Rainy Days and the Last Full Day of Vacation Always Get Me Down...

Thursday, early AM, we were awakened by the sound of a steady rain. The rain was expected so we knew any significant time spent outside on Thursday would be quite wet. Luckily we did not have any plans to hike or go biking...ha ha.

We got downstairs a bit earlier today and sat in the living room talking with some of the other folks staying at the B&B. One couple was from Pismo Beach, one from Valencia and one from London/Israel. We sat and talked and ate breakfast until after 9am. We then got ready and headed off to Sugarbush Farms.

Sugarbush Farms is a working farm and also produces various grades of maple syrups and ages and packages various cheeses. We sampled some Vermont cheeses and maple syrups and watched a video on the farm. The main theme of the video was that "god loves farmers, farming is hard work, and it takes a lot of maple sap to make a little maple syrup." One cool thing in the video was an innovation in the maple sap collection process. The old-school way is to tap the tree and then hang a bucket off the tap. Eventually someone needs to detach the bucket and dump it into a central container. The new-fangled method involves tapping the tree and then interconnecting the trees with what looks like drip irrigation tubing that all funnels into a central collection tank on a cart. Seems like the tube method would save a lot of time and labor. Another thing we learned at the farm was that as tough/stressful/frustrating as our jobs can be at times, there are definitely worse jobs...two of which are: 1. the person who manually wraps the 8 oz blocks of cheese in tin foil and 2. the person who drips the foil wrapped cheese blocks into the various waxes many, many, many times to seal them for freshness. Rosie and I estimated our over/under on going insane doing either of those jobs at about 15 minutes. See the picture of the person dipping the cheese in wax.

After leaving the farm, we headed down to the southern part of the state to view some more fall colors and to stop by some local shops (i.e. wood shops, country stores, and quilt shops). The first place we stopped was at the Vermont Country Store in Rockingham. The store had a ton of nostalgic toys and candies from our childhoods. All I have to say to Sandy and Jay about our gifts for Chris and Amy is that..."I hope your dental premiums are paid up!" We also bought Rosie a locally bottled bottle of raspberry lime rickey soda. The report on the soda was...good but not great. The Bar Harbor blueberry is still the trip champ.

We next stopped at a quilting store in Chester. The store had a crazy amount of fabrics for sale. They also offered classes in quilting. Rosie talked to one of the store-keepers about the amount of time it takes to make a quilt and found out it is very labor intensive. She learned that some of the quilts can take up to 6 months to make working on them regularly. I guess this would explain the hefty price tag on some ($1000+). Most of the queen size quilts seem to be about $750. Rosie saw a really nice Halloween/autumn quilt, but it was not for sale. It was on display so that they can sell the kits to make the quilt. Although the kit to produce it was for sale. I recommended to Rosie that she buy the kit and learn to quilt by hand and if she finished that first one by hand, she could sell it in order to buy herself a sewing machine for future projects. I will just say...this recommendation was not well received...end of story.

Before heading to our ultimate destination (a wood bowl store near Bennington) we stopped by a deli for a quick bite. Our deli experience summed up much of the customer service attitude of many staff in some of the more mid-range establishments in Vermont. Rosie wanted a Philly cheese steak sandwich on a baguette roll. But apparently the deli was out of rolls and offered her a wrap instead...she ended up opting for a bowl of soup. As we were ordering, a gentleman who had just received his advertised lunch special (sandwich, chips, dessert and drink) sans the chips came up to inquiry about his missing chips. The cashier informed him that they were out of chips until the next order of chips arrived and that there would be no substitution...end of story. Ah...service with a smile.

We eventually meandered our way to the bowl store. The store had some beautiful wood products, but most of them were made from multiple pieces of wood that were glued together. And anyone who knows Rosie know that she prefers items made from one piece of wood. We did end up buying a couple of items but no bowls. Christmas gifts this year will be full of wood products... Just to give you some warnings. Disclaimer: If you play your cards right that is, and don't offend me from now til then... Else you may be downgraded to getting a plastic moose or something equivalent.

We headed back up north on the western edge of Vermont and saw many beautiful shades of reds, oranges, yellows and browns. We ended up cutting over to our B&B through Plymouth Notch (where Calvin Coolidge was raised and where he was sworn in as president when Warren G. Harding died in 1923). The drive through this valley with its rivers and lake was idyllic and serene. As we drove up a steep hill from Plymouth Notch to Bridgewater Corners, we thanked ourselves for being smart enough to be in a car and not on bikes...like Deb and Jack were.

We had dinner at the restaurant (Corners Inn Restaurant) next to our B&B. We split a caesar salad, Rosie had the cioppino and I had the veal parm. The food was good...a bit over-garlic'd, but good none-the-less. It is hard to figure out how these type of businesses survive in this area. At 5:45pm, we were outnumbered by staff by about an 8:1 ratio. Additionally, the plates were immensely huge and they need a lot of food on those plates to fill them up. Rosie ate about 1/2 of her cioppino before she was full. We are now at the B&B packing up and figuring out our plan for tomorrow. We fly out of Portland, ME at 2:45pm, eventually arriving at SFO at 11:45pm. Portland is about 75 miles as the crow flies, but about 200 miles driving.

Addendum: before signing off, I forgot to post my rant about Subaru Outback drivers (sorry Missy, I hope your Subaru is not an Outback). This trip has confirmed a long-held belief of mine. ..Subaru drivers, and more specifically, Subaru Outback drivers are the worst, slowest, most clueless drivers on the planet. Is it a coincidence that all these drivers are driving Subaru Outbacks...or is it the car that makes these drivers bad? I don't know that this question has an answer, but serious research should be devoted to this topic. Other factors that will need to be accounted for in this research are: why do all these cars have Obama bumper stickers on them?...is there something in the glue that seeps into the person's skin that affects his/her driving skills and awareness?; why do the drivers feel a need to place a VT bumper sticker on the car?...I already know they are from Vermont because they have a Vermont license plate; can a Subaru actually go more then 18 miles an hour...I think that is the top speed I saw one doing downhill on a 65 mph freeway...just curious. Rant over.

This will be the last blog post for this trip. Thanks for following along with our travels. Back to the dreaded elliptical... Stay turned for our next trip: Savannah/Charleston in March/April 2009.

Take care.
Rick and Rosie

Wood Bowls, Apples, Ice Cream and Lots of Other Stuff...

Well, today was an action packed day. We saw a good portion of the state of Vermont (and a little bit of New Hampshire)...unfortunately our time was mainly spent in the central and northern parts of Vermont where the colors have already turned and most of the leaves have fallen. On Thursday, we will be heading down south in search of some more color. Today was more about taking care of some of the items we had researched prior to arriving that we wanted to see.

The day started off by having a communal breakfast at the B&B (October County Inn) that we are staying at. For those of you who know us well, you know that Rosie and I are not big fans of the communal living/eating concept...we pretty much like to be anti-social and hang out on our own and not interact with other people. The other people we ate with were pretty mellow...a couple of couples from Florida and one from Pismo Beach. We had pleasant conversations while having our coffee, maple scones, scrambled eggs and bacon. As soon as it was socially acceptable, Rosie and I bolted from breakfast to get ready to depart. So we hopped into our less than clean, white Saturn Vue and headed up towards Killington.

Our first stop was a mecca for Rosie. Maybe not as much of a mecca as Deruta, Italy was for her dishes, but a mecca none-the-less. A little background here...about 10 years ago, Rosie and I went over to a dinner at our friend Nick Enthoven's parents' house. At dinner, Mrs. Enthoven brought out a huge, wooden salad bowl. Rosie went ga-ga over the bowl and tasked me with getting her one. All I had to go off of, was that it was made in Vermont. After a lot of internet research, I was finally about to track down the place that made large, wooden bowls out of one piece of wood and I purchased one for Rosie for Christmas or her birthday. She was very happy. Today we stopped at the mill where these bowls are made. The place is called the Bowl Mill and it is in Granville, VT. This place gave factory tours until April 2008 but now they do not offer tours but they have a store on location. Rosie looked at many, many bowls...some in the store and some in the shed behind the store. We were there for about an hour. Rosie increased her bowl collection as a result of our visit. When we were getting ready to leave, I asked them if they stopped giving factory tools because of liability issues. The woman said it was not because of liability but because they shut down the mill for good in April...they are just selling off the rest of the inventory and then closing it all up. This was not happy news for Rosie. Yeah, very upsetting!

After leaving Granville, we stopped at the country store in Warren. This store was recommended by our host Edie at the OCI. The store was the quintessential country store...it had a ton of random items...a town's one-stop shop (think Wal-mart in about 1/1000 the space). We bought a couple of sandwiches (Smoked salmon with capers and cream cheese sandwich and a roast beef with wasabi mayo) and drinks and sat outside on the picnic benches overlooking the small creek and waterfall that runs past the store. It was very nice...it was about 60 degrees and sunny. The food was good too.

After lunch we drove up through Waterbury and into Waterbury Center...home of the Ben & Jerry's factory. When we got there, it was quite crowded as two big tour buses had arrived prior to us. We purchased a couple of tickets for the tour that started in 15 minutes and rustled our way through the over-priced gift shop. We eventually went on the 30 minute tour and did not learn much other than everyone who works at B&J calls the founders Ben and Jerry, "the boys" (maybe it is just me that finds it odd that 50+ year old men are called boys) and that all Ben & Jerry's employees must get unlimited ice cream as part of their compensation package...must be similar to the cigarette companies that use to give all employees a carton of smokes each week. I have dubbed our tour of Ben & Jerry's as the 50/50 tour. The name comes from the fact that Rosie and I were about 50% of the average age and the average weight of the tourists. If you ever want to see yourself as young and thin...I highly recommend touring the Ben & Jerry's factory. Another sad fact about the B&J, they don't offer all their flavors for sale at their store. That is really lame! How can you not have all the flavors at the factory? We settled for a banana split with Cherry Garcia, Cake Batter, and Phish Food. Rosie was very disappointed. After our sugar high, we went to visit the flavor grave yard. It was funny.

After leaving, we proceeded up the road to the Cold Hollow Cider Mill. This place is a working apple mill making all types of apple products from ciders to cider donuts to apple butter and lots of other apple-based stuff. Everything we sampled there was delicious. The fresh, cold apple cider was exceptionally good. We also got to see how the cider was pressed. They basically grind the apples and then using a tube, they dispensed what looked like apple pooh onto a slab of cloth. They keep stacking it until it is pretty high and then they use a big press to squeeze out all the juice. Feeling good about our newfound slimness, Rosie decided to purchase an entire apple pie while I decided to try an apple cider doughnut. The doughnut was good (maybe not a good as a plain cake doughnut at Chuck's Doughnuts on Woodside Road), but still good. We are eating the apple pie as I type this blog and it is good too (maybe not as good as Nancy's apple pie, but still good). Update: Rosie says her piece pie is a little "mushy".

After leaving the cider mill, we stopped by the factory store for a brand of Vermont cheese called Cabot. This was not the production facility but a store. While we were browsing around, two buses pulled up with our friends from the 50/50 tour lines. At this point, we beat a hasty retreat from the free cheese samples...I could see the headlines in the local paper..."honeymoon couple trampled in a stampede for free cheese". After speeding out of the parking lot, we headed back down south via the main state highway. Things were going great until we came across a traffic jam across both lanes of the freeway heading in our direction. About a half-mile before the accident there was a myriad of signs and flashing lights and more signs signally that there was an accident ahead. After about 20 minutes of inching forward, we finally got past the fender-bender. My take is that when there is an accident in Vermont, it is a big deal and all the stops are pulled out. I figure this was probably the first time the Vermont highway patrol was able to bust out some of these signs and lights...so it was a big to do. On a side-note, most drivers in Vermont seem very courteous and nice...they only use the left lane to pass and then get back in the right lane. Everything on the roads is about 75% of California pace. One concept many of the towns in Vermont seem to have a hard time mastering is traffic control. IMO, there are way too many left-turn lights for not enough cars needing to go in that direction and there are way too many no right-turn on a red light. In the end, most of the traffic control seems very inefficient.

We then drove down to Quechee Gorge but it was getting dark so we did not get out to explore it. We will do that Thursday or Friday AM. Since we had eaten dinner in Woodstock the night previous, we decided to make a run for the border and drive the 10 miles to Hanover, NH for dinner. Our logic was that a college town must have a lot of good, cheap places to eat. We drove into Hanover, blinked and then were driving out of town. We made a u-turn, drove around the Dartmouth campus and then parked on the main street and found a pizza parlor. The campus looked really nice and scholastic. The buildings were very stately and prim and proper. The entire town seems to only be there to support the college. The pizza was mediocre, the toppings were good...the crust, not so good. Rosie is wondering how they managed to burn the crust but still make it soggy...perplexing.

Now, we are back at the B&B planning our day for tomorrow. Right now there is a 60% chance of rain tomorrow, but that should not impact us too much. Potential items on tomorrow's agenda are: Calvin Coolidge historical site, Billings Farm, Sugarbush Farm, Quechee Gorge, another bowl store, and another country store or two. We will play it by ear.

Hope all is well with everyone. Take care.

Rick and Rosie

Basilicas, a snake, and a fort

Our last day in Montreal. We spent the morning visiting various Basilicas that were interesting. Finally made it to Notre Dame only to find out they charge $10 admission. I never heard of admission to enter a church! But heck, I guess they need to get their donation somehow. I wonder if I could write it off as charity? :oP We went to 3 Basilicas in total and needless to say, the Church had a lot of money back then, and you can certainly see it in their churches.

We left Montreal around 1:00 p.m. and headed toward NY to Fort Ticonderoga. We went through quite the border crossing. They had us stop our car, turn off the engine and give them the keys. Then they had a VERY large German Shepard sniff the cars. Good thing I had my window up! The dog found something in the car ahead of us so that car got stopped for a more thorough search while they let us pass. We had to inform the guards that we needed our keys back to move on... Good thing I ditched all the left over cold prosciutto and cheese and grapes before crossing the border!

Our drive today was another beautiful drive. We came across some place called the Ausable Chasm. It's a bridge that overlooks some falls and gorges... We stopped there. On the way to view the falls, Rick saw a snake and was not very happy about that. See picture of the snake! He was also not very happy about walking on the bridge so high up. He did however rally and got out there to he can take a picture of me. Poor thing, he was not in a good place. His fear of heights was very evident here. I told him that I could tell the family that he saw a snake, got scared and fell off the bridge... He informed me that it would only prove that his fears are well founded! Anyway, it was a beautiful, unplanned stop.

We got to Fort Ticonderoga around 4:30 p.m. They close at 5:00 so we got there just in time. Very cool place Jack. The drive into the fort was really picturesque as well as the fort itself.

We left the fort and headed toward Vermont. There were not too many places to eat dinner on the way so we drove to Woodstock and had dinner at a place called Bentley's. Rosie had French onion soup and Rick had a chili burger and a Caesar salad. Oh yeah, and I ordered a blackberry/apple pie. The pie itself was very good except for a slight taste of ham... weird. I confirmed it with Rick. Yeah, it had a slight taste of ham to it.

After dinner we went to the October Country Inn and checked in. This place has no TV! What are we going to do with no TV for 3 nights??? I hate not having TV! At least we have wireless access. So, that is our day today. Back in the USofA!

around Montreal...

Today was a discover Montreal day. We started with a drive to an outdoor market called Marche Jean Tallon. It was cool just to see all the produce and how people sell them. We also bought more bread, grapes and cheese for our drive to Vermont tomorrow. Take a look at the large avocados that we saw. I took the picture with the normal size avocado for context. I also found Mangosteen there. It's a tropical fruit that is not available in the US so I was very happy to get some. See picture.

After the market, we went to a park called Mont Royal. It was high up, overlooking the city so we were able to take some nice pictures. The weather was a bit rainy today so visibility was not great but it was still a really great view. There was also one area where the homes were really cool. They were more like mansions, built with rocks, and they looked really expensive. I guess that's where the Montreal elite live.

After Mont Royal, we went to have lunch in Old Montreal. We passed by Notre Dame but it was so crowded that we decided to skip it and head for lunch at a place called Le Bourlingueur. Rosie had roasted pork and Rick ordered liver and onions. The food was very good.


After lunch we headed to the bontanical garden. It was really nice. The fall colors really stand out. We walked through a Japanese garden and there were a lot of Bonsai trees that my father would really appreciate. There was also a pumpkin display that was very cool... They had kids dress up pumpkins and then displayed them. See pictures. All in all, a really cool place to visit. We were there for a couple of hours and then left to do a little shopping. I bought 2 Portmeirion platters. Yeah, more dishes! To defend the purchase, they were cheaper than anything I could get in the states or on line so I HAD to buy them!

We chose to have an early dinner to skip the crowd. We went to a place called L'Express. It's a Bistro that Susan recommended and it was very good. Rick ordered country vegetable soup, steak and fries, and Rosie had fish soup and Beef and Chicken stew. All well done and very good. Thanks for the recommendation Susan!

After dinner, we walked around the area near our hotel. There are a lot of shops around there so we did more shopping. Most of the shops were low end shops like Aldo, Urban Outfitters, Levis... but it was nice to walk after dinner. Afterward, we went back to the hotel and checked up on our emails.

So, our assessment of Montreal is that it is a good place to visit with a lot of things that you can do. It is easy to get around via car or metro. Montreal is a larger city than Quebec City so you do need to to have some sort of transportation as the points of interest are rather spread out. All in all, we like Quebec City better as we found it more quaint but there are a lot of things to see and do in Montreal.

This trip so far has been a really good trip. We would highly recommend it to anyone. We also think that fall is a really good time as it is just beautiful. I still have not ceased to be amazed by all the colors. Our luck with the weather has certainly helped.

On the Road Again...

Sunday was our last morning in Quebec City. We got up, had coffee, packed our stuff and then did one final walk through the Quebec City. It was cool and nice, not crowded at all. After checking out of the hotel, we drove to a local shopping area and browsed around for a while. We did not end up purchasing anything. After that, it was off to Montreal. The trip to Montreal is about a 3 hour drive. There was very little to see on the drive. The signage both inside Quebec City and throughout Canada, in general, is really good. Also, most of the drivers are very courteous. On the freeways, the left lane is pretty much only for passing and drivers are generally aware of the other drivers. We made good time to Montreal. We found our new hotel quickly (the Square Phillips) and checked in early. After checking in, we checked emails and I watched a little football. We then decided to walk around Old Montreal for a bit and grab an earlier dinner. Our first impression of Montreal is that it is bigger, dirtier, more cosmopolitan, more American and less quaint that Quebec City...we will see if that impression changes.



For dinner we went to a bistro recommended as a "value" by Frommers. The name of the restaurant was Marche de la Vilette. It definitely seemed like a local hang out. Even though it was a cool day (about 60 degrees), it was smokin' hot in the restaurant. The restaurant has a 4 course house menu as a special. The first course was a vegetable soup (quite hearty and good); Rosie ordered a country ham crepe for her entree and Rick ordered a croque-madame (fancy name for an upside-down ham and cheese sandwich); both entrees were good. The final two courses were coffee and dessert (stawberry and mandarin oranges). All-in-all, we agreed that it was a good dinner for 2 for $30 CAD.

After dinner we walked over to the Notre Dame basillica. There was a mass going on so we were just able to enter the church but not really go in. It looked amazing. We will be back on Monday to further check it out. As a side note, we see a lot of horse drawn carriages in both Quebec and Montreal. I am not sure why anyone would go on one of those as they stink when they just pass by, never mind having to sit in the back of one of those. Ugh! Nasty... After that, we headed back to the hotel for some more internet research on Monday's itinerary, some phone calls back home and some television.

Food, Farms, Falls, Fish and a Cracker

Today we decided to venture outside of the walls of Quebec City and visit some areas in the nearby countryside. We started off the day by visiting a Draegers-type market and picking up some baguettes, cheese, cold cuts and sodas for lunch. After that, we drove about 10 miles out of town to the Ile d’Orleans. The island is a relatively small farming community. We drove around the island (about 25 miles in total) and looked at some of the old houses and farms. There were a lot of apples and strawberry farms with fruit for sale. It was nice…and it was extra nice to be in the car since it was about 55 degrees.

After leaving the island, we stopped at Montmerency Falls. The falls is higher than Niagara Falls by about 100 feet, but the volume of water going over the falls is much less. There are gondolas that run from the base to the top…but there was no way I was getting on one of those. So we took our picnic food near the falls and had a picnic. We found a nice, sunny spot on the leeward side of a building. We sat there are ate our lunch listening to the pounding of the falls. After lunch, we decided to walk toward the falls…it was wet, windy and loud…but very neat. After leaving the falls, we looked at the map and figured out that we can drive up near the top. So we may the 5 minute trip and took a foot-bridge out near the falls. Rosie went down to a gazebo overhanging the falls for some pictures, while I clung on to the railing further back. Neither of us decided to walk across the bridge spanning the entire fall.





After our falls excursion, we drove east to the town of Saint Anne de Beaupre. The town has a real cool basilica that was built 300-350 years ago. The story is that some sailors were stuck in a bad storm and sea and promised that if they survived, they would come back and build a church…St. Anne de Beaupre is the result. This was also the sight of many documented miracles so there are many who come here every year. The church was beautiful inside with stained glass and historical painting. The demeanor of the staff we very nice and relaxed…visitors could pretty much go anywhere and take pictures of anything they wished to. We were also able to go down below the main level of the church and check out a couple of cool little chapels. One room underneath the church had hundreds and hundreds of lit candles. Walking into the room was like walking into a blast furnace…the hit just enveloped you. You could also smell the burning wax and see the heat rising to the ceiling and then getting trapped. I lasted about 30 seconds in that chapel. We decided to leave Ste. Anne de Beaupre and head back to Quebec City since we had a 6:30 dinner reservation at a highly recommended seafood restaurant called La Marie Clarisse. Before getting back to the hotel we stopped at a large farmers market (kind of like Pike Place Market in Seattle). We also stopped back by the food store to pick up Rosie some more bottles of the black cherry soda we purchased in the morning. She seems to be into the fruit sodas.

After relaxing for a few minutes, we hoofed it down to La Marie Clarisse in Lower Town. The restaurant was very quaint with stone walls and candle lighting. Before dinner was served, the waiter brought an order of periwinkles (small sea snails). Rosie dared me to eat a few, so I did. The main takeaway from the periwinkles was a very salty, chewy, rubber thing…not much in terms of flavor. Rosie started off dinner with a calamari appetizer; Rick had a bowl of vegetable soup. Both were good, Rosie thought the soup was too cinnamony. We both ordered fish stew for entrees. The seafood in the stew was excellent…very plentiful and fresh. This time I agreed, the broth was too cinnamony. Overall, I would say the fish stew may not have been the best thing to order. Vis-à-vis the cost of the dinner, we were both a bit disappointed….good but not great.




We then walked back up the steps to Upper Town. For our exercise effort, we decided to treat ourselves to a dessert crepe on the way back to the hotel. The crepe restaurant was really crowded so we sat at the counter. The restaurant was understaffed and it took about 45 minutes to get our banana and chocolate crepe. During the wait, we watched the girl making the crepes. Being crepe experts…having been to the restaurant the past 3 days, we both decided her cooking technique was flawed. She was supper messy and spread the batter too thinly. When we finally got our crepe, it was more cracker than crepe…extra crispy. The flavor and the banana and chocolate were still good…it was only the crepe itself that was lacking.

After getting back to the hotel, it was laundry time. The hotel has a washer and a dryer off the exercise room. We didn’t even know the hotel had an exercise room..ha ha. So here we are at 10:30pm on a Saturday night on our honeymoon, doing laundry…party times! About another 30 minutes and it will be beddy-bye time.


R&R

Eating Our Way Through Quebec City...With a Little Sightseeing

Today was a day for strolling around Quebec City and seeing the sights. We lounged around the hotel in the early morning having our coffee. We started off the mid-morning by doing a little window shopping as we walked down to a recommended breakfast/lunch spot. Rosie ordered a melted jambon and fromage (ham and cheese) sandwich on a baguette. Rick ordered some quiche with spinach and asparagus. We each had some very strong coffee (it is a bit embarrassing the amount of sugar and milk we need to put into our coffee to make it palatable). Rosie enjoyed her sandwich; Rick's quiche was not as good as the quiche Rosie makes (...see, who says I am not a fast learner). It think Rosie may make her quiches extra cheesy...which is definitely a plus in my book.

After breakfast we hit many of the main sights in the city. Getting around is super easy...everything is more or less within walking distance. We saw the Notre Dame Cathedral...it is beautiful and ornate...lots of gold items and statues. We also walked around Montmorency Park. It is amazing with all the cannons pointed over the edges of the walled city at the harbors. We also checked out the Chateau Frontenac (http://www.fairmont.com/frontenac/), it is an amazing photogenic hotel. It looks like something out of a Disney movie. Finally we went down to Lower Town and did some more window shopping. By that time, it was now lunch time...





We went to L'Echaude, a French bistro that Susan O'Brien (Jack's mom) and Fodors and Frommers all recommended. We waited about 15 minutes to be seated...but it was worth it. We started off with a cheese plate (three cheeses, some nuts, grapes and figs). All three cheeses were excellent...the other stuff was alright...I think some apple slices would have been better. We both had the same entrees, steak frites. The fries were excellent and the steaks good, too. Rosie's was a bit beyond medium-rare, but still good. After lunch we did some more walking around the walled city.





We were too lazy to walk back up the hill so we took the funicular. It was the best $3.50 spent on the trip.




After getting back to the Upper Town, we walked up the 310 steps on the Governor's walk. The view over the St. Lawrence river was beautiful. It is a very nice country side...not over developed at all...even right by the city. We proceeded to walk around the Citadel and then back to the hotel to relax. Since we had a big lunch, we decided to have a smaller dinner. We ended up going back to the crepe place from Thursday night (Casse-Crepe Breton). We both had savory crepes (pepperoni, cheese, mushrooms (and tomato sauce for Rick)). We also decided to each order sweet crepes. Rosie went for a cherry filling and chocolate crepe. Rick went for an apple filling and whipped cream crepe. The apple crepe was awesome...it tasted like a really big warm Hostess apple pie with whipped cream. I never thought I would ever say this, but...there was too much whipped cream in the crepe. Even I had to shovel out mass amounts of whipped cream from the crepe. The entire staff on Friday night was different from the staff on Thursday night. The girl making the crepes on Friday was definitely heavy-handed with the ingredients...generally not a problem.

After coming out of my sugar coma, we did some more walking around and window shopping. Quebec City is a very romantic city...it is cool, not crowded, quaint, etc...all things I like in a city. We are now back at the hotel planning our side-trip out of the city tomorrow. We will do a little day trip to the north of Quebec City with a picnic in the middle. We will stop by a market for some cheese and bread and cold cuts. For dinner, we have reservations at Le Marie Clarisse...a highly recommended seafood restaurant. Rosie is really looking forward to ordering some bouillabaisse or fish stew.

Got to go to bed. Hope all is well with everyone.

A day of travel

Today was a day spent mostly traveling. It took us about 6 hours to go from Bar Harbor to Quebec City. It was a really beautiful drive but it was really weird that most of the drive was a one lane road. We did get to see a lot of beautiful autumn leaves. Funny, when I was a kid in Vietnam, and was learning French, they had books with fall looking pictures in the US and then when I came to California, I was wondering what they were talking about because there was no such Autumn look in Los angeles. Now I know that I was in the wrong part of America. :o)

It rained on and off today so all in all, we did not miss much. Good to rain during travel time and not while we are visiting. You can see the clouds in the pictures.

One funny story. As you know, there are not too many Asians in this part of the country. I get a lot of "looks" and double takes as we walk about. Today, there was a woman who runs the breakfast at the hotel who went around to talk to everyone. She asked us where we were from and was talking to us for a little bit. Before she left, she looked at me and said, "enjoy your time in the US and Canada". I laughed. Yeah, I guess she thinks that only Rick was from the SF Bay Area. :o)

We went to the Blueberry soda brewing company and it was very sad looking as well as expensive. Their soda was cheaper at the stores than in their own store. What a rip off! Leslie, the soda is REALLY nice. It is not too sweet and it does taste like blueberry. Their rootbeer is not as good.

We got to Quebec City around 5:00 p.m. and once we checked in, we went out for dinner. Dinner was at a crepe house. It was so good! I had a peperoni, muchroom, spinach, and mozarella crepe and Rick had a peperoni, swiss, and mushroom crepe. We shared a chocolate and banana crepe for desert. All excellent! We walked around a little after dinner just to check out the city but will do most of the actual sightseeing tomorrow.

The Acadia Forest & more lobster

The Bayview Hotel has a continental breakfast so we ate breakfast at the hotel. They have homemade baked goods like blueberry scones, a range of muffins, and pastries, served with homemade jam. All very good. An excellent way to start the day.

We spent most of the day today at the Acadia National Forest. It's really beautiful with all the autumn leaves and creeks, ponds, and peaks. See the pictures! We walked and drove around and we're glad that we didn't take a guided tour. The weather is about as perfect as can be. Sunny and no wind, but cold enough so that you don't get all hot when you walk around. Notice I said walk and not hike. Yeah, we are not hiking people.

We had lunch a place called the Jordan Pond House. It's the only restaurant inside the Acadia forest and it used to be a tea house but is now a full fledged restaurant. Their specialties are popovers and lobster stew and we can tell you that both are very good and worth ordering. You sit outside, the food is great, and the view is spectacular.

After lunch, we drove up to Cadillac Mountain. It's supposedly the highest peak on the Eastern Seaboard between Canada and Brazil. We took a lot of photos and even saw a couple of bald eagles. They were too lazy to fly. They were just perched on a branch but neat to see just the same.

After the Acadia Forest, we went in to town in Bar Harbor. Bar Harbor is big into blueberries and Rosie has discovered blueberry soda. We had some for dinner last night at McKay's and have since bought some more. In fact, eating some blueberry pie as we are blogging. Tomorrow, we are thinking of stopping by the brewery that makes the blueberry soda and maybe buying some more.

We walked around town but it's a total tourist trap with all the people from the cruise ships walking around. There were Christmas stores but very sad ones. Nothing much to tell, it's like any other beach town tourist trap.

We went to a really cool place for dinner. It's called Trenton Bridge Lobster Pound. You go in, select your lobsters, they weigh them, and then they take them outside to steam them in wood burning steamers. We had lobsters with some steamed clams and coleslaw. Rick says it was the best lobster he had ever had. It was REALLY good and cheap too. Only $8.95 a pound. We each got a 1 1/2 lb lobster. The only down side is that it's a really small place so there are not enough tables, so you end up sitting with other people. Yeah, we don't like that.

After dinner it is back to the hotel. We picked up some cookies on our way upstairs. Today's flavor is raspberry thumbprint. The cookies here are very good. Deb, you would love them!

Lobster...anyone?

We arrived in Portland, Maine from JFK late Tuesday morning. We quickly picked-up our Saturn Vue rental SUV and made the 3 hour drive to Bar Harbor. On the drive to Bar Harbor, the colors were beautiful...lots of yellows and reds and light greens. There was a lot of road constuction going on...I guess with a limited window, they need to get it done quickly.

We arrived in Bar Harbor a bit too early to check into the hotel and we were hungry so we decided to try a lobster roll place, the Lobster Claw, we saw on Yelp. The place was a hole in the wall and primarily a take-out place. Lucky for us (since it was about 55 degrees), one of the three tables (using the word "table" may be overstating it...maybe more like a folding TV tray) was available. We each ordered a cup of clam chowder and a lobster roll. The chowder was excellent...lots of clams and not too creamy...just right. The lobster roll was good...not exceptional. I would dare to say that the Old Port Lobster Shack (http://www.oplobster.com/)in Redwood City has a better lobster roll...primarily because I think their "rolls" are better and the mayonaisse mix is better...this one today was a bit "naked". The other thing about the Lobster Claw was that of the 6 people in the restaurant (including Rosie and I), 4 of them were just chatting incessantly about nothing, so the ambiance left a bit to be desired.

After lunch, Rosie and I drove to the hotel, the Bayview Inn (http://www.thebayviewbarharbor.com/). The hotel is very nice, a bit dated, but the rooms are large and the staff was very nice. They even left us a bottle of champagne in the room since it was our honeymoon...now to figure out what to do with it. See the view from our room! It's very pretty and peaceful. After checking into the hotel, Rosie and I did one of our favorite pastimes...napped. When we woke up, we did some internet research on what to do on Wednesday and also on where to eat dinner on Tuesday. We also got an email from our wedding photographer that our proofs were ready to be viewed. So we spent some time looking at wedding photos. The photos look good so that is good. We went to dinner at a place recommended by the hotel staff called McKay's Public House (http://mckayspublichouse.com/). Rosie and I split some crab cake appetizers and a McKay salad. The crab cakes were alright. The salad was good except for a bit too much white truffle oil. For entrees, Rosie ordered the cioppino and I ordered lobster mac & cheese. Rosie really like her cioppino; my mac and cheese was good but a bit over-salted for my taste. After dinner we walked around town a bit and then headed back to the hotel...and are now about to call it a night!

...and off we go!

Well...here we are at the San Francisco airport...waiting to take a red-eye to JFK and then a 3 hour layover and then a quick hop to Portland, Maine. From Portland, we will drive to Bar Harbor, ME for 3 days/2 nights.

The last few days have been a whirlwind. Starting with the wedding rehearsal on Friday through the post-party on Saturday...the time just flew. Everything went very well...there were a few minor hiccups...but I guess when there are so many variables in an equation, something is bound to fall off track...but luckily all the important stuff went as planned. The weather just held out and Rosie got her wish of getting married outdoors. All the people we love and care about (except MES) were there to celebrate the day with us. It was great!

Well..got to go...need to board a plane...more later.

Rick