Bali Bound

The airport is always such an interesting place to people watch.  I have to admit Halifax isn't too exotic.  Aside from a flight from reyshavik and Frankfurt its all from the east coast area.  It makes Edmonton seem a little bit more interesting!  I'm happy that today's plans went as planned and I made it to the car place to return the car and get on the shuttle with plenty of time.  But not so much that I just sat around for hours!  Security wasn't too bad today, I did get picked for the extra screening where they swipe your hands but it got me out of the long line up so it was a blessing.  The food choices here leave something to be desired which is unfortunate as I had a late lunch and was planning on having something at the airport as I had just eaten before I came.  But I'm hoping to sleep the flights away! Never fear, I did have a little bit of excitement this morning.  Now Moncton is a lovely city but there isn't too much to do. ...

The strangest thing so far in new Brunswick has been the language.  Since they are officially bilingual a lot is in French.  it's weird buying stuff at the grocery store and hearing French announcements.  Otherwise the only other strange part is really the street signs, which are bilingual as well.  I also forgot to mention the PEI license plates.  They are so small they only have 5 characters. Some seem to be getting to the standard 6 but I'm guessing you're more of an islander with the original 5! Today was a frustrating and fascinating day. I started out heading down to the hopewell rocks.  They were amazing.  It's so surreal to walk on the sea floor and then only hours later see people kayaking in the same areas!  I wanted to see low and high tides so ended up spending more time than I had hoped. After that I headed north to Fredericton.  Can I say that there isn't muchto see and or do in either Moncton or Fredericton.  Unfortuna...

So ends my day in PEI.  It's such a pretty island, not as flat as I expected!  I started the day Exploring Charlottetown.  I found parking which is a whole 1.50 an hour.  So cheap.  I was discussing it with a lady in the store and she said that people are in an uproar about it.  It really is what you are used to. I went to province house, the home of confederation.  Most of the building is a heritage setup with rooms that aren't used any more and are setup as how it was.  Their representatives only number 27 so they don't need a lot of space.  But it was a nice tour.  I then meandered over to beaconsfield house.  It was an old house built by a boat builder who then went bankrupt 5 years later.  And it was a private tour as it is really quiet here. I was a little scared of how busy things would be based on the guidebooks, but I'm thinking the books didn't take the recession into account.  Things are really quiet here. ...

Today was a tiring day.  You look at the maps and the provinces all look so tiny.  But they aren't.  I headed up to cape Breton island today, which is really pretty,  it's almost like the foothills but far more lush.  I went up for a puffin tour, sadly few puffins.  I guess everything is ahead by about two weeks, including the whales and the plants and flowers.  Which was unfortunate.  But I still got to see a ton of birds and seals.  And they even fed some bald eagles which was really interesting to watch,  I would really like to come back in prime season one day, the tour operator said that the islands we saw today would be u nrecognizable.  Maybe I can come back and do the miners museum too!  I really wanted to go as you get to go down into a mine but I decided that the extra 3-4 hours it would take was too much.  Instead I took the long and "scenic" route back.  It wasnt really that scenic as the small towns here ...

Well, I didn't get lost today.  That was an accomplishment.  I did do a lot of driving but it was mostly on highways so it was easy. I left Halifax and headed north to joggins, where they have fossil cliffs. Now these aren't animal fossils but more of the mundane sort consisting of plants and bugs. But it goes back 300 million years and because of the unique geography they are tilted instead of stacked so as you walk away you go back farther in time.  I'll admit, I won't look at rocks the same way.  But of course because it was on the bay I drove down all these secondary highways through little towns, and they all have a church and accompanying cemetery.  But it was worth the drive. Afterwards I went through the coast instead of the highway and hit up parrsboro and saw ottawa house.  Which is really just an old house on the outskirts of town filled to capacity of any sort of item afrom the 1900's.  I didn't stay too long.  And then I went to a...

I've discovered that I am a really good navigator in a car.  Give me a teeny map with a few details and I can get you anywhere, in any city.  As soon as I am on foot I'm useless.  It doesn't matter how hard I try I will always go the wrong direction.  I had a lovely morning downtown Halifax, more on that later, and on my way back to the hotel I ended up walking in a gigantic circle around the hotel.  Stupid cities and their street names.  At least with numbers you only go a block or so out of your way.  Funnily enough, the man who checked me in was really confused and asked if I lived on nineteen thousand street.  Not how it works.  But anyways.  I was disturbingly happy to have found the hotel.  Of course I didn't bring any sort of way of contacting the hotel for help so I was on my own.  My feet hurt a bit but I survived.  I also got lost on the driving but the gps helped me get back on course.  And mostly because t...

Well here I am in foggy Halifax.  I'm waiting for the shuttle bus to take me to my car so I have a little time to burn.  I'm still trying to figure out why I keep thinking the red eye flights are good.  I'm feeling awake and alert right now but not sure how long it will last.  I guess that is one good thing from work, I'm used to being up really early on not a lot of sleep and still functioning. The flight wasn't too bad, lots of kids and people snoring.  Thankfully my iPod blocked a lot of that noise.  I do feel like one of the only tourists on this flight though.  I'm pretty sure I'll be the only one on the shuttle bus.  I guess people don't really think the maritimes are touristy.  But I've found a lot of interesting things to do. Today's plan is to wander around the waterfront boardwalk they have.  And maybe check out the citadel, which appears to be a confederation themed version of fort Ed so that should be good,  also it ...

Welcome everyone for my second big vacation of 2012, which feels extravagant but exciting at the same time!  This time I'm off for a whirlwind week in the Maritimes.  All by myself!  Curious to see how this goes.  I'm not sure if I'm ready for a vacation where I handle my own luggage and transportation...  But I'll do my best to keep you all up to date on the trip.

This is finally the last of the pictures.  Hope that you have enjoyed the journey along with me.  I've now adjusted to being home and getting back in the routine of things again.  And now to plan the next vacation!! Razor wire around Buckingham palace to keep out the commoners Very interesting pub, sadly the location of the phone theft The view from our hotel door, look it really is Big Ben!! View from the London Eye, this is a new park and I really liked this building Houses of Parliament and Big Ben from the London Eye Shot of the Thames river from above The London Eye, yeah, it's really high up Westminster Abbey, now that William and Kate were married there the lineups are insane Monument along the Thames river Cleopatra's Needle, only they placed the sphinxs the wrong directions and never changed them.  I guess they are supposed to face out to watch for danger The olympic countdown clock in Trafalgar square ...

Well, the pictures are almost done.  I'm still amazed of how many pictures I took.  That's the good and bad thing with the digital camera.  Now the challenge is to weed through them to see which ones to get for me! The view of the Eiffel tower from our hotel room.  Seriously, I had a good laugh The Louvre Museum in the morning without the swarms of people Random interesting bits from the Louvre, they had a lot to look at The crowds waiting to see the Mona Lisa, it was crazy busy.  Then I read an article today about Paris and there are people lined up right before the museum opens and they all run to have some quiet time with the painting.  We didn't care enough to wait in the line! The never ending corridor of paintings A lovely view of the river Seine A fine example of some Parisian architecture with all the wrought iron, and of course, the McDonalds! The closed Catacombs, am still disappointed The green gate i...

More Venice, this is the bridge of sighs, basically it takes you from the old courthouse to the jail.  So it's called the bridge of sighs because that is the sound people supposedly made when crossing St Marks square, it's rainy so there isn't anyone out but later, when the sun came out, it was packed Part of the Doge's palace, it was fancy Part of St Marks Basilica, they had a lot of mosaics More canals and bridges, and this is our tour director, I didn't think she would be in the picture and she was much happier than this looks The glassblowers, this man made a fancy vase in about 2 minutes.  Amazing The Grand Canal Mosaic floor from St Marks, it's very fancy Gondola shot of the harbor Here is our pack of gondolas, that is Cindy with the musicians, we were the only group out with musicians, classy touch indeed The Matterhorn on the train up to the mountains Matterhorn from the top of Gornergrat, looki...