Amazing Canada

TRAVELLERS: Caterina CAT, Matteo TEO (18 months), Davide DVD DURATION: 22 days (from 3 to 24 September 2008) BOOKINGS: every booking was "do it yourself", using the wonderful and inexhaustible basket of the internet. FLIGHT1: airtransat.it (rome-toronto-rome booked online €1,158 return). we were happy with it both outbound and inbound. decent meals with an exotic twist (sweet and sour pork outbound, tandoori chicken inbound). if you're travelling with a child under two and booking online, skip the seat-selection option (it costs extra); at check-in they'll give you (usually) row 5 (the first after business class), slightly roomier than the normal rows. FLIGHT2: we ruled out Alitalia (direct flight to Toronto), British Airways (stopover in London) and Air France (stopover in Paris) because of the clearly higher costs and the stopovers that add a great deal to the journey time.

JET LAG: we can say we didn't suffer from it too much, contrary to what we'd read in many accounts. on arrival, 14:30 local time, we didn't rest and wandered around with no fixed plan to keep ourselves awake. in the evening we went to bed very early (20:00), picking up the local rhythm straight away. on our return, 09:30 local time, we allowed ourselves three hours of afternoon sleep since the night flight had been sleepless, and then back to the local rhythm. TEO (18 months): children have no scruples and sleep when they're tired! avoid afternoon naps that are too long so they reach the evening a little tired. that's what we did and all in all it went well. B&B: bbcanada.com (a remarkable site for finding B&Bs) and tripadvisor.com for a cross-check of the information.

B&B SEARCH REQUIREMENTS: no smoking inside, private bathrooms, no pet (mandatory), allows bring children (obviously!), accepts Visa & Amex, Double-Twin-Queen-King beds types (so all three of us could sleep comfortably), parking availability. CAR RENTAL: alamo.com. calling the Maggiore freephone number 199.151.120 they give you the quotes for Alamo (all included) and National (a lower base offer than Alamo but extra costs for insurance cover: ruled out). with Alamo the price quoted is the final one, which avoids the usual "counter-offer" at the desk topping up what wasn't covered beforehand; what's more, and this is not to be underestimated, they didn't ask for a credit card number to book (obviously left until we picked up the vehicle).

we paid 789.07 € for 17 days with: theft included with no excess, damage included with no excess, 3 additional drivers free, 1 free tank of petrol (in practice we returned the car empty). they gave us a dirty and rather "well-travelled" "automatic" PT Cruiser, but in the end it did its job. SAT NAV: we didn't rent one; in our view it isn't needed. a few printouts from google maps and two nice road maps bought on the spot were more than enough to go anywhere. GUIDEBOOKS: Mondadori (Canada); Rough Guides (Québec Ontario). We decided not to buy Lonely Planet any more, as we'd been disappointed several times by the quality of the information and by gross printing errors. by the end of the trip we'd somewhat changed our minds about the Lonely Planets, and we also confirmed that two guidebooks are too many. perhaps even a guidebook itself is useless.

from the internet and above all from the many tourist centres you can get all the information you need for your trip. KM COVERED: 3295 km ROUTE IDEAS: Hotelplan and Kuoni for an initial idea of the route to take. viaggiscoop.it (obviously) and turistipercaso.it for the accounts and tips of those who went before us. PRACTICAL INFO: bonjourquebec.com MOTORWAYS & LIMITS: on the motorways the limits are not below 60 kmh and not above 100 kmh. at 100 kmh everyone passes you, at 110 kmh many pass you, at 120 kmh you're not the only one but watch out, because the checks are there and you often see police cars on the roadside (we limited ourselves to 110 kmh).

the quality of the motorways is on average lower than ours, but the substantial difference is that they're completely free! TIPS/SERVICE: from 10% to 15% on top of the bill itself, there's no getting out of it, it's the rule, taxi drivers included. at first it's a bit annoying, also because some people ask for it openly. once you've accepted the mechanism it becomes automatic (like haggling over the price in Asian and African countries). ROUTE

Wednesday 03/Sep flight Rome > Montreal Thursday 04/Sep Montreal Friday 05/Sep Montreal Saturday 06/Sep Montreal > Ottawa Sunday 07/Sep Ottawa Monday 08/Sep Ottawa > Huntsville via Algonquin Provincial Park Tuesday 09/Sep Algonquin Provincial Park Wednesday 10/Sep Huntsville > Toronto via Bracebridge (Santa's village) and Orillia (Lake Simcoe). Thursday 11/Sep Niagara Falls and Niagara-on-the-Lake Friday 12/Sep Toronto Saturday 13/Sep Toronto > Kingston Sunday 14/Sep Gananoque, Ivy Lea and Rockport Monday 15/Sep Kingston > Quebec via Trois-Rivières Tuesday 16/Sep Quebec Wednesday 17/Sep Ile d'Orleans Thursday 18/Sep chutes de Montmorency; Ste Anne de Beaupre Friday 19/Sep Levis Saturday 20/Sep Quebec > Tadoussac Sunday 21/Sep whale trip Monday 22/Sep Tadoussac > Montreal Tuesday 23/Sep Montreal > Rome Wednesday 24/Sep Rome

COMMENTS ON THE ROUTE: 5 nights in Quebec are too many. we included them partly to slow the pace and not stress TEO too much, partly because we thought we'd find a different city (we didn't like Quebec). with hindsight we'd recommend 2/3 nights (no more) in Quebec, 1 extra night in Toronto (by far the city we liked most) and 1 night in Niagara on the Lake to go and see the falls lit up at night. the detour to the Gaspé peninsula wasn't considered.

THANKS to CAT for her essential contribution in preparing and carrying out this wonderful trip THANKS to TEO for his cheerfulness, his perpetual good humour and his strength in dealing with change, which made this long trip of ours even more pleasant