It's not much fun going back to work - but then if we didn't have to it wouldn't be a holiday, we'd just be tramps. Lots of those in Vancouver - fewer in Montreal, for obvious reasons. I got back to Edinburgh on Sunday afternoon at 5pm, and then went straight back to work the next morning. The time differences aren't as bad going this way as they were in the other direction, as we were all waking up well before dawn on our first few days in Canada, before getting acclimatised to the new timezones. Thankfully that only lasted a few days, but our continual travel between these major North American cities always reset our clocks for a while. I'm not after any sympathy of course, just making the point that everywhere is a long way away in Canada, it's one enormous country.
The final day in Montreal we climbed the 'Mountain' in the centre, Mount Royal, that I was on about in the previous post, which took about an hour with several stops for snowball fights and picturesque photos as the night before had dumped a few inches of snow over the city. It made the walk all the better, as Quebec 'neige' is proper stuff, dry and crunchy, and the cold temperatures meant we had almost the whole place to ourselves, apart from the odd jogger (appearing outside in that weather wearing lycra, I just don't understand it). We even built a snowman in the centre of the viewing plaza at the top, where I was last four years ago in the warm summer fighting the urge to elbow any of the hundreds of schoolkids charging about.
The flight back to Vancouver was much better than the one out, although it was longer at almost 6hrs. With a final day there, I met up with Andy and Jess again and we walked around the Dr Sun Yat Sen Garden, a small but very beautiful Chinese garden in the heart of the city named after the first president of the Republic of China (in 1911), who made three visits to Vancouver to gather funds for his struggles to overthrow the Qing Dinasty. It had also snowed here, and in fact was -6˚C, so the whole garden looked especially sparkling covered in ice and frost. After a brief bit of shopping (have to take something back for the office), it was off to the airport and home, via Amsterdam.
Since we left, several things have happened to people/places we encountered. Firstly, Craig in Montreal said the day after we left they got 30cm of snow dumped on them, which must have been amazing (for us tourists, not so much for the winter-weary locals) - and fortunate given our flights leaving without hindrance. The Seattle Seahawks aren't 'Hawkin' On' any more, as they lost the next playoff game after the epic Dallas win, going down with the last kick of the game (ironically) in Chicago to the Bears. But for them to get to the final four in the NFC was a great achievement, and I'll certainly never forget that Dallas game (or where we saw it). The day after I visited BC Place Stadium (see my photo here), strong winds punctured the air-supported dome and the roof collapsed (see another photo here) [cjob.com]. The pristine inside of the stadium was swiftly covered with several inches of rainwater, thankfully nobody was hurt.
Photos are still coming in from the trip, when I get a minute I'll stick together a special post of the best of them from the other people who were there, and then I suppose it's back to the type of standard post I've been clogging the internet with for the last few months. I do have a few ideas, but we'll see if any of them are interesting or not (I'm guessing not, but we'll see). So until I go away somewhere again - well, until I pay off the credit card bills - thanks to Craig and Anna for letting us stay with them in Quebec, and if you're ever looking for an apartment rental for a holiday in Vancouver, go for Chocolate Lily, it was superb (link below). I'm off to get out my map of the world and a dart to see where I'm going to next...
Dr Sun Yat Sen Garden, Vancouver
Seattle Seahawks Official Website
BC Place roof to be repaired this week
Chocolate Lily Apartment Rental
