Heading South

Darcy and I left Toronto at the end of September and joined up with sisters, Patty and Sandy, for our annual trip to Ottawa to help celebrate Aunt Do's birthday. Darcy had not been to Ottawa since our cross country trip in 1975 so he enjoyed touring the parliament buildings, library and peace tower. My sisters and I are so shallow. We prefer to see the National Gallery and shop in the Byward Market. It is always fun to spend time with our Ottawa relatives

Quebec City was our next destination. The fall colors were beautiful. We stayed just outside the old city and took a wonderful walking tour by a very knowledgeable francophone guide. On advice from cousin Elaine we had lunch at anciens canadiens (pea soup, tourtiere and sugar pie). It was fantastic. From Quebec City we headed to PEI where we spent four days at a golf resort on the very east side. The weather was a little windy and rainy but Darcy managed to get in a couple of rounds of golf. The rest of the time we drove back and forth on the island just enjoying the scenery. September is the Pumpkin Festival in PEI and there are pumpkins everywhere. We realized when we go to Nova Scotia that pumpkins are popular everywhere in the maritimes. They decorate their yards and porches with them and even make scarecrow people with pumpkin heads. Darcy was very patient while we were in PEI and let me visit everything "Anne", Lucy Maud Montgomery's Museum and birthplace. Our last Canadian destination has been St. Margaret's Bay, just south of Halifax. We rented a coach house and our window looks out on the bay. There are sailboats and the trees with the beautiful fall colors come right down to the water. It has been a little cool, windy and rainy but that has given us chance to rest up, do some reading, get some office work done and do lots of driving. We have put miles on the minivan touring the south shore, Peggy's Cove, Lunenburg, Mahone Bay, Shelburn, Birchtown, Wolfville, Kentville. There are so many quaint towns and the fall colors are beautiful. We have also spent some time in Halifax where our favorite tourist spot was the Alexander Keith Brewery tour. It was fun and we were definitely the oldest tourists there and the only ones who did not have to show ID. We also did some serious touring like the Maritime Museum, the Black Cultural Museum, the Loyalist Museum in Shelburn, the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia where they have a Maud Lewis exhibit including her "little painted house" that they recently moved to the gallery. Now we are busy getting the boxes repacked. We leave Saturday and will spend the weekend in the Annapolis valley and the Bay of Fundy to see the tides. Then we start heading south.

Our Trip to Europe

I have tried 3 times to get this blog done and have been having nothing but trouble with the website. If it doesn't work this time, I give up. Darcy and I, together with our wonderful Toronto friends, Trevor and Brenda Green, left for London September 3 and that was the beginning of a very hectic 21 days. We got up early every morning and went until late every night, trying to see everything we could. The first thing we did when we arrived was go to Abbey Road. So now Darcy can cross that off his bucket list. We spent the next 3 days trying to see all the famous tourist sites - Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace (I have attached a picture of that), Thames River cruise, Tower Bridge and Tower of London and Billy Elliott. My favorite was seeing the Rosetta Stone at the British Museum. We also took the train to Windsor to see the castle. Unfortunately the Queen was not there to receive us so we had lunch at a wonderful pub (like we did every day) where we always tried their meat pies and banger.

Then we took the Eurostar under the channel to Paris. What a great surprise we had when we arrived at our hotel so find we had a view of Eiffel Tower. So every night we had our nightcap on the balcony watching the lit Tower. We did all the usual tourist things while in Paris - Notre Dame, Montmarre, the left bank, Musee d'Oursay, Champs Elysee, l'Arche de Triomphe, Sacre Coeur and, of course, the Louvre. Two hightlights was seeing the Mona Lisa in the Louvre and doing a bike tour of Versaille. The tour involved riding bikes to the metro in Paris, getting them on the train in 7 seconds, riding to Versaille, buying lunch at the outdoor market and then eating on the banks of the Grand Canal. I have included the picture of Darcy with the baguettes in his backpack. (Please excuse my terrible french spelling.)

After 4 wonderful days in Paris our tour bus picked us up and took us to Trier, Germany to start our river cruise. We spent 7 days cruising the Moselle, Rein and Main Rivers. We toured many quaint towns along the rivers and saw lots of vineyards, churches and castles and ate sausages and drank beer at every one.

We docked at Nuremberg and we were taken by bus to Prague for the last 3 days of our trip. Prague was wonderful and one place, besides Paris, that we want to come back to some day. There is so much history, architecture, music, shopping and food. We just scratched the surface. I have included a picture of the astronomical clock in one of the squares. We sat at one of the outdoor cafes, having goulash, watching the clock as it struck the hour. What a spectacle.

We had such a great time with Brenda and Trevor and are already planning our next trip together.

Our Bags Are Packed

After we left South Dakota, we made our way to Ontario through Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan. The highlight for Darcy was a visit to Lambeau Field in Green Bay. We also did a very Wisconsin thing and tasted cheese curds. They are delicious. After a night in Sault Ste. Marie where we visited the locks which are much larger than the one on the Canadian side, we arrived in Parry Sound to spend a few days with Kathy and the girls. A dream came true for Darcy as he was able to visit the Hall of Fame of his boyhood hero, Bobby Orr. We finally arrived in Toronto the middle of August with plans to really tour the city. We had one of the best times ever and didn't do any touring. We spent 10 days partying with the kids, playing games until 2 a.m., enjoying the occasional beverage and going to 2 Blue Jays games. This afternoon we leave Toronto with our wonderful friends, Brenda and Trevor Green, on our London/Paris/German River cruise/Prague trip.

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Blogger has been giving me trouble. It won't let me download my pictures to the blog. So I am trying again.

Our South Dakota Adventure Continues

We, and thousands of Harley Davidson riders, stayed in Keystone, SD near Mount Rushmore. We were surprised at how much there was to see at the monument. It took us 3 hours to see everything and I took about 40 pictures from all different angles.

The four presidents are carved out of the granite of the Black Hills. The original plan was to have western heroes but the sculptor, Gutzon Borglum. convinced the park officials to have presidents. At first he was just going to have Washington and Lincoln but then Borglum added Jefferson and Teddy Roosevelt, whom he admired and was a close personal friend. There was also controversy and opposition to the monument by the Lakota indians. Where the monument is located is sacred land to the Lakota tribe. As a response, they decided to build their own tribute to their hero, Crazy Horse. The Ziolkowski family has been working on it since 1948 and because of lack of funds and refusal of government assistance, it will probably take them another 50 years to complete it.

We left Keystone and on our way across South Dakota we stopped at the Badlands National Park. It is located in the White Hills of South Dakota and was called the Badlands because it was desolate, dry and very difficult to move across. They are spectacular hoodoos and carved out hills and a real sight to see, reminds us very much of Drumheller.

We are spending 2 days in Sioux Falls, SD so Darcy can get some work done. It has been so hot here (the hottest was 34) that we were happy to spend a couple of days in an air conditioned hotel room. Now we are heading east and planning on being in Parry Sound by the weekend.

Leaving Billings we were part of a motorcycle caravan that grew to hundreds by the time we got to South Dakota. The reason we had trouble getting a hotel reservation near Mount Rushmore was because of the annual Sturgis, SD Motorcycle Rally. There were thousands of Harley Davidsons and other than the Japanese tourists, we were the only people touring these sites who did not have tattooes. I have included a picture of the parking lot at the Crazy Horse Memorial so you could get an idea of how many of them there were.

On the way to Mount Rushmore we stopped to see where the Battle of the Little Bighorn and Custer's Last Stand happened which is now on the Crow reservation. The army used white grave markers where the soldiers and civilians died. You can see them scattered around the hills. The black tombstone in the picture is Custer's. The bodies of the indians were taken away by their tribes and so one large monument was placed on the site to remember those who died. The story was told to us by a park tour guide from the Crow Reservation who gave us a very emotional talk about members of her family who died during these battles.

Then we headed to Keystone SD where we stayed 2 days and toured Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse Memorial but more about that tomorrow. It is going to take me some time to decide which of my 50 pictures of Mount Rushmore I should include.

On the road again

We got back on the road August 3 starting our trek east. We spent 3 days in Medicine Hat visiting Writing on Stone Provincial Park, Cypress Hills Interprovincial Park and Darcy got a round of golf in at Desert Blume.

Writing on Stone is about a 2 hour drive south and west of Medicine Hat. We got to tour the restricted area where there are petroglyphs and pictographs some up to 1,000 years old. Some are as recent at the early 1900's. We learned that it is a sacred place where Blackfoot today still go for their vision quest as their ancestors did 1,000 years ago. It is speculated that some of the petroglyphs are a recording of their conquests or success in hunting. It is well worth the trip if you get a chance.

Cypress Hills is about 45 minutes south east of Medicine Hat on the Elkwater Lake. It is a beautiful lush oasis surrounded by the Alberta and Saskatchewan prairie. We hiked up to Horseshoe Canyon where we got a beautiful view of the Sweetgrass Hills in Montana. The wildflowers were spectacular.

We crossed the border into Montana Saturday and spent the night in Billings on our way to Mount Rushmore. We had no idea when the border guard asked why we are going to Mount Rushmore during the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally that we would be travelling to the same place as thousands of motorcycle riders. More about that later.