I’m trying to remember what I did on my 26 hour day but failing miserably!
Having never been on a plane (that I actually remember) it was a pretty exciting experience (which I’m sure sounds totally lame but hey). Very odd suddenly rising up off of the land… We had Aidan’s GPS set up (with an ingenious use of the belt clip on the window blind) so I was amazed as we blasted off to 250mph and then we left it running the whole journey, so we actually have a Google Earth export of the entire path we took (especially for my Dad!) as well as Geocoded photos as we went over the amazing views of Iceland and Greenland. It’s especially random when you think you’re going to go over Canada and see loads of things and towns everywhere.. But in actual fact you’re passing over a huge, empty expanse.
The actual plane ride was pretty fun. I had my iPod with a couple of films but in the end just listened to music and being very surprised by the constant supply of food and drink being provided in my direction!
We touched down and picked up the car, a Chrysler Town and Country which is absolutely HUGE! 7 very comfortable seats, aircon controls for the front (driver and passenger) and separate in the back, it’s like a tank. No need to even mention it’s a V8 auto.
It took me about 10 minutes of being in Canada to already be fascinated by the talking and the absolutely amazing views. Every direction is beautiful trees, mountains and on the plane you see these huge beautiful lakes.
We went straight to pick up Rosie and B from the Ferry, and then we went to Tim Hortons for lunch, my first experience interacting with a Canadian without assistance 😉 Which I didn’t do too badly, manage to order myself some lunch! The woman wasn’t too impressed with my complete confusion though (It was 1pm but of course I’d been up for 16 hours already)! Still trying to get used to the odd “we’ll give you a price but feel free to try and calculate the extra 12% or whatever on top of that price *confusion*!
After this we went to the beach and had a wander round, purchased an amazing Ben and Jerrys ice cream.. Like the “half baked” we have at home (Chocolate Fudge Brownie and Cookie Dough) only in ice cream bar form, way cool (people are teaching me Canadian woo!)
Time for the hotel, we pull up to this Holiday Inn Express slightly set off the road, looks brand new (turns out it’s only been open 3 months). It’s totally amazing how nice the Canadians are.. The woman explained where everything was, offered us freshly baked cookies, asked us how our flight was etc. at which point we went to the room… A fantastic 2 bedroom suite with a 28″ TV in each room, two huge beds, two bathrooms, kitchen with dishwasher, aircon in each room, but unfortunately no view of anything other than the car park!
After lounging around for a while we went just across the road to The Old Spaghetti Factory where again had amazing service.. the people are just so nice (at this point I’m still laughing at all the Canadianisms “For Sure!” the girl waiter said after every question). $12 buys you a “complete meal” as they put it.. A salad with your choice of dressing (delicious), garlic bread (delicious), Lasagne for me (delicious!) and then ice cream for desert (also delicious!) not bad for £7! At this point we were mostly falling asleep at the table.. Only 9pm local time but we’d been awake for 26 hours (and I’d only had 2 hours sleep the night before!) so back to the hotel for sleep, in a very comfy, absolutely huge king size bed in a lovely and beautifully air conditioned room, bliss.