Quebec City (Thurday, Fri, Sat leave Sun)

We arived in Quebec in the afternoon of thurday the 4th, on the train. We didnt get seated next to eachother on this train, and I was moved about three times before they could find me a free seat! A nice train ride through the country though. It was nice to be reaching a hotel rather than a hostel for once, as the bellman greated us and opened the doors for us and there were elevators to reach your rooms! The last places we have stayed in Canada were up at least 3 flights of stairs, which of course we had to get all of our luggage up (and back down, which is not as easy as it sounds).

The hotel is lovely and this time I get the double bed! There is a pool, gym, sauna and outdoor spa. The winter carnival activities are about a 2 minute walk down the road (we couldnt be in a better spot) and one of the roads the hotel is on is a hot sport for resuarants and bars. woo! So you can almost forget how feazing it is here!

We have met up with Steph and Alices parents, Wendy and Nigel who are so kindly going to let us stay at their house for most of a week when we leave for New Brunswick. They arrived on Friday night, and so all saturday we spent exploring the carnival and the city. The carnival includes all sorts of activities and located all around the city, however the man area is the place up the road. It has ice scupltures and carvings, tubing, sleigh rides and other activities. There is also this giant ice castle across from the grounds which you can walk through and gets all lit up at night. Tonight we are heading to a parade, held for the winter carnival. Its about a half hours drive out of the city and its going to be cold.

So freazing watching the parade! The vibe is cool though, as every body dances and sings to keep warm, so nearly everyone is involved in some way. When we got back, Steph and I had an outdoor spa. Such a refreshing thing to do when it is negative degrees outside, and all the other people are wearing beanies! Off to new brusnwick early in the morning, au revoir Quebec!

xxx

Montreal (tues, wed, thurs)

Caught a train ride to Montreal, from Toronto on Tuesday, which is part of French Canada. The start of out stay here was tarnished slightly by a not so lovely taxi ride (the gentleman decided to take us half way round the city, proclaiming he didnt know where we needed to go, when we finially got there he says oh! Saint piErre! However we had written the address down for him to over come any language barriers...).

The Hostel here is great! Its an alternative hostel, there is no TV and everyone is encouraged to cook healthy meals and drink nice tea! The communial kitchen is lovely, but our room is sweet as well. I dont know how but Steph got the double bed! We are staying in Old Montreal, which is just beautiful. All the buildings have so much old character and its so nice to go walking down them, as their all covered in snow.

We were able to explore the city on foot quite well above ground, but below ground there is a network of underground malls and shops connected to the subways. This was obviously easier to reach by the underground! It was insane how much shopping you could do underground, and how dissorientated this made you when you finally reached ground level.

Had to leave pretty early on Thursday, but Steph and Al mannaged to fit in an iceskating trip! (I was uploading blogs). Then off to our next stop: Quebec City!

Toronto (sat, sun, mon)

We made it to Toronto! And its freezing!! It was sitting on about minus 12 when we arived and was so dark but only about 6 pm. So all we did was grab some dinner and warm up before heading to bed. We are at the gloabl villiage backpackers, which is quite nice, dispite the hike up the stairs. We have a room to ourselves, which includes Stephs younger sister, Alice. We met up in the Toronto airport and she will be with us untill we leave New Brusnwick.

On sunday we managed to have a walk about town. We visited the CN Tower, which is apparently the tallest building, but i doubt it considering Dubai is breaking every record atm! You get to wlak out over this glass floor though, which is pretty awesome. We then stayed warm by walking around the shops! And then caught the underground to the Royal Ontario Museum. It was huge, we were mesmerised! We didnt get to see it all and we rushed some parts, it was so extensive. They had this amazing geology section, It was stunning. It also included a jewellery display aswell (mostly from the same lady) which included all these amazing vintage peices from Cartier, Bvlgari, Harry Winston etc. So increadible!

On Monday we headed out to Niagara Falls (over an hours bus ride away) with a tour group. It was impressive and the view was lovely, however it would have been nice to be able to ride the 'maid of the mist'. We couldnt because the river was mostly frozen on top, even with the fall still flowing! The mist creates rainbows over the river and the falls themselves are breathtaking up close, but it was too cold to stand around looking at them for very long. The next stop on our tour was Niagara on the Lake, which was this special little town which had tried to preserve its old character. Its situated where the Niagara River meets Lake Ontario, hence the name. All the buldings are old and there are no fast food places or neon signs at all. Instead (like all tourist destinations) you will find quiant coffee shops, fudge and lolly shops and authentic souvenir shops. It was such a pretty little town with the snow falling! Our next stop was wine tasting, i didnt even realise it was included in our tour! Best suprise ever! They took us to a winery called 20Bees, also home of the Dan Akroyd wine (who knew!). Apperntly he has a very good taste for wine. 2OBees also makes Canadas famour style of wine: Icewine. The grapes are picked when frozen, which contain far less juice but is more concertrated. The amount used for one bottle of icewine is equivelant to 30 normal bottles! The result is a very sweet desert wine, which we got to sample. The tour was great, with a funny guide and good stops. It was also great to get out and see the Canadian countryside!

Love E, S and A
xxx

Dinner and an outing (fri night)

After Rodeo drive we were starving! so we headed to a place we had been meaning to check out (mostly as it is where Vanessa Hudgens had held a birthday party before, woo). The place was georgeous, all mood lighting and pretty light decorations. We wanted to take some pics for you but it was too fancy! (We took some of the bathroom though so have a look!) The menu was awesome, the idea being to get a few different dishes and share them between you. Steph and I had some tofu, chicken, vegie salad and cod. Yeah I ate some fish! it was all so delicious and it was just the best to get some food which wasnt microwave or from a diner.

We had some cocktails and some sake at the bar afterwards, which I had never tried. It was pretty good and we felt pretty fancy! There was an actor from the American Office sitting at the bar aswell! woo the only celebrity I saw, and he is a fat, balding middle aged man! Go L.A.!

We went on the hostel pub crawl afterwards which was nice. The people there are so friendly and cool. The trouble was that the music around here is lame, and we miss the clubs in Radelaide, especially JIVE! It was a good way to finish our trip with the L.A. gang and say our goodbyes :( but its always easier to leave than stay!

Universal Studios and Rodeo Drive (fri)

For our last full day in L.A. we hit up Universal Studios and in the evening walked down Rodeo Drive. The studios was pretty fun, although not as big or as good as Dinseyland, but we expected that. The tour through all the sets was awesome fun and its great to get an idea of how many movies and TV shows are actually made there. While we went through they were filming parts of Desperate Housewives and also Ghoswhisperer (or what ever it is called!) not that we got to see any one. The locations you drive through are all set up in sections, like the western area and the frenchy one, the English and New York sets and the Mexican street. And they are all set outside. The Mexican street is all set to start raining everywhere strait away and can also make a 'flash flood',all of which was demonstrated. The Mexican street is actually where the OC filmed most of their TJ trip woo! And one of the villa thingos in the frenchy or european like streets is where Tourtuga from Pirates of the Caribbean was filmed. Wicked!

So the tour was the most exciting thing to do there, the other bits and pieces were some rides, side shows and themed cantinas and cafes (the Flinstone's BBQ anyone?). There was Itchy and Scratchy Land (the Simpsons) which was so deatailed and included this amazing virtual rollercopaster where you dont even leave the building but instead have this massive screen in front of you. The chairs rock and water sprays your face, and when a giant maggie tries to eat you, you can also smell baby powder. The Shrek film is the same idea except in 3d (or what they call 4D including the seats moving and water/wind effects). It was an amazing experience involves the auience so much more in watching the film. We also got to see the 'waterworld'production, which is a stage play but the set is mostly water and then fake rigging and towers etc surrounding it. That was amazing, except that the actors splashed us before it started with water pistold and big buckets of water!

Rodeo drive we didnt visit for long as the shops were starting to close, but it was such a lovely street. In comparisson to Hollywood the place was paridise! However we didnt see any one famous :( Except Taylor Lautner had been into the same coffee shop we went to earlier that day! Ha ha there were so many stories like that, but it was still nice to have a look at all the really nice shops (and all the really expensive cars parked outside!).

Love E and S

Disneyland! wed.

Yay! we went to Disneyland on Wednesay for the whole day and it was great. Its like walking onto a disney movie set, every one that works there is in old school costumes and everything is clean and perfect. We got there pretty early in the morning so we managed to avoid alot of the lines for the good rides. There were quite a few good rides, but then there are also the tour like rides which mosly take you through the story of whichever one you are on. However the Snow White story finished as she took a bite into the apple with a painting saying they all lived happily ever after (im sorry but how, when we havent even seen a picture of the prince??). The rest were cool though. I got to finally see the Pirates of the Caribbean tour, oh my, which i have been waiting to do for half my life. Was so good! mostly as i just love the story! And they had added the modern story to it, which was nice but i do like the original, but it was cool to see the jhonny depp Sprarrow and Davey Jones and the story relating to that.

One of the best was Space mountain, an indoor rollercoaster in compete darkness, appart from lights which look like stars, it was so much fun. There was also the buzz lightyear ride, which was a cross between a ride and a video game (you get lazer guns and aim at targets and you get a score and its super fun), which we went on to many times for people our age! Mostly as they send you the pictures on your email, and we knew where the cameras were.

I was so dissapointed that we could find any of the disney princesses for photos, and any one who knows me will no how sad I am. We went to buy princess costumes in one of the shops but they only had kids ones, or as the lady in ye old shoppe said "those are for the younger princesses, we dont sell them to you older princesses as we dont want to confuse the younger princesses and have them taking pictures of you". I will take it as a compliment i guess that we might have pics takken of us, and i was happy that she still reffered to us as princesses :)

We still didnt even get to see every thing (like meet mickey!) but it was a fun day.

Hollywood

So we made it to L.A. at about 5 am after a flight in which we got no sleep (thanks baby in seat c opposite with a fever). So we were a bit like zombies for the day, and we couldnt sleep anywhere as our hostel rooms werent ready till 2! So we wandered around Hollywood Blvd, but the shops dont open till later (appart from starbucks) and so instead we settled for the hostels library for a nap. Dont get excited, its a room about 1m square and has one arm chair, and in my case a comfy floor...

We also took a delirious walk up to the hollywood sign, which is quite a hike, especially on no sleep! but the view was pretty awesome though, dispite the pollution. We also got to see a star laying ceremony for some director we had never heard of!

Hollywood itself is a weird place. Hollywood Blvd is pretty dirty and there are dodgy shops the way along. Some areas are nice though, with theatres and shopping malls etc, and of course there are the stars on the walk of fame. Only by looking at all the stars people know your tourists and keep asking weather you want to take a celebrity home tour. THE ANSWER IS NO!

For dinner we went to this really nice diner, a cool modern one with a cocktail bar and cupcakes. We also ordered a hot cider and when we got it the waitress tells us that this cider is mixed with whisky! Ah!

love E & S xx