Category: Travel

I love to Travel, these posts are about trips I have taken.

Europe: 2010 – 2011 – 2013 – 2016 – 2018
Sun Trip: 2014 – 2015 – 2017 – 2018
NYC: 2010 – 2011

A Journey to King Arthur’s Court

A Journey to King Arthur’s Court

Once again, without much foreplanning the quest was quickly booked. I was of on another grand adventure. This was the first time I travelled to Europe in the end of October. As usual I departed from the Saint John Airport, and connected in Montreal to London Heathrow. The flight itself was rather uneventful and me and my luggage arrived as expected to London. Using Google maps for hotels in the area of Southampton I was looking for the most affordable option that was commutable by train and had settled with the Travelodge in Winchester, Hampshire. I knew absolutely nothing of this place and had procrastinated due to my dislike of making plans and the rail option had jumped to be far greater than taking the bus to Winchester, and the weather was horrid as the tropical storm that devastated my home region was no having the same fun to the folks of the UK especially Scotland and Northern England. Due to this I had decided to go directly to Winchester. From Heathrow Terminal 2 I had never taken the bus before and following the signage was pretty easy to the Bus terminal. Once there it was like any other bus…

Day 4 – To Château de Cruix

Day 4 – To Château de Cruix

This was a rough bus ride. We drove a while and ended up at the Chateau de Cruix. There was a great wine tasting here. Though the cheese was great the wine had trouble going down after puking so much the night before. After dinner we had an easy nighty and skipped the party. We also went to the town Napoleon rallied the troops on his final return from exile. Journal entry from 2013 The beads of water are dropping on my head in a nice warm shower as I awaken to hear the alarm sound that it is time to get up a begin the day. I am sitting in a stand up shower stall at the ibis Budget hotel in Paris. As I emerge from the shower to pack up to meet up with the tour group. I see the victim that the room has become. Where my bed was there was the remnants of of the Parisian dinner experience including the 5 bottles of previously consumed red wine on the bed and the bed of the person I was supposed to be sharing a room with. Though in reality he didn’t use the room that night, as…

Day 3 – Paris (a.k.a. the last day I enjoyed wine)

Day 3 – Paris (a.k.a. the last day I enjoyed wine)

Start by going to the Arc de Triumph with the group then ditched them and explored the entire Champs-Élysées. Of special note was the amazing pastry in the back alley. Then from near the Louvre took the Metro to Bonne Nouvelle (Good news). I got out and seen 2 amazing Arches. Then want to the Musée des Arts et Métiers. The place was amazing. I saw a Kilogram and a satellite. After that I walked down to the Hotel de ville and the Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris. Caught the Metro again and went to Rodan’s house but ran out of time so walked back to meet the coach. Then went up a lot of steps to the church on the hill. Then the Parisian dinner where thought it was a good idea to polish off 4 bottles are wine. The fish dinner and onion soup was great. Then went to Nouvelle Eve and was very drunk, had a few glasses of Champane. When clapping I spilled a glass on Catherine. When show was over, we went to O’Sullivan’s but I was too drunk to be let in so I went to the hotel. Where I passed out and woke up…

Day 2 – To Paris

Continuation of a series from a Travel Log I found from my 2013 Contiki trip Got up early and started the bus journey. Met the ferry and had breakfast. Finally made it to Paris. We did a city tour by bus, had some snails then spent the night going up the Eiffel Tower. I took the stairs. It was difficult, but easier than the 1st time. I did not want to go to the very top but like what the hell and did it anyways. Then it was 12:30am by the time we got down and took a taxi home.

Europe Trip Travel Log 2013

This morning I was cleaning out some old notebooks and I found a travel journal I started during my 2013 Contiki trip to Europe. This was the trip that I added Monaco and Liechtenstein to my list of travelled countries. Day 1 – London Great flight. Heathrow went quite quickly. I thought that I had food poisoning on the flight as I was very gassy. Then I went to the Royal National dropped off my bags and then explored the city walked across Westminster Bridge seen the London Eye and Parliament. Then went to Canada Water to pick up a few items at the mall. Went back to the hotel & checked into my room. Then I met my roommate Probin from Regina, SK. Went to see Westminster and Buckingham Palace. Then back to the Royal National for the meetup and drinks at London Pub.

A Journey to Start All Journeys

Looking back I don’t have many posts outlining my early international trips this was my 2010 trip to New York City. This trip starts like any other trip a random bus ride to Montreal to see the Canadiens in their playoffs bid in Montreal. However, it took a bit of a turn. I instead ended up going to the Forum cinema and catching a movie and then went to PearlVision to fix my glasses that broke. It had been a very long bus ride to Montreal overnight on the Acadian Lines bus. Feeling down from the long trip that I only took because I sold people I was going to the game that I had no way of getting tickets to, and no booked hotel in Montreal I had a “great idea”. I was going to take the bus to New York City and then take the Greyhound up to Bangor and catch the Acadian Lines service home. After a day in Montreal, I went to the old bus station and got my tickets. I was really tired and quickly after leaving fell asleep on the bus. Only to be woken by the overzealous US Border Service Officer getting on…

Charlotte Amalie and the Prairie Dog💩

As I had been to this port before, it was no big hurry to get off the ship. When I did there was the typical Caribbean band and warm welcomes. It was sun and rain periods and humid, so even though it was not the greatest, it was not that bad either. When I made it to the main street, I considered trying to find a bus to the other side of the harbour and instead just kept walking. The island looked familiar but very different from last time. Which due to two hurricanes, was not surprising. Many of the buildings had rooves that were replaced with blue tarps or red metal roofing. Then there were the chickens, no why in the world have I ever seen more chickens than I did in Charlotte Amalie, and the ear-piercing bellow of all the roosters. Along Veterans Drive, there is a lot of construction work to improve and build a multi-million dollar project to build a veterans memorial causeway that will look incredible, especially to visitors. The sight of which is just following the Extreme Tsunami Risk Zone. It is a real shame given the number of hurricane destruction on the islands,…

The Virgin Islands, or Where They Used to Be

The Virgin Islands, or Where They Used to Be

This morning, I was pumped and excited, I work up stupid early so that I could emerge for breakfast and grab some amazing, red sky in morning, photos of the island as the sun peaked over the horizon. For this morning, I wanted to be ready to go early and quickly plate loaded from the buffet. I then returned to my cabin to shower and prepare the day bag with everything I needed, camera, phone, tripod, sunscreen, sunglasses, hat, and wallet. I really had no plans at all what to do and I had no US cash on me so the vague plan was to get off the ship, find wifi and catch-up, post some pictures to make those at home jealous, and find a bank. Today I arrived at the port of Tortola, one of the British Virgin Islands. I got off the ship and it was a nice close walk to the Tortola cruise village. It was actually quite obvious that the cruise village was a fake example of stereotypical island life and all the usual shopping. I sat on a bench in front of Diamonds International and got on the wifi there. It was pretty good wifi,…

Off on the Epic, the Dancing King

Off on the Epic, the Dancing King

Okay, the Epic titles and making reference to epic things may be getting old at this point but trust me there will be more and they will be epically cliche. Upon boarding the ship, it was luck time so I headed to the buffet as usual and sampled a bit of everything. Apparently, the buffet on the first two days of a trip makes up about half of all food waste for the entire week-long voyage. The food was pretty good. Nothing outstanding from most buffets in most ships and restaurants. I was also disappointed that Washie-Washie was not as happy-happy as my last trip. This may seem like complaining, but it is not. The Norwegian Epic is very good, and far superior to not travelling in the first place. After lunch, I grabbed a drink and explored around the ship until it was time to meet up with the Solo Coordinator at the meetup in the solo lounge. The solo lounge on the Epic was really good and better than the Getaway. It had an espresso machine and was amazing coffee. From this meeting, I went to dinner and then called it a night. The next day I did…

An Epic Night and Journey to the Epic

An Epic Night and Journey to the Epic

Following the subway ride, I ended up on good old St. Andrew Station in Downtown Toronto on a Just above freezing evening. I was a bit hungry so as I wandered Downtown I was looking for somewhere no but ended up going to Hooters on John St.. The meal was good I had the Steak Spice Quesadilla and it was really good. There was a hockey game on so, I enjoyed the meal and a beer, game, and people watching until about 1 am. After that, I left and continued to wander down John to Queen West and then stopped at the McDonald’s at Spadina. Since I had time to kill, I stayed at the McDonald’s for just over an hour to charge my phone and people watch with a coffee and a muffin. This area in the daytime is high class, in the evening it is just high. I sat up on the second floor and there was a guy at the end of the booths that kept being woken up by security, it looked like he was very impaired. Then going in and out of the washroom was an uncomfortable assortment of people. Prior to leaving I needed…

A Subway Journey to finish All the Stations

An evening on a subway train can be a very interesting experience. Tonight my transit adventure began at Pearson Terminal 1 where I picked up the 192 Airport Rocket to Kipling Subway station. The bus ride was really nostalgic as I haven’t taken the bus in quite some time. The bus was packed and well filled with travellers, airport and airline staff calling it quits for the night. Once at Kipling station I got on the first eastbound train to transfer a St. George station. Watching people is one thing that I absolutely love to do. I noticed that although Toronto is very unique that it still has a Canadianism about it. At St. George station, I switched to a northbound train to try and visit the new stations I have never been to. There was a kind of new couple that was sitting next to me. She was teaching him things about the subway because he is new to Canada. Although it was cute that he missed his stop to go one more stop because he didn’t want to leave her. After they left the train around Downsview Park station was there was a larger but still average woman…

The banged up emotions, banged up car, and big boom finale

As we left off the quest, I was on the back roads of southern Ontario, with the Spotify music pumped. I was taking the back roads partly because it was taking everything to keep myself together, and partly because the 410, 407, and 401 scare the hell out of me. It was at this point, I decided that seeing Niagara Falls wasn’t going to happen with the gloomy dark cloud of depression. It was also raining and cloudy too. After close to 2 hours, I arrived in Kitchener and the sun came out there. I managed to find a convenient little parking spot and walked down Festival street. I have written before about Kitchener-Waterloo Oktoberfest but there is something about this festival that in its own special way brings it over the top. There seems to even be a much higher percentage of people in a traditional dress than you even see in Munich. The Rogers Hometown hockey was there and there was a beautiful smell in the air that brought nostalgia back. Like most things, however, the second time is just not the same and the depression came back. I grabbed a sausage and water and then went to…

Drywall Flying Off a Trailer is Still a Sign

Drywall Flying Off a Trailer is Still a Sign

Planning for this trip started months ago, it was planned as the best available excuse to visit Brampton Civic Hospital to determine what was real and what was not. I had already sacrificed a day from this mini-vacation for my day visiting the Anthem of the Seas and had Friday to Tuesday for a road trip to Brampton. “Coincidence” (with air quotes) would prevail that it was also during Kitchener-Waterloo Oktoberfest. As the weekend approached, I was starting to have second thoughts about this trip and a feeling that it was not the most financially planned decision to make. It was literally the Friday morning that I was going to go. The plan was Montreal on Friday, Brampton/Kitchener on Saturday, Niagara Falls on Sunday, back to Kitchener on Monday for the parade and then drive home. As I was leaving Saint John and just passing Spruce Lake. Out of nowhere, a sheet of drywall flew in the air just metres in front of me and luckily there was none beside me and I switched lanes to avoid disaster. As soon as that happened, I had this dreadful feeling that this trip was a mistake. I continued on anyway. I crossed…

My Day on the Anthem of the Seas

My Day on the Anthem of the Seas

This tale begins about a month ago. I received a marketing email from my favourite travel company Maritime Travel. It offered a talk about the offerings by Royal Caribbean Cruise Line, lunch, and a tour of the Anthem of the Seas when it was in port on September 13th. I had never received one of these invitations before but was in envy of those who did. I was kind of in an when I showed it to a colleague, her eyes lit up and said: “I’m your plus one right?” So, I replied back that I was interested and quickly go a reply back that I was on the list. About a week before the trip, I received an email with the details that basically confirmed the times. Meet at the “Port of Saint John” by 9:30 am. There were no specifics. Let’s face it, if I can find a ship in San Juan, Saint John would be a walk in the park. I mean how could you miss it on a beautiful sunny day. When we got to the terminal the commissioner let us into the terminal and gave us directions to go to the furthest door. We passed…

The Irish Finale

I departed the Enterprise starving, and in pain a bit from the ridiculous amount of walking in Belfast. I went down the stairs to the tram station and the Google Transit app said there were no more trains but there was a dot-matrix display showing next tram in 7 minutes with a group of at least fifteen people waiting for the tram. Then a local said to the group no more trams tonight and the screen was for the next station down the line. A vocal man with an American accent convinced the group of people that the local was wrong. I looked at the sign and noticed it said “Busáras” and the blank one said “Connolly”. Since I can also read perfect Gaelic, I recognized that Busáras means Bus Station and Connolly was the name of the train station. I decided the local was right and since I didn’t know where the Bus Station stop was, I just followed the track, and it was not even a block away. My plan for the night was to go to an Irish Pub and grab dinner there, but once I got off the Luas (what Dublin calls trams/streetcars) near my hotel…

If at First You Don’t Succeed… Build a Museum

Shall we continue where we left off, attempting to sleep— Update at 2:24am #1 stopped snoring and #4 and #6 are sharing #6 and double “bean flicking” #FML Facebook Post After the above comment to the Facebook post in my last post, I passed out with exhaustion regardless of the hostel situation. Buzz!!! Buzz!!! Buzz!!!… it’s 5:45am! That meant it was time to get up. For once I was prepared with my go bag and clothes for what I needed for the day. Went to the shared washroom, brushed my teeth, and ran (hobbled quickly with only one ankle) to the tram stop a few blocks down. It was a brisk and crispy morning as the sun was already rising over the buildings in the square. I arrived several (23) minutes before the first train. (or so I thought) to the train. After determining that I had time, I went to Costa to get coffee. (Sorry, Closed) The coffee shop across the street.  (Sorry, Closed) The 15ish coffee shops in this college/young urban district of town. (Sorry, Closed) Needless to say, I was going to get on this tram without a morning coffee. The tram arrived, I got on several…

Europe 2018 #33 – Part 3

After a well rested night, it is now my birthday. I slept a bit late and left the hostel to wander around Dublin. The most important first stop was the local Costa Coffee shop across the plaza, and to pump up some energy for the day, and to Facebook creep what was going on in the world. After coffee, I went to the waterfront (river the passed through the city) and walked towards the area that the hostel said was where all the tour tickets could be brought about a 25-minute walk away. I took a lot longer taking photos and resting due to my limitations every couple of blocks. It was at this point that it hit me that, I was near no one I knew, in a place I knew nothing really about. This got me really sad. The first bridge I came across I thought was the famous (according to my map) Ha’penny Bridge. I Facebook Live posted a video going across it. (Which had no viewers.) Then as I continued on to the next bridge it had a sign that it was the Ha’penny Bridge. It looked cooler but yet less impressive and had about a…