Canada.......at last

TRIP TO CANADA

BY ANTERO AND MARY From 2 to 29 September 2005 1 Why Canada.: Ever since we were young we had dreamt of this far-off continent (North America) where the prairies, the mountains, the woods are so vast, just as its territory is immense, with so many, oh so many lakes that, together with the parks, are a traveller's delight.

Let's plan the trip.

Mary retired in May 2005 and Antero on 1 July 2005, and right away we decided the moment had come to fulfil our wish, since we had time to spend on the journey and enough money. We began gathering the material needed to organise a long stay in Canada and weighed up the various tour offers put forward by the travel agencies. We browsed every website that describes the cities and places of Canada and decided to visit Quebec and Ontario, considering that these two provinces are, each of them, five times bigger than Italy.

Once the place to visit was settled, there were still so many other details to sort out such as: Direct flight to Montreal or flight to Toronto with a stopover in Paris; Organised or independent travel; Travel insurance and personal health-assistance cover; Language; Documents and payment methods; Miscellaneous equipment; Clothing; After carefully weighing the agencies' offers for an organised trip, including return flight, half board and a few guided coach tours, with a minimum cost of euro 2,600 each 2 for 12 days and 4,500 for 23 days, we decided to take the big step on our own, preparing the itinerary, the language and everything else needed to carry out our great adventure, which would keep us busy for the whole of September.

Programme: Start of the Canada tour from the city of Montreal, visiting the regions of Quebec with its main routes: the Appalachian road, the Navigators' road, the Whale road, the fjord road and, on the border with Ontario, the Explorers' road. We will then visit the regions of Ontario, from the Great Lakes to the Niagara Falls on the border with the United States. We will go up the St Lawrence River, along the road of the great historic sites, full of memories of the battles between the French and the English and between the English and the Americans.

Itinerary: Montreal-Drummondville-Riviere du Loup-Miguasha-Percé-Gaspé-Matane-ferry-Baie Comeau-Lake St.Jean-St:Catherine-Beaupre-Quebec-Mont Tremblant-Ottawa-Pembroke- Maynnhoot-Algonquin Park-Huntsville-Parry Sound-Midland-Waterloo-Niagara Falls-Toronto- Kingston-Montreal. For a total of 6,500 km. 3 The adventure begins. Friday 2 September Departure at 9 with a nine-hour direct flight Rome-Montreal and arrival in Montreal at 12 the same day (6 hours' time difference behind). We left home at 3.15 at night to reach Fiumicino in good time, accompanied by Bruno (our son) who kindly offered to drive us. At 5.45 we were at the airport, a quick seat reservation and then we waited for departure, which took place at 9.25.

The plane, big and short, didn't look good from the outside, and inside we were packed like sardines with rows of three seats on the left, three in the middle and three on the right, for a total of 267 passengers, which made us say: but where are the beautiful, wide, comfortable planes, with seats like the ones they show us on television?. To be fair, the journey went without any particular problems, Mary dozed the whole time and ate often while one film after another ran on the tv. One nice touch was that the captain every hour showed us where we were; at what altitude and at what speed we were cutting through the sky, letting us follow the plane's route in real time and the distance still to go.

At 12, making up for the late departure, we arrived in Montreal; the landing was greeted by all the passengers with a long round of applause for the crew, who had kept us such warm company throughout the nine hours of the journey. Disembarking and collecting the suitcases was quick and easy because Montreal airport, recently refurbished, is welcoming and easy to get around, with signs everywhere, with bars, supermarkets and duty free, and with a great deal of staff, always friendly and kind to travellers. 4 At 12.30 we were outside the airport and saw that the weather was fine; the taxi arrived immediately and straight away, in imperfect French, we asked the driver to take us to the Clayron Hotel, which is in central Montreal at number 1202 on Boulevard de Maisonneuve. Central Montreal is 24 kilometres from the airport and we covered the distance in next to no time.

The driver, amid the vastness of the motorways that intertwine, coil, rise overhead, intersect, disappear underground, all with six lanes in each direction, seemed like a Formula One driver; by 13 we were already at the hotel and, after leaving our credit card, we reached our room, large and airy, with a view of Mont Royal, with bathroom, living room, tv and a kitchenette with oven, fridge, microwave and coffee maker, in short with everything needed to cook in the room. (all the motels where we slept would be like this too). Just enough time to drop off the suitcases and off we went for a brief visit of Montreal, taking the metro, whose entrances and stations aren't as beautiful as those in Moscow but are functional, sleek and very punctual.

Tiredness got the better of us; it was only 17.30 (23.30 in Italy) and the time difference was beginning to tell; after a pizza — we don't know what toppings, but it was very tasty — a beer and a long, very long American-style coffee, we went back to the hotel, where we slept deeply enough to recover our strength.

5 Saturday 3 September This morning we go to visit Montreal with its skyscrapers and old Montreal, where the first French settlers founded New France; the weather is glorious and there's a fresh little breeze. We have a quick breakfast in a bakery and off on foot towards the historic heart of the city. We cross the great streets of Montreal, full of elegant, sprawling shops, and it's immediately clear that this is the capital of Canadian commerce. The great streets and motorways that cross Montreal run alongside and beneath the glass skyscrapers; every now and then you see one- and two-storey houses built in European style, almost all turned into bistros and surrounded by pretty little alleys that sometimes look abandoned, while other houses in American style all have external staircases, are made of brick and have no roof; all of this between one skyscraper and the next.

We reach Montreal Cathedral, dedicated to Marie Reine du Monde, built just like St