(no longer) LOST IN JAPAN: Thanksgiving weekend in Montreal...

2006-10-10

Thanksgiving weekend in Montreal...

So this past weekend was Thanksgiving in Canada. This means that I got to eat turkey and stuffing for the first time in over 2 years, which made me really happy. This weekend was super busy seeing as we had 11 people in the house. My cousin and her friends (5 of them) came to spend the long weekend in Montreal. Her friends are all Thai natives and had never experienced Thanksgiving before so my family was happy to oblige.

I spent all weekend working up an appetite for dinner Sunday night. We went sightseeing all day Saturday. Every time I go exploring the city, I realize how much I really love Montreal. It's so much more charming than any other city in Canada. Montreal has style, Montreal has character. The only problem with Montreal is that it's in Quebec and is thus plagued with the never-ending politics of the language debate... It is nevertheless a really nice city.
I went out dancing for the first time since I got back and let me just say that I keep forgetting how much I actually like going clubbing. PLUS, the no-smoking-in-public-places thing ROCKS. You can dance all night and not worry about smelling like smoke. Sweat yes, but not smoke.
Sunday we went hiking in the Laurentians (an extention of the Adirondak Mountains in New York State). The highest peak--Mont Tremblant ("Shaking Mountain"--comes in at a mere 960m which is hardly anything to get excited about. The girls wanted to see the fall colours in all their glory and the plan was to head up to Tremblant but we ran out of time since, we opted for Mont Saint-Sauveur which is closer, smaller but still very pretty. Saint-Sauveur is a ski hill in the winter and a water park in the summer but in the fall, it is open for "hiking". I put it in brackets because there isn't actually a trail until about halfway up so for the first half of the hike we were scaling a 70 degree slope... NOT FUN. Nice view though. It only took about 30-40 minutes to get to the top then we headed back down for some outlet shopping. YAY!
Back at the house, my mom and dad were busy getting ready for dinner. My parents love entertaining and they are good at it. We had 13 people over for dinner, a 7kg turkey and there were still tons of leftovers!

And I leave you with some pictures. Because pictures are worth a thousand words and I'm lazy.

The St-Joseph's Oratory... our first stop.

Adrian expressing his delight at being back at the Oratory for the fourth time since my triumphant return to Montreal.

The whole crew at the bottom of the stairs. Notice that Adrian is the only guy...

Yet another picture from the lookout. This time with the striking reds and yellows of fall.

The crew walking along the marina in Old Montreal. Usually it's quite deserted at this time of year but with the summer-like weather we had, it was bustling with people enjoying the sights.