decided to have a Greek night. I bought them and I made some Greek rice and made a Greek Vinaigrette for the Greek salad I made. It was all very good. I also picked up a bottle of my new favourite wine and a couple cans of the Pear Cider I discovered last month. I ran a couple more errands and hit up the grocery store before returning home to bask in the sun coming in my windows.

I started to watch Madagascar 3 this evening. It made me laugh so that's good. I'll watch the other half in the morning.

Since tomorrow is looking like it's going to be a dreary day, I'm going to use it to clean my kitchen. I'm going to make a pasta dish for dinner. It's on the cover of the April issue of Food Network magazine. Looks easy enough. They have a truly kick-ass cake in this issue. It looks just like a flower pot with flowers in it! So cool.

My friend Michelle and I head to Montreal in 13 short days. I'm excited and not excited all at the same time. I have a lot of house work to do before she gets here and work is crazy busy right now so I have to make sure everything's all organized before I leave. That being said, I'm only actually missing 3 days of work and the break will be really good for me and I really am looking forward to seeing Michelle again. It's been a very, very, very long time since I've spent this much time with her, so I'm slightly apprehensive about it too. I'm sure everything will be great. I just hope that Mother Nature co-operates too and gives us some nice weather while we're there. The long range forecast isn't looking very good. But it's still a good ways out.

WTF?? It's 11:30pm and it sounds like someone is walking around upstairs with a peg leg. I swear, I have some of the most disrespectful and inconsiderate neighbours ever. Earlier, I got to listen to the couple down the hall yelling at one and other, again. It's pretty much a weekly event. It's one of the things I miss about my apartment in Calgary. Other than the dude that used to watch porn with the volume up and the naked people who lived in the building beside me, the neighbours were pretty awesome and very quiet.

Anyhow, I can hear my bed calling, so I think it's time to hit the hay and see if I can not only fall asleep quickly, but stay asleep until morning.

Good Night!

Sarah

Sunny Saturday, Spring Cleaning and Strength

I haven't been in much of a blogging mood lately and frankly, I've been too damn tired. So I decided I'd better log in tonight and get some words on the screen. Thanks to Daylight Savings Time, I'm going to bed an hour later than planned. To off set this, I shall attempt to sleep in an extra hour tomorrow morning. Not sure if it will work but it's worth a try. My mother tried to tell me that clocks go back an hour tonight instead of going an hour forward. I think she was just trying to find a way to sleep in an extra hour tomorrow.

I had a pretty darn good day today. One of the best I've had in a while. The sun was out and that seemed to be the key. I stood on my balcony in the sun for a bit this morning and it felt glorious. I'm in spring cleaning mode too. I had originally planned to stay home and just clean all day but this afternoon I decided that it was too nice to stay home all day so I escaped for a bit.

Before I left, I managed to get the dishes done, a load of laundry done and some dusting done. I then went downtown, had a Beavertail, walked around the market, taking in the wonderful sunshine, stopped at the butcher and bought a beautiful New York Strip for dinner and then came back home. I did some more cleaning once I was home. I tackled the greasy vent cover that's in the hood over my stove. Thanks to Pinterest, I got it clean without any effort. Just some boiling water and baking soda. Amazing. I also got the burner inserts clean that way. My stove is spotless (for now). I got the toilet cleaned and my bookshelf dusted too. I was on quite the roll. I really do love Pinterest. I was standing in the kitchen, holding the filter and trying to figure out how to clean the damn thing when suddenly, magic words popped into my head. They were "go check on Pinterest". I'm so smart! The answer was there and it worked and now I have a clean filter. Yay!

Tonight I watched the movie "The Other Guys". It was horrible. So I watched the first half of Mall Rats to make up for it. I'll finish watching it sometime tomorrow. I'm hoping to continue my cleaning spree tomorrow.

Adding to my good mood today was that I booked 2 trips this morning. Nothing overly exciting but I'm happy about them. The first is in April. I'm going to Montreal with my old friend Michelle. We're taking the train from my house, which is awesome since I love taking the train and it's a great trip from Ottawa to Montreal (and faster than driving). The best part is that I used some networking skills to get us a LUXURY hotel room for a very budget friendly price. I'm very excited. I can't wait to see what kind of shenanigans we get up to when left to our own devices in Montreal. This is going to be great.
The other trip I booked was just a train ticket home for the May long weekend. My bday (a kind of big one) is one the Thursday before the long weekend and my Great Aunt's 80th bday is the Friday of the long weekend, so I'm heading home to go to her party. I'm really looking forward to seeing my family. I haven't seen them since Christmas so this will be great. I hope the weather is nice.

Since it's actually 12:34am instead of the 11:34pm that my clock says, I really should get to bed. I have a lot more cleaning ahead of me tomorrow. The weather is supposed to be warm but cloudy and maybe some rain in the late afternoon. Perfect cleaning or book reading weather. I have a couple of books that need to be read so we'll see what happens. I found a very yummy sounding scone recipe on Pinterest too that I might attempt. LOL. This truly was a good day. I'm starting to feel like myself again and I really don't have the words to explain how amazing that feels. It's more relief than anymore. The days are getting longer, the shadows are weaken. Step by step, I'm walking back out of the darkness and into the light again.The birds chirping this morning is the kind of sound that makes my soul smile. We're not totally out of winter's grasp yet but we're close and I'm experiencing a strong sense of relief and accomplishment. I've made it through another winter in one piece, coming out into spring, just a little bit stronger than I was when I went in late last fall.

Good Night!

Sarah

My favourite sign of spring: Lily of the Valley