Hey people

I'm back from a trip to Canada. The picture shows me close to the Horseshoe Falls at Niagara Falls, Ontario. It was the most impressive thing i've seen on the trip.

PLease start reading from the item about Dulles Airport and then move up, cos that's how it's written chronologically. You can read it from the top too, but i think sometimes it will make no sense what i wrote. Although, it probably will make no sense at other points too.

But anyway, enjoy
big kiss
nico

Last days of the trip

With Niagara, we ended our Canada trip. The next days were okay, but were basically just getting back to Boston. The last day in Ontario, we decided to look for an old friend of our father who emigrated to Canada in the 50s. Thanks to the help of a girl in a tourist office near Lake Eerie, we got in touch with his wife. The man had passed away this May, but the widow wanted us to see us anyway, so we headed that direction. Through yet more farmland, that used to belong to a lot of immigrants from Flanders who had thriving tobacco plantations there. Of course, there's nothing left of that industry anymore and the sons of the Flemish immigrants emigrate to other places.

We drove through New York State and stopped at the Finger Lakes District, where we visited a winery and an Amisch store. That was a surprise. The Finger Lakes has only been a wine region for 10 years or so, but it was beautiful and the Amish, well they sold their land in Pennsylvania and moved up north to NY state. The Amish girls working there were unfriendly though and i thought it was weird that you could pay with visa in a store of a community that is known to not use electricity. Oh well.

I had planned to visit lots of things in New England, but we somehow didn't manage to get to Vermont or New Hampshire and we had missed that first day in Maine. In stead, we drove through the Berkshires, in Eastern Massachuttes, which was nice. Stockbridge, Lee and Lenox were worth driving through as you could see the big summer mansions of the rich of Boston and New York. But Williamstown in the north was a bore. THen we took the Mohawk Trail under the border with Vermont which was nice, especially the flower covered bridge of Shelburne Falls where we had lunch. But then the drive to Boston was long and boring.

We stayed at the Motel 6 in Braintree and that is a tip for all of you who want to visit! it's just right at the final stop of a metro line and it's half cheaper as staying in Boston itself. We took the metro and I showed my sis the Freedom trail. She wasn't imrpessed frist, as i wasn't imrpessed the first time either, but by the time we arrived at Quincy Market it was all good. We at on a pavement restaurent there and watched the atmosphere which was really nice.

Next day we went to Cape Cod, stopped to have breakfast in a village called Sandwich! and then headed to Provincetown which i absolutly loved last year. We spent a whole afternoon there and it was carnaval, so we got an extra treat. We had great fun. I really like the place a lot. Nice main street, nice view, nice beach, nice people. I even met a couple that lived there who were on my first tour this year. they invited us in to drink STella, a beer that you find EVERYWHERE in canada and new england. If i'm old i'll go back to provincetown for a longer stay.

Niagara Falls: Awesome!

Upon my return I told some people about the Niagara Falls being the highlight of the trip, to which they all responded: yeah, but you haven't seen Iguaçu yet. True, I haven't, but still, i was really in awe by this natural wonder.

We made the good decision to visit Niagara while we were staying in Toronto, althoug the original plan was to visit it the next day. The next day turned out to be drooly (or however you write that). We had great weather, so we could get wet and have the sun dry us.

We got to Niagara and there were already masses of people walking around. the first thing you notice isn't the falls however, but the tourist attraction along the road. my god, it looked like vegas. Casino's, hotel with towers that offer 'best views', all kinds of tourist draws like Ripley's Believe it or not that you find everywhere, game houses, malls, whatever... You can do big business in Niagara Falls.

However, you still have the Falls and WOW!!!! I was so amazed by the fact that the water just continues to stream and fall and it just makes the greatest sound ever. The Horsehoe falls are amazing, the other fall (on the US side) are also impressive, but the HOrsehoe Falls (named after the shape) really impressed me a lot. WHen we returned later in the evening, there was a rainbow over the fall and that itself was amazing too.

I looked around and i saw a lot of different kind of people looking at the same thing and it struck me how amazing that is. I saw orthodox jewish people with the curls, I saw women in burka's and their agfhani husbands, i saw camp queens shouting OH MY GOD very loud, i saw a catholic nuns, i saw Sikh, i saw a punk couple, i saw an ordinary family... and they all thought the same. I found that as amazing and beautiful as the falls itself.

We bought an all in ticket which includes a walk behind the horseshoe waterfall (okay, but don't bother really), a ticket on the Maiden Of The Mist ship that brings you close to the falls (a must!! really, that was pretty cool), a walk to where the river becomes a rapid river (boring) and a visit to the botanical gardens and butterfly garden (okay but just okay). So basically, buy the maiden on the mist ticket and forget about the all in one.

People said you can only spend a few hours there, but we spent a whole day there and we could have stayed longer. I really loved it and i didn't care about the fact that it has become so touristy. We didn't bother going over the bridge to the US side as it probably wouldn't really be different. The canadian side is far more popular and more impressive!

We drove to Niagara on the lake in the evening for dinner. It's a nice little village with beautiful houses that have nice flower gardens. It's a quaint town and the main street has some nice boutiques, but it's not the must guide books say it is. Or maybe we should have arrived there a bit earlier to enjoy the beautiful lake views.

Toronto Tour

Our hotel was located right in the middle of Midtown Toronto. The city looked huge, coming in from the North, and it took us almost an hour to drive to our hotel. I mean, you get in Toronto, signs welcome you, and then you still have to drive an hour. It remined me of LA. There are not that many skyscrapers and all the houses in the residential areas are only two storeys high. The boulevards are very wide and the whole city looks like a network of highways.

The first impression was a good one though. We did a walk around the hotel and although it was a bit of a rundown area with the usual peep show clubs and drug dealers on the street, we felt very safe. We were also located quite close to the gay village, which is the party district of the town. Right on!

We started the next day with a visit to the CN Tower. I mean, you have to go on this one, the hightest single standing tower in the world. The view is amazing (providing good weather) although) the city doesn't really look like Prague if you know what i mean. It's expensive, but it's just the thing to do. They have a glass path from which you can look down more than 300 meter. SOme people find it scary. I liked it. And you can just walk around and do a 360° spin. I'll post a videoclip on either YouTube.com or Myspace.com. We'll see.

After the CN Tower, we walked around the harbour front, which was nicer than the one in Montreal. Lake Ontario looks like a sea, so you don't really feel like you are at a lake. Whereas in Montreal you really see that you are at a river. We were also lucky to get tickets for a boat trip to the islands that lie in front of Toronto. It's the kind of place where people go to in the weekends, lots of yachts and nice walk paths. THe islands look nice from the top of the CN tower.

After that we walked in the shopping district. Like in Montreal they have a huge subterranean network of shopping malls, the biggest of which is called the Eaton Centre. They totally have my kind of clothes stores and my sister couldn't believe i didn't buy more stuff. SHe however didn't find anything to her liking.

The next day we went to visit the Bata Shoe museum first, as my dad once contributed stuff to the museum and wanted us to go there. It's a girl thing of course, especially the temporary exhibits on roccoco shoes (think of the movie Marie ANtoinette), but the temporary exhibition is interesting. It has replica of the oldest shoe found and also the baby shoes of our king Leopold II, in case you wonder...

Next up was Chinatown, where there was a festival. It pretty much looked like Chinatown in San Francisco although in Toronto you had two huge chinese shopping malls as well. The very strange thing was that in Toronto, more than half of the population looked asian. Toronto is known to be a very multicultural city and although white folk are still in charge of politics and the media, you don't really see that many caucasians on the street. Honestly, it really felt like an Asian city. But we survived. We didn't get any Sars.

Toronto has several neighbourhoods, all of which have their own atmoshere. The old Distillery District has turned into an arty farty collection of galleries and boutiques. There was a junior dance festival going on as well. You can do courses there and see performances. It's like the place i would go to from time to time if i lived in toronto. Another distric was Greek Town, where there was also a street festival going on. We wanted to eat Greek and headed up there but there were just too many people and we ended up going to one of the richest shopping districts, Yorkville. Again, totally different.

The gay village was a bit of a bore though. I recognised places from the series Queer as Folk and the house music was good (compared to for instance in San Francisco), but the crowd was very young and there were too many drag queens performing everywhere. I went in and out in almost every establishment there and only found one place i kinda liked, a three storey building that had several rooms all spinning different music.

All in all, both me and my sister really liked Toronto. it's the kind of city i could live in. And it's not that expensive. I talked to this person who lived nearby our hotel and only paid 650 can dollar (not even 450 euro) for a big appartment.

St Mary Amongst The Hurons

Although it's now a village in Ontario, the place is named after one of the first settlements of French Canada and thus holds the word Saint in its name. The settlement was peculiar because it was only Jesuit priests who lived there. Of course with the aim to conver the native Huron People to the catholic believe, in which they succeded very well.

There is a historical site that shows the buildings of that time and explains how the relations was between the friendly and curious Huron people and the strict but as curious Jesuit fathers. THey sort of lived 'happily' together, until the Iroquois came to murder the Huron and the Jesuits. The Iroquois are fierce warriors who did not want to collaborate with the white people. They rocked! But they were violent too. The stories of how the Jesuit fathers died is cruel literature. Scalping and boiling them alive, taking out their hearts and eating it. Cool stuff. The historical site however, focuses more on the nice interaction between the First Peoples and the Jesuits. But not a must if you visited Val Jalbert and Upper Canadian Village first, which we had done.

Ps: The quaint towns around Huron Lake aren't quite as quaint as guide books describe. They were boring really. Skip them! But do drive around Lake Muskoka, the villages there were nicer.

No moose, but beavers in Algonquin Park

I had thought eastern Canada would have looked like western Canada. I have never been there, but I know a bit what the rockies and the pine forests look like. But it doesn't. It looks like FInland, although I have never been in Finland either, but still...

There are many lakes in Canada. In the beginning of the trip we were really in awe when we saw a lake. After a week or so, we didn't even stop to watch. We didn't even watch. However, I had planned a visit to the Algonquin park and to the Huron Lake region, so we would have to see Lake life at any cost.

THe algonquin park is a vast park that you bascially should discover by cano. We only stayed on the highway and did two walking trails that are very well indicated. The first walk brought us to a beaver pond and after waiting a while we did see some beaver in the distance. Thank god my sis brought her binoculars, cos I would have thought it was just a duck. The second trail brought us to a river flowing into the lakes, nice and all, but nature walks are just not my cup of tea. Respect for pepole who want to walk with their backpack through the woods and then camp along the river. I don't say I'm never going to do that, but if i want to walk in a forest I can do that in Wallonia too.

The view over the Lake in the park however was awesome. We sat more than an hour just watching the lake. There's also an interesting visitor center in the park, which gives more information about the animals you might encounter during your stay. But like i wrote before, we saw a lot of dead animals on the highway but no live one. We even waited until dusk in order to maybe see moose, but no. We have seen so many dead racoons that my sister made the correct remark that she could have made a fur coat out of it for free if we just picked them up along the way. However, i don't think customs would love that idea.

SMALL BILINGUAL OTTOWA

We both liked Ottowa immediatly. It wasn't as charming as say Quebec City, but it was very compact and there was a lively atmosphere because of that street festival and on that old market disctrict.

The Parliament building is awesome. It reminded me a bit of the one in London because of the Big Ben like Freedom Tower, but it was different. It really stands out. It exists of three part of which only the back part (a round library) remains from the original site. The building is built on a hill overlooking the Ottawa river and the Quebec city of Hull/Gatineau. In the evening they have a light show talking a bit about the history and the famous people of Canada. It started out amazing. The light show that was. But bilingual presentations get really boring after a while and half an hour is way too long for the show.

Ottawa has an artifical feel though. Everything is bilingual and everywhere you go you read messsages about a united Canada. You can walk a trail with monuments that depict this unity and important people of the past. Get that brochure in the tourist office, it's really excellent. We did the walk and, compared to the one in Montreal, it really brought us to interesting side streets we would never have discovered on our own.

THe old market assembles ALL the nightlife. That means that it's quite lively there, but that the rest of the city is a bit dead. Especially the downtown area where our hotel was located. But we ate very well, twice, and the general feeling was positive.

We also visited the best museum of Canada as the books say: the museum of civilisation. it's excellent in deed. We spend three our in there. Especially the section of the First Peoples was interesting and on the second floor you really walk throught the historic stages of the nation of Canada. It felt a bit like walking in The Venetian in Las VEgas, with blue sky and recreated streets, but it worked. I was really impressed by that museum!

If you go to canada, plan at least one full day in Ottawa. I could have gone to the other museums too, so i would have stayed a day longer maybe. The museums in Ottawa looked really interesting, but we only did one.

ONTARIO day one

There was no real culture shock going from Quebec to Ontario. The funny thing was - again - that at the border with Quebec a lot of things in Ontario were bilingual, where they were unilingual in Quebec. The first stops we made in Ontario were actually more the bilingual things i would have expected in Montreal. First up was a visit to the Upper Canadian Village and later on the day we arrived in Ottawa, the capital of Canada.

The Upper Canadian Village is a historical site, that shows how the people used to live in Ontario until not so long ago really. Just like in Val Jalbert, there were all kinds of actors who lived their character very well. I really tested their knowledge about the period they were supposed to be living in and all them surprised me with their knowledge. The shoemaker, the silvermaker, the farm girl, the doctor's assistant, ... They really had fun being this character from the past. I would have loved a summer job like that.

However, Val Jalbert was a much more authentic and unique place that this town. It was interesting, but I'm not sure I would recommend it as a must see thing. After all, the Upper Canadian Village didn't really differ that much from a the port villages I saw on a trip to the South of England for instance.

The drive from there to Ottawa was again flat farmland and thus very boring, but when we arrived in Ottawa, an incredibly small capital, we already felt a charm that we missed in Montreal. Our hotel was very close to the Parliament and bascially to the center of it all. Just outside of the hotel was the final night of a street performance festival, so we had fun watching those acts and we easily found the old market area, that has been transformed into the place to be and eat!

Laurentides: summer ski resorts

Because we were a bit fed up with Montreal, we decided to head out to the Mountains for a day. It was Sunday and we felt like doing what most people in Montreal seemed to do: leave the city. The Laurentides are a small mountain range in Quebec which has the most popular ski resorts of the country. Now driving in the mountains we tried to image how it would look like in the winter, and we would really want to go back one day to see it for real. This Sunday was sunny however. We had great weather and could stop in several ski resorts, turned into mountain bike resorts during summer time.

The people in the hotel had recommended us two places. One was Mont Tremblant and the other was Saint Saveur. Both excellent tips for a fun afternoon. Mont Tremblant is incredibly kitchy. A real tourist trap. All the houses look like they are built to be places in Disneyland. The city centre is hilly and you can go from the parking lot to the central square with a ski lift. Nice! That's exactly what we did, planning to walk back the nice main street downhill. THere was a band playing on the main square and there was a lot of action going on. During summer month a New Zeeland company operates a cart-like descent on the hills around Mont Tremblant. When i informed about it, the cashier said, efficiently, that it was a 'guy thing', so i bought two tickets straight away. It was fun. You take a helmet, a cart, get on a ski lift and then race down the hill. AWESOME!!!! The view up the hill was beautiful too, so i wasn't bored queuing for a silly but great attraction.

We tasted the Beaver Tail, a typical pastry thing from the region. It's like a mix of a boule de Berlin and a pancake with all kinds of flavours, especially cinnamon. I loved it. We got really hungry and stopped at Saint Saveur, which is another mountain town that looked quite Swiss, but that was unique because the main street was just filled with restaurants. I mean, honestly, it's like all the restaurants of the region were located in that one street which also had art galleries, small boutiques and a typical new england (or better new france) white church.

After two disappointing days in Montreal, this was a real treat!

What about Montreal?

Ask any European if he can name a city in Canada, and everyone will most likely answer Montreal. It's not the capital of the country and it's not it's biggest city, but yet it's the most famous one. Because of the Olympic Games of 76 maybe or well, i don't know why really.

I was very much looking forward to Montreal. I really had high expectations. People generally seem to like that metropolis, so I really thought i would love but. but no... We walked around in the city for two days, visiting all kinds of places, and yet did not feel charmed at all. We both had a feeling of missing out on something as there was nothing that really made us feel like we discovered something nice. There are a few reasons why we didn't like Montreal so much and why we probably need to go back and give it another try. Someday, preferably in the Winter when we can see it in the snow.

1. We started out with a guided walk in Vieux Montreal. The tourist board had sent me this walking tour booklet that recommend us to start near the Notre Dame Cathedral, but we were walking the tour for more than a half hour before realising that we should just do our own thing. There was absolutly nothing to see in Vieux Montreal. It was boring as hell. The Cathedral charged 4 euro to get in, which we both declined to do, as churches should be open to everyone. There was a huge line to get in anyway. The Place D'Armes was just an ordinary square and the Bank de Montreal building wasn't all that impressive. The rest of Vieux Montreal was lifeless and left a bad first impression of the city.

2. We had both loved Quebec City which is still very authentic in it's history and charm. Compared to Quebec City, Vieux Montreal was nothing but a rundown area. There were only a few places around Place Jacques Cartier that were nice, the square itself, the city hall, the old courthouse, the Marché Bonsecours. But even the harbourfront did not excite us much.

3. It was cloudy weather and we even had rain when we were walking around. Not many people were outside, so it did not look thriving at all.

4. Our hotel was far away from the center or from any nice neighbourhood, so we never felt like we stayed in the city.

5. There is not much colour in Montreal. And grey cities just don't charm that much.

Anyways, i liked the Downtown area more, which reminded me a bit of the area around Union Square in San Francisco. The subterranean shopping malls are impressive, but the shops aren't that interesting. THe skyscrapers are big and impressive and the skyline looks better than the one of Boston, but it's not Manhattan. I really liked the street we drove through to get to the Mount Royal and the parc on the hill itself was great too. The view was amazing. We enjoyed the Olympic park as well, although come to think of it, the tour we did was boring (well, our tour guide was boring) and the view from the top of the tour at the stadion isn't really worth the money. Besides of that we didn't really visit that much in Montreal. I'm sure the museums are great, but we didn't care for the museums that much.

And don't forget.. and you won't... Montreal is a French speaking city. I mean, I thought it would be bilingual, but it's not. Not everything is indicated in English and if it is, it's in a smaller letter size. honestly, it's a law. If you have a bilingual document, the english has to be at least half the size of the french. I am not kidding here.

Oh yes, when we were there it was the last weekend of the Outgames. Liza Minelli was to perform in the Olympic Stadium at the closing ceremony and there was a street fair in the gay village. We saw the arrival of the marathon winner and went to have a peek at the party grounds of the contestants where The Netherlands had of course taken over the stage and present a sing along eurosong drag show. In Dutch! believe it or not. Those party grounds sucked. But the street fair in the gay village was nice. The village is a cool gay ghetto. I didn't go out as i was too tired and too far away, but i'm sure Montreal is a good place to party. Big clubs, big bars, big muscles, big wigs... hehe.

Bon Cop Bad Cop

Just as we got to Montreal, there was a new Quebec movie released. Now Quebec has a thriving movie industry. Not only is Montreal the location for many Hollywood movies, the province itself produces their own movies that are extremely succesful. In Quebec. There's even a fun movie museum in Quebec City devoted to the succes of Quebec movies. Makes you wonder why we don't have that.

The new movie was highly original and unique in it's kind: it was the first bilingual movie released in Canada! At least that's how they wanted to sell it to the audience. We went to see it, because it was the movie to see. And although the movie was crap, we had great fun. The movie is called 'Bon Cop, Bad Cop' and is about two investigators who have to work together. The typical buddy cop movie. One is from Ontario and the other from Quebec. The reason why they have to work together is because a dead body has been found on top of the huge border sign between On and Q. So the body is basically half on each territory.

The two don't get along of course, but end up finding the killers who is kiling of people that mess with his favourite hockey team. Yes, this is Canada. EVERYTHING is about hockey.

What i liked though, although i did not get all the jokes and i understood only half of the Quebequois, were the jokes between the two cultures. My sister and I strongly believed that a film like that could work in Belgium too. However, just like in Canada, only one region will go watch the movie. In this case, the people from Quebec, as the characters from Ontario are not really presented at their best. One scene was hilarious: the french speaking cop is fucking the ontarian cop's sister (yes, it's that kind of movie) and shey says: teach me something in French. Then when she's about to come she shouts: VIVE LE QUEBEC LIBRE!!!!!! I can imagine Jan Verheyen making a Flemish version of this movie and then a Walloon woman shouting: VLAANDEREN VRIJ! when she's about to come!

oh well. stupid movie, will never be released here, but the thing to do while we were there.

Zoo of St Felicien and Val Jalbert

Although we were disappointed by the region around Lac St Jean, we did visit two very interested sites. The tourist office suggests one full day in both sites, but we did it in 6 hours, as we had to head to Montreal the same day too.

The Zoo of St Felicien is an open zoo, meaning that the animals are not really caged. There is the normal zoo park, with cougars, grizzlys, coyotes, wolverines (i didn't get to see them unfortunatly, which was a downer as i love this unique animals) and three funny icebears who are really the stars of the parc. There's no Sea World like show or anything, but these bears just love posing and doing silly water jumps for the visitors. They really seemed to have fun. HOnestly. Then there's also a train ride you can take through a large park that depicts several habitats of the Canada. Of course, it's very touristy, and we would have preferred to see those animals LIVE along our trip. But we didn't and so we appreciated this park a lot. While you are looking at some Virginia deer to the left, there is a black bear passing by to your right. A bit further you see buffalo, caribous...and a moose!

Honestly, ever since we left POrtland we saw these Moose crossing signs. So we were really anticipated to see moose, after all it's the animal you see on every shirt and in every store. it's like national symbol. But NO. You see dead racoons and dead foxes on the road, but no moose and definitly no dead moose. So there we saw one, hidden in the shade of a tree. A moose. A male moose. My god, that animal is BIG!!!!!

The other site we visited was Val Jalbert, also located around Lac Saint Jean. Val Jalbert used to be a thriving village that prospered on the paper industry, but in a few months time, the factory closed and everybody who lived there left the place. The city became a ghosttown until of course some clever businessmen turned it into a charming tourist attraction. Most buildings have been renovated, apart from the factory. There's a nice waterfall in the parc and you can go up on a hill to have a view over lac st jean. But the most interesting thing is that the people who work there are all actors who really live like the people lived beginning of the 20th century. A nun was teaching three children class in the renovated school, which you can just walk in. So you have the nun teaching three children and some 15 tourists watching the 'scene'. Enters a Father. The three children jump up to greet him and the nun looks around and shouts very convincinly at the tourists that it's very bad to stay seated when the Father comes in. All tourist got up and interacted in the scene. Nice.

Of course all this was in Quebec French of which I really didn't understand 5 percent.

Quebec: proud province, weird language, friendly people

Quebec is a huge province. I mean, it's bigger than I don't know how many European countries together. And yet, there's only 6 million people living there. In the north, near the Hudson river, you have the Inuit people. And in other distant places to the north west of the province you have some more Algonquin tribes. They call themselves the First Peoples and don't feel Quebecuois. Neither do some English speaking immigrants in Montreal. But all the other 5,8 million people of Quebec are QUEBEQOUIS! And proud to be so too.

We spent a week in Quebec and really felt like we were in an indepedent country, where French is the main language and where you can see the blue/white Quebec flag hang everywhere. Being supportive of an independent Flanders, I couldn't help showing much respect for the positive nationalism that exists in Quebec. I don't think the next referendum will be in favour of a united Canada. This is already a country on its own.

First of all you have the language. My God, they call it French, but I am still not sure after one week of talking to the locals. They complemented me on my French, in which I have become really fluent after two years in Brussels (at least one positive thing of my stay there!). But most of the time I thought I was speaking better French than they did. Their accent and their vocabulary is so weird. You hear French in it, words like 'oui' and 'merci', but the overall impression is that they speak a secret language they can only understand. It sounds like the Letzenburg language, but then more English than German. It sounds like someone with a speech impediment from Marseille prolongs his words even more. Sometimes, it just sounded like Dutch tourists in Brussels asking for 'ei peign aveic froimayge ei jambong'. Honestly, the language in Quebec is weird. The strange things is that you think people just talk like that on the street in their dialect, like they do in west-flemish places, but no no no.. the news anchor, weatherman, sports commentator, advertising people.. they all speak that funny dialect. 'Bonjour' becomes BOING DJOEYR. 'J'ai faim' becomes JAY FEIGN. It's an incredibly ugly language, but you start to speak like them after a week. I constantly was thinking about those poor immigrants who learn Dutch in school and then end up in Passendaele or Ardooie. (two west-flemish villages, for those unfamiliar with the region).

The people are very friendly though. We haven't encountered one single rude person on the trip. Of course, it helped that we spoke French. The people in Ontario did ask suspiously if 'the people from Quebec treated us well?'. Apparently they are met with very arrogant behaviour. After all, the french speaking Canadians do decend from the French. The only thing i really found surprising is that they have no idea about Flanders. For them Belgium is this french-speaking country in Europe. At least you would hope nationalists allover the world would support each other, but no.

We arrived to Quebec City via a region called La Beauce. It was the first impression we got from Quebec and from Canada. Our first stop was at a beautiful wooden covered bridge, of which you see a lot in New England as well. Apart from that, the first thing you notice is that everything is in French, nothing in English at all, and that all villages start with saint something. I mention the no english thing, because in the border region in Maine, USA, everything is bilingual. But as soon as you pass the border, it's only in French.

From Quebec city we drove along the Charlevoix coast. We took the highway as we had a long journey to go on, but i really would recommend the road that you from one coastal village to the other. We didn't get too see much of the St Lawrence river, until we decided to get of the highway and descend to a fisherman's village for a light lunch. After that we headed north to the Saguenay river, which we crossed with a ferry boat, that gave us a nice view over the whole merging of the Saguenay river in the LAwrence river. THen we drove along the north side of the Saguenay river, which was one of the most beautifl stretches for me. That was the Canada that I thought I would see, huge trees, small rivers, in which you can imagine bear catching salmon. The highway doesn't really go along the fjords though, so you have to make a detour to see them and we did in Sainte Rose Du Nord. Very nice views there.

I had booked a hotel in Saint Felicien around Lac Saint Jean. I had imagined it to be this typical Canadian lake district with a hotel near the water, but NO. The drive from Chicoutimi (which is an ugly industrial city of 500.000) to Lac Saint Jean, was incredibly boring. We felt like we were driving from Calais to Bruges. Just flat farmland with one small uninteresting village after the other. I was constantly thinking why I didn't read more about this region, as our Flanders Fields are ten times more beautiful to drive through. We did not see moose, we did not see bears, we saw cows, sheep, horses, chicken... just like we do at home. Even our end stop St Felicien wasn't really that interesting and the Lake, well it was just a lake. No beautifl setting at all.

However, we did visit the zoo in St Felicien and more the next day (see other item). And the way back from Lac Saint Jean to Montreal was gorgeous, although that was the stretch i feared most of being boring. That stretch took us in binding roads along the Mauricie region and that is a drive (a long one though) that i would definitly recommend. Again no bear or no moose, but a lot of dead racoons...

By the way: exits are not numbered from 1 to 10 or so, no exit 75 means the exit is 75 kilometers from the source. the next exit is not going to be exit 74, but maybe 67. I thought it was a good system, but my sis found it very confusing. ANd yes, they talk about kilometers in Canada. Even in Ontario.

Canadian Lourdes And Our Only Rain

After our visit to the Wendeka village, we decided to head up north of Quebec.

First stop was La Chute De Montmorency. I live in Flanders, where we have no waterfall at all. Our southern neighbour Wallonia has a fall and it's one of the most popular tourist attractions of the region. I went to see it last year for the very first time and it took me 5 minutes to actually find it. Right in front of me!!!! That's how small it is.

I have seen falls before. In Costa Rica and in Yosemite, California. But this Montmorency fall was something else. It was huge. I was impressed. We got really wet just walking close to it and I loved the sound the falling water made. I was soaked, getting the closest possible, but I didn't care. Until it started raining, thundering, pouring down from the sky. Both my sis and I ended up having a cold the next day. It actually started to storm when we were about to cross the bridge over the fall. Pretty scary, but fun! We didn't stay that long there and headed for safer place where God would protect us: St Anne De Beaupré.

Now, in the Province of Quebec, almost 80 percent of the villages are called Saint.. something. It's hilarious. Think of a French name, put the word Saint in front of it, and it's a village in Quebec. Honestly.

Now in St Anne de Beaupré, there was this church where people seemed to go pray to when they were sick. And guess what? Some of them got cured after the praying and the place became a huge pilgrimage resort. Some guidebooks talk about the Canadian Lourdes, but -although I've never been in Lourdes - I really think it's Lourdes ultra light. Sure the church is awesome (really!) and you see the crutches of cured crippled people hang on the wall when you go in. THere's lots of souvenir shops and you can buy incredibly expensive candles and spring water. You even have a restaurant in the shape of a church and there's a Imax-like movie theater about the life of jezus. But the place itself is a bore really. The only thing i really liked was a path on the hill nex to the church that reprented the cross walk of Jezus. I had totally forgotten about that part of the bible, although i have seen The LAst Temptation Of Christ, but I liked the idea of doing that walk myself. Without a cross of course.

In search of the Indians

Both my sister and I have much sympathy for the Native People of America, so we really wanted to see what is left of those great nations that once roamed the country we were going to visit. Of course these days, it's difficult to find places that look like the images you know from books, movies and television as, they sadly no longer exist.

However, we decided to visit the Wendeka site. The Wendeka are Huron people who used to live near the Great Lakes but fled after long disputes with the Iroquois and moved more north near Quebec. The site itself is located within their reserve. Now the reserve is nothing more than a neighbourhood of a big city. The only thing that reminds you of being in a different place is that all sings are written in French and in Huron. A stop sign say: 'Arret/Seten' for instance. BUt apart from that, you just feel like you are driving in the outskirts of a big city. Outskirts sound a bit negative and, truth be told, it's not like you will find huge villas there. It's not a trailer park either, just a normal neighbourhood.

The site itself is VERY touristy, but I would still recommend people to go there. you can skip the dance performance, as that is really full of shit. One of the dancers looked whiter than me and looked as if she was a student at a dance school doing these native american performances as a summer job. But the guided tour was excellent. Our guide wasn't huron but part Algonquin. More info about that later. She was fun! The site is a remake of a village and shows a long house (storage room), tipi's, sjaman tents, etc... The information the guide gave us was informative and fun and she could answer all my questions. I do pay more attention to tour guides lately. DOn't know why.

Anyways: brief summary of the Indian tribes in Ontario/Quebec. Basically you have the more tranquil Huron people who liked trading with the French. And then there are the Iroquois and the Mohawks who were more fierce and started wars against the Hurons and the French/British. They are all part of a larger group called the Algonquin after the language they spoke. There's more of course, but those are the names we most frequently encountered. We didn't go up north in Quebec, so we didn't see any inuit people. You don't really SEE who's indian and who isn't, as most of them have mixed with the rest of the Canadians.

We also went to Point Blue near Lac St Jean, but there was nothing to see there. The museum looked desolate, the guy at the tourist info was not in the least interested in giving us info (he wasn't even a Native American). The village looked depressing and we couldn't help thinking that these reserves are worse off than the rest of the Province. When we saw the Mohawk information center in Ontario, we didn't even bother to stop.

In the early '90s there was a Mohawk community near Montreal protesting against developpers of a golf course who wanted to ruin their holy land. They made a documentary about it and it was something that I was really interested about. We didn't go to that place, because, well, there's nothing to see there. But I tought this whole fight of the Native Americans for recognition was great. The strange thing is that the mohawks in that documentary, of which i saw some part at the Muséé de Civilisation in Quebec, were looking nothing like the image we have of Native people. They just look so european.

Funnily enough, there was a similar protest going on in Ontario when we were there. We actually drove by the Six Nation REserve; of which a lot of people are protesting against real estate developpers. Pretty heavy protest. I like that. It made headlines every day because, surprise suprise, the judge who had to decide on what to do with the protesters had a share in the new building project.

We never hear about this in the news in Europe. You just think Native Canadians live in peace with the rest of the country, but they don't.

THere are two museums that give excellent background information about the First Peoples culture and history. The musée de civilisation in Quebec and the one in Hull, on the other side of the river of Ottawa.

Cute Quebec City

Everybody raves about Quebec city being so charming and well, they are right. We both really enjoyed this town a lot. Our hotel was located in a nearby city, but we could easily get to the centre by bus. The center is split into a higher city and a lower city, both of which are definitly a must if you visit Canada. The Higher City was built on a hill of course and is dominated by the Chateau Frontenac, which is really impressive. We wanted to stay a night there, but it was a bit too expensive for our budget. Yet, it's worth going in the hotel to have a look inside as well. Around the hotel you have a busy square and the beginning of a Montmartre like artist street. There's also an incredible nice shopping street that goes from the center to one of the gates of the former city wall that is almost entirely intact. I forgot the name of the street, but we entered the city via that gateway and stopped at an excellent pastry store and shops where they sold mediaval and renaissance clothes. Apparently those are in fashion in Quebec and I'm sure some of you would find something to buy in there.

The Lower city is even more charming. There's this one street just under the hill which you can reach either via stairs or via an elevator, which has an excellent atmosphere. Again, a lot of art galleries, but also a lot of restaurants and on old Quebec house that you can visit for free, plus the oldest square of the city, etc... I really liked that part a lot. We decided to have dinner there and watch the crowd go by. We spend a full day in Vieux Quebec and that was enough. We could have gone back, but this way we had a very satisfying visit and spending another day there could have spoiled the fun.

Maine Lobster Burn

The idea was to spend a day and a half on the south coast of Maine, but with the whole flight cancellation, our Maine visit was reduced to the marvelous art student city of Portland. I loved that place so much last year, that I wanted to show it to my sister, who was at first a bit sceptic. But after we did a free Duck Tour in the city and the water, she was also really charmed by the place.

The Duck Tour was fun. They have it in most cities by the water. It's city tours on amphibious vehicles that just go from bus to boat in no time. Well, in ten seconds really, as that's what it takes to get in the water. I had never done such a tour, so we got on one. For free. Being a tourguide and telling the company I will recommend these tours to others, helps of course. The tour guide we had was great fun! He was queer as fuck, but so much fun. He gave away cheap 'made in china' necklaces for the people who could answer questions correctly or the visitors who came the furtest. Of course we got a necklace for that last 'competition', although the couple next to us was from Dover, UK. Oh well. The guy was fun, I told him I'll use his jokes as well, but alas! I already have forgotten about them.

Portland is just this nice harbour city with lots of little arty boutiques and nice restaurants. Very touristy, but fun. My sister loves seafood, so we had to go eat LOBSTER of course. Something I don't like at all, but something my sis is crazy about. She enjoyed her lobster so much that she ended up looking like one in the evening. Reason: we had been eating outside in the sun and I swear, I never thought you could get a sun burn in Maine, but you can!

So Portland was nice and that was it for Maine, cos we headed straight to Quebec City for our next stop.