US-50 Coast-to-Coast: Epilog

I was able to get the bike home after the chain broke.  Once home I identified that besides the chain, the clutch push rod was broken into three pieces, and the push rod cover was also damaged. I was very lucky that given a broken chain, this was all that was damaged. I was able to fix the damage in short order and was back on the road.

The Montreal Vacation. Part 2

Day-5. We got up around 7:30 AM and took the Kava Winery tour, which started for us at 8:45 AM in the Square Dorchester. Our driver was the bilingual Nicholas of Montreal. We then made one other stop in the city at the old Montreal information station and then left the city traveling down highway 10 for about 30 minutes before making yet another stop to pickup additional people at the city of Brome, all before we arrived at our first winery. There were probably about 24 people on the bus, of which 4 of us were anglophones. 

Nicholas would use the microphone to lecture in French, and then talk English to the 4 of us, who were seated in the first two rows. I would say that about 95% of the tour was in French. Nicholas would go on for about 15 minutes describing the countryside or winery in French over the microphone, and then give us a quick review in English as he drove, and as we leaned forward to hear the best we could. 

The first winery we stopped at was the Domaine Les Brome Winery.  We split in to two groups.  One group was led by the women owner, who later said she was an American. This group was the French speaking group. Our group, was led by Nicholus and was the English speaking group. The other couple consisted of two students from outside of Quebec.

The owners of the winery were a husband wife team that had left the corporate world to start the winery. He had formally been a bank president.  The winery had a reputation as one of the top wineries in Quebec. The winery was perched on top of a little hill, from which you could see lake Brome in the distance. Nicholas went on to explain to us about how they take care of the vines, which were now covered with bird proof netting as per the season.  Later in the year they cut the vines down closer to the ground so that they can cover them with materials in order to protect them from the snows. Nicholas went on to tell us that sometimes they must use helicopters to warm the vines if a deep freeze occurs. It all sounded a bit risky and very costly to maintain. 

Nicholas also told us about the distribution of the vines. The winery had three options when it came to selling their goods. They could see directly to the public at their winery, or they could sell directly to the public from a booth at the market.  Or they could sell their wines to the government owned distribution system, from which restaurants and other retail establishments buy from.

We then went inside were we received a tour of the facilities, which were not much different than other wineries that I have been to. We sat down and tasted about 6 wines that they produced. In my opinion, the best wines were the dryer white wines. Jeanne and I agreed to purchase the “Le Pepin” wine as we left the winery.

We left the winery and after about 20 minutes arrived at Union Libre Cidre and Vin. They told us that they had yet to produce their first wine, but we were going to taste apple cider.  They instructed us on how to make a cocktail using they cider. It turned out to be pretty good.  We then went and took a lunch that they had prepared for us. After lunch we lined up at a table and tasted about 6 ciders, all sweet.  Some of the ciders were good, but some were just too sweet for my liking. I felt like brushing my teeth after tasting a couple of the ciders. Jeanne and I both thought the ciders were good, but they were not what we normally drink, so we passed on purchasing any of their products. 

We then left and went to the third and last winery of the day. It was the Vignoble de la Bauge Winery.  Interesting winery in that they really started with raising wild boars and then moved into wines. They now sell both products. We started the tour with an ice tea cocktail, and then went for a walk along a trail surrounded by their livestock of exotic animals, which they slaughtered and sold to restaurants. After walking for about 30 minutes we went into the tasting room were they gave us tastings on about 5 of their wines. I believe that all the wines were white wines. They ranged from somewhat dry whites to crack your teeth sweet wines.  They also gave the group tastes of the animals they sell: I declined to taste any of the animal parts. Jeanne and I passed on purchasing any of their wines. 

After about an hour we then headed back to Montreal, after dropping a group off at Brome.  On the way back the road became very congested, looking like LA after a holiday weekend. Nicholas was now coming down with a cold and could barely talk, but decided to take an alternate route to enter the city in order to bypass the heavy traffic. But, it was not to be.  The traffic was bad everywhere.  We were about 2 hours late rolling into Montreal. 

Nicholas, the perpetual professional, kept a smile on his face even though he could barely talk in the end. We parted and Jeanne and I went back to the hotel to rest before going out to dinner.At this point, Jeanne was also coming down with a cold. So we stayed close to the hotel and ate at an Italian restarant on Stanley. I had a wood fired pizza which was just fantastic.  It was probably one of the better meals I had in Montreal. 

Day-6. We once again slept in until 10:00 am.  We stopped by our regular coffee and Croissant shop before attempting to get one day bus pass so we might head to old Montreal and take a river cruise. We did not realize it before but you can only get a bus pass with a credit card at the Metro stations. We then walked down to the Metro station at Bonaventure to purchase a pass. Unfortunately, once finding the machine it did not work property and we had to abandon the plan of purchasing a pass at that moment in time.

Therefore we were doomed to walk and we went down to the water front so we could get on the 12:30 ride. We purchased our tickets and were the first people on the boat. We opted to sit out in the open, which was just fine weather-wise, since it heated up once we were out on the St. Lawrence. The only bad part about sitting out in the open was it appears to attract all the little “jimmies”, who were running from their mothers and attempting to throw themselves off the boat into the waterway.  It got so bad with the Jimmies trying to kill themselves that we finally had to move to the middle of the boat to get away from them all. As it was just too stressful watching them run to the railings and hanging over the roaring churning water, while their mothers modeled for pictures. 

The boat ride was great and very interesting. We went down stream and then up stream.  Where else you going to go on a river? It spattered a little rain, but nothing bad.  This was the first day that the sky was not sunny. 

We left the boat ride and decided to get a late lunch in Old Montreal. We opted for a crape restaurant where we both had red Bordeaux wine with our crapes. The food was good and we sat at a table on the second floor out of the way.

We then went to the chateau in old Montreal. We paid the fee and did the self tour. It was somewhat interesting but not over the top. You do the first floor and then down into the basement. Round and around you go.  

When we were done, we exited into a rain storm. We made a bee line to the nearest Metro, where we finally got our beloved one day pass which we used to ride the 747 bus to the airport the next day. If I had not already said so, the 24 hour pass is $10 CAN per person. We rode the metro to the Bonaventure station and walked home. 

Jeanne was not feeling good so I went out and got a couple of sandwiches at the Crudescience vegetarian restaurant which was about a 45 minute round trip walk. On the way back to the hotel I was enjoying walking through the groups of people that were out on St. Catherine street. There are times where it is feels just great to be with many people, but be total invisible and anonymous at the   As I passed her I could see the beads of sweat rolling down her face. Clearly she had been carrying the box for quite some time. As I passed I looked at her and smiled knowing the work she was doing. She then smiled back at me as she held the box on her knees.  This was obviously a purchase that was well worth the effort. 

When I got back to the hotel room, Jeanne and I then sat on the bed and ate the sandwiches along with drinking the bottle of wine that we had purchased on the winery trip. 

Day-7. We got up at 4:00 AM and went down to the peel street bus stop and waited for the 5:05 AM 747 bus to the airport. There are more taxis on the street than people at that hour in Montreal. The bus pulled up on time and much to my astonishment it was almost full.  We road the bus to the airport and arrived just before 6:00 AM. 

Departure processing is always changing. Gone are the days where you just walk up to a man at a counter, he stamps your passport and then you board the aircraft. Now you must go through security, which of course means taking your shoes off. Then you must scan your passport, answer questions and then take a picture of yourself all on little machines. Then you go to the man at the counter and he asks the regular questions and lets you pass to the gates. 

The flight left on time at 7:30 AM. We flew for 6 uneventful hours and quickly were able to get back to the car in the LAX C parking lot. Unfortunately, the car battery had gone dead... and there it is.

The Montreal Vacation. Part 1

Jeanne and I settled on Montreal as a vacation spot for September. We were sold because there was a direct flight from LAX, which takes about 5.5 hours. We left September 23^rd, 2015 with a return planned for September 29^th. 

Day-1: The flight was on time and we landed in Montreal about 3:30 PM.  We immediately caught the 747 bus from the airport to downtown.  The walk to our hotel, the Best Western Europa was just a couple of blocks. We went over to Crescent St. and grabbed a pretty good meal at a high end hamburger place. The food was pretty good, but so were the beers.  We then went to bed after walking around the block and checking out our new home for the next week. 

Day-2: We slept in until 10:00 AM, which I have not done for years. Then we walked over to Peel St. where we had a croissant for breakfast. We then walked about a block away and took the 715 bus which goes to old Montreal. 

We walked all around old Montreal. As I read in reviews, it is very pretty but touristy. There were not that many people there since it was Thursday.

We grabbed a lunch at a very small and interesting restaurant where the chef takes your order and delivers the food, while his wife sat by and feed their kids food. The food was excellent, but the ice tea was the oddest taste we had ever had: not bad just different.

We then walked over to the Notre-Dame Basilica and took the tour. The church is beautiful. It is made of all wood.  They told us when we paid that there was a free organ concert on Friday and Saturday night. We could not make Friday, but we decided that Saturday night would work.

We then walked back to our hotel and went to dinner back on Crescent St. We decided to try a different restaurant, where they once again had excellent food. 

Day-3: We got up and 4:45 AM and took the Via Rail to Ottawa. The train ride was 2 hours long and very nice. I keep my eyes closed most of the time, because I was just so tired from the different hours we had kept. one day we get up at 5:00 AM and the next day we get up at 10:00 AM.  Once in Ottawa we had a taxi take us to the Canadian War Museum where we spent 2 hours checking out WW1, WW2 along with the tank collection. The War Museum is pretty big, so you probably could spend the day there.

At 11:30, Krista from ArcherPoint came and picked us up at the War Museum. Krista is an ArcherPoint project manager that lives in Ottawa. Krista gave us a quick tour of the downtown and then we went off to lunch. We had a great lunch together where we talked all things Canadian. Krista then went back to work, but beforehand suggested we walk up through the park overlooking the locks and then go over to Parliament to take a tour. We did walk the park where there were great views of the city. Ottawa is just beautiful,with the river below and the government buildings on top of the overlooking cliffs.

We then went over to Parliament, but we were told that the tickets to get in were on a first come, first serve basis each day.  Of course they were all sold out.  We then settled to stand in front of Parliament and take pictures.  It was still very good and fun. 

We then sat in Starbucks and drank coffee until about 4:00 PM. We grabbed a taxi and went back to the train station, where we soon found out our train was delayed for another 45 minutes. Two hours later we were rolling down the tracks on our way back to Montreal. In the station, we grabbed two cheese sandwiches at Tim Hortons, and then grabbed a bottle of Canadian wine at the liquor store, and then went back to the hotel where we found out the wine was pretty good but Tim’s sandwiches needed something else to make them really good: probably a good dose of mustard, of which we had none.

Day-4: On Saturday we again slept in until 10:00 AM, which really feels good. We walked down Drummond and then we went over to the Bonaventure metro. We took the orange line metro to Jean-Talon station, where we intended to go to the Jean-Talon market, that Jeanne so desired to go to. Unfortunately, neither one of us looked up where the market was. Therefore we just kind of walked around for a bit thinking we might eventually run into it. We did not. 

At one point I stopped and asked a man standing on the corner if he knew where the outdoor market was. He did not, but pointed at several corner restaurants and told us we could get food there. I thought his response was a bit odd since the market is probably the biggest thing in town. We then walked a bit more and found a map on a sign, which clearly showed us that the market was back down the street 3 blocks past where we found the man. It became obvious that nobody let’s this guy out to often. In case you are wondering why we did not look at our iPhones, the reason is we have the data turned off as to not get international charges.We arrived at the market and were just amazed by all the produce, fish and meets. We were dying of hunger so we ate at the crape restaurant. It was mind-blowingly good.  We then walked around for about the next two hours, stopping once for coffee.

We then decided to head back to our hotel, where we rested up for about an hour before heading back to old Montreal and the 6:30 organ concert at the basilica. We first had a great pasta meal in old Montreal before walking over to the basilica. We stood in line for about 10 minutes before they let us all in. We got great seats.The organist was Pierre Grandmaison, who has been the organist at Notre Dame since 1973. The organ was installed in 1891, but we very recently overhauled. There are 7,000 pipes, 92 stops, four keyboards and 32 pedals. Pierre decided to play a full 45 minutes run from musical themes of the classics of cinema. He ended with Bach’s Toccata et fugue en re mineur. 

The concert was simply life changing. The clarity and volume of sound was just amazing. I could not imagine being a church goer in 1891 and sitting down for the first service after the organ was delivered. In 1891 there was no TV, stereo, records, or any recording sound system. I can only image that some of the goers must have run out of the basilica thinking that god was descending upon them as the organ played. Combine the sound with the beautiful wood interior of the church, with gold trim and breath taking blue background, and you are transported to another time and place. 

I have been to churches around the world: The Sistine chapel in Rome, St. Peters in Rome, churches in Florence, churches in the UK and Notre Dame in Paris but I have never seen a more beautiful church as the Basilica in Montreal. I was over powered by the French Canadian culture and history that created this magnificent church. At one point I was ready to throw myself upon the blue linoleum that leads to the alter, and pledge my faith to the church so that I might return to their regular services.After the concert, Jeanne and I went to a very nice restaurant/bar in old Montreal and had a very good glass of wine. We then caught the 715 bus at 8:30 PM back to the hotel.

Tomorrow we spend the entire day on a wine tour in the country. Sounds like fun.