bonjour

Hello from Montreal! Doing the same as usual it seems... sitting in a cafe on a laptop. Actually, I haven`t brought my laptop or cell phone on this trip, but am borrowing a friends. Anyway, here`s a quick update (sorry the ` s are french accent graves or something...).

The time in Winnipeg has been great with not much besides family, family and some more family affairs. Attending roller hockey games, ringette games, making lunches for my sister`s kids (house sat with them for a couple days too), sailing with my Dad, painting the cabin with my brother-in-law, ummm.... lot`s of good quality family stuff, which was priority No.1 this summer! Will be back in Winnipeg for another couple weeks after the current trip to do a cottage weekend with the whole family (parents, brother, sister, and all the associated kidlettes) and a 5-day or so sailing trip up to the north part of Lake Winnipeg with my Dad. But that`s the future...

Spent the July long weekend in Toronto hanging with John & Jocelyn (John`s a friend from SF who moved back home to Toronto, well, actually Etobikoe or something like that for those who differentiate the suburbs from the city... I personally just refer to it all as southern Ontario). We went for a sail on Lake Ontario Friday afternoon and got to see the waterfront from the water side. Then went `out on the town` and saw some live music and closed the place down. I remember once again why switching to gin & tonics half way into the night is not a good idea (or at least I remembered the next morning as John woke us up at 7 AM to go to the cabin). We spent the long weekend at John`s family`s cabin on Georgian Bay. A very nice weekend of sailing, canoeing, boating, and reading (emphasis on reading for me - I can be quite boring when I choose to be). One of the near by islands had some cheesy fireworks, so we even celebrated Canada Day. Actually, we made it back into the city and down to the waterfront for Monday night and saw the official TO fireworks too.

I spent Tuesday at a relaxed pace making it to the train station around noon, then put my bag in storage and wandered around downtown till my 3PM train to Montreal. Was very nice weather except for a crazy heavy thundershower that forced me into the CBC building. This was actually nice since if forced me into the CBC museum which has histories and sets for the Friendly Giant, Mr. Dressup, etc. etc. Trains are so nice, but I can`t understand why:

A. there aren`t more of them (you`d think there would be a train leaving every 15 minutes)
B. they aren`t cheaper (TO to MNTRL was $92... how much does an airplane cost)
C. why did my sister make me pay for this... note she`s paid for the other legs of the train trip :)

It had been a while since I`ve been on a train and it was quite nice (i.e., I found a great used book store on Queen St. in TO and bought two books and the train gave me a good 4.5 hour start on the first book - Postcards - which I just finished yesterday by the way).

Been in Montreal for a couple days now. Melanie, one of my `students` in Pinawa many years ago picked me up at the Metro stop and has set me up at her new apartment. I`ve been there for 2 nights (or is it 3 nights, I seriously can`t remember, okay, must be 3) and she`s moving in today (I could be helping, but instead I`m hiding out in a coffee shop... something to do with 2 exboyfriends helping so I`m just making myself scarce. Her and I have caught a couple nights of the Jazz Festival. First night, the night I got here, we caught a tribute to Paul Simon with performers such as Leonard Cohen, Elvis Costello, Holly Cole, Daniel Lanois (a Quebec artist who I saw in SF last year), and several others. Last night was a more small venues including a stop at a salsa place where Mel made me Salsa and ChaChaCha (it was brutal despite having lived in the mexican area in SF for several years... Mel made me be the women and she led).

Other highlights in Montreal so far... a 13 hour walking tour that started way up north (relatively speaking... Jarry for those that know Montreal) on St Laurent, proceeded downtown, saw the Portugal-France game (city went nuts when France won), checked out a hostel (decided I like my current digs), then to the old Ville & Port, then walked back home along St. Denis. Definitely got my exercise that day. The next day I took it easy and went to the Musee de Beaux Artes (Fine Art Museum). Both these days were very much like a typical European vacation day for me. I can tell I`m on holiday because I can just randomly chat with people. Of course it usually seems to be cute women that I chat to, but what can I say, I have good tastes!

Robyn ( my sister) and Jack & Emma arrive on Sunday. Sunday is going to be a crazy day. First, it`s the final of the world cup. Regardless of the outcome, this city is going to be nuts. There are nearly as many flags hanging out windows and people driving 60 mph up and down streets as there was in Calgary or Edmonton during their hockey attempts. It`s also the last day of the Jazz Fesitval and that`s bound to be a blast. So the new arrivals should be up for a fun day!

Also still planning to be in Calgary for Aug 5-15 and then to Seattle for some climbing & hanging with Erin & Justin say Aug 16-20 and then continue the road trip to SF (arriving by say Aug 25) in prep for Burning Man on Aug 28 (just keeping you alls updated with the schedule hoping that our paths will cross).

A la prochaine!! (please no correcting my french! .... I need to practice bad!)