Scenes from a Fourth

We had a very nice Fourth of July in these parts, with both community and family celebrations.

On Thursday, Julianna and Nick had a little parade and sang a few songs for us at their summer school.



On the Fourth of July, our little town has a nice celebration, which includes a Pancake Breakfast in the Fire Station, a parade down our main street, food, games and music in the park, and a fireworks show at night.

This is our second year living here. Last year, we left town on the Fourth but did the Pancake Breakfast before we left.

This year, the girls and I went to watch the parade. They were hot and were not shy to let me know about it (again and again), but we all enjoyed it. It's a small and ragtag little parade, but it fits our town well.


Katie dressed up as Betsy Ross for the occasion, but quickly became too hot and lost the outer layer.

We saw musicians from the high school,


AYSO families and the YMCA girls' basketball league,



the local chapter of Neighbors for Peace and Justice reminded us of our rights,


the volunteers who help the city put on the Clean Air Car Show & Film Festival reminded us to B! Y! O! B! (Bring Your Own Bag!)


The Chamber of Commerce said, "Save Gas, Shop Local!"


The neighborhood preservation group dressed up as historic homes and trees,


town officials got to ride in vintage cars, and residents drove their own interesting vehicles,



The high school spirit squad performed for us,


as did the local square dance club,


and my favorite? The Scottish Pipe & Drum corps!


After the parade, we decided to forego the park and go home for some time in the pool!


We felt so lucky to have family in our home! It's new for us, but we loved it! We all enjoyed a hearty meal of baby back ribs, corn on the cob, and fruit salad.


After dinner, we headed over to the high school stadium, where my band played as the opening act for the fireworks!

It was the kids' first fireworks show, and they loved it! It was a great show, with musical accompaniment that really added to the spirit. I had trouble looking away from the kids' awe-struck faces to watch the fireworks!

Happy Birthday, America! We are so lucky to live here. I have several hopes and wishes for this country as we celebrate our 232nd birthday!

Canada Days (Pt. 3) (The Final Chapter)

We set out on a road trip to Tadoussac, to see if we could get a spot on a whale watch boat.


It was another trip with nervous butterflies in my stomach, because now we were going to go out on the water and look for whales, which is what I did every day for two weeks when I was last here fifteen years ago. This time, I was not so much worried that the trip would live up to my memory, because one 3-hour trip couldn't compare to two weeks of being on the water all day. This time, I was worried about making a fool of myself. Fifteen years ago, I was planning to become a whale researcher. I learned many skills that I thought were just the beginning. But not long after, I made some decisions to go a different direction. I went into education, and then having a family, and now here I was, fifteen years later: a tourist instead of a scientist.

I don't regret the direction I ended up choosing (too much), but I really wanted to still be good at the whale stuff! So I was worried that day about whether I would look like I knew what I was doing as I got in the zodiac, rode the rough waters, and watched for the whales surfacing. I'm a person who chose not to go into whale science (at least so far), but who really could have, not someone who was never cut out for it in the first place; that self-image is important to me.

Despite my anxiety, the drive was pretty. We took in the scenery along the way, and although the morning was cloudy (even on the ferry across the Saguenay fjord into Tadoussac), when we made our way down to the dock the sun was shining. We got spots on a 12-passenger zodiac for a 3-hour whale watch trip and decided to find some lunch before we had to be back at the dock.

The sun was out and it was lovely, and we sat on an outdoor patio and ordered some lunch. I had no appetite, but knew that I needed to eat something and drink some water before I went out on the water for three hours. As I shoo-ed bug after bug away from my face, I made myself eat and drink a little.

I visited the rest room at the end of our lunch time, since my nervous stomach had moved southward a little (that's me trying to talk about it delicately), and since I also wanted to tie my hair back before going out on the boat. As I looked in the mirror to do my hair, I noticed three drops of blood on my neck. Great, I'm not feeling that great due to nerves, and now I'm bleeding too. Apparently some bug(s) had bitten me during lunch. Super.

We walked down to the dock and suited up in gear similar to what we all wore fifteen years ago:



Looks a little big on me! It felt alright, though.

Our guide told us that the morning's cruise had been very cloudy, and now that the sun was out the visibility should be better. However, the ride would be rougher (very bumpy, like lift you off your seat bumpy). This took me back! We sure bounced around fifteen years ago!

I stepped into the zodiac just fine, and found my seat at the front. Soon we were on our way out of the harbor, and then kicking up to a higher speed to bounce along the waves toward the open river. It only took me a minute to remember how to ride with the boat, and oh, it felt good to be back. I love being on boats; my body quickly relaxed and I felt better than I had all day. Really, it just felt RIGHT.

As soon as we got out of the harbor, we hit the cloud bank (and never saw the sun again that day). The temperature dropped and we were cold! But we did see some minke whales and a small pod of beluga (I estimated 3 adults and 2 juveniles). We had decided to focus on experiencing it rather than photographing it, but we did get a couple of shots.



That last one was in the Saguenay fjord. This whale was circling under the surface, rounding up fish into a clump and then surfacing through them to feed on them. A few times, he came up sideways (minkes like to do that) and we saw his belly and pectoral fin. Fantastic!

We also took in some scenery in the fjord, which I never did fifteen years ago, since our camp and dock was 15 miles away from Tadoussac in Grandes Bergeronnes.


The last portion of our ride was ridiculously cold, with a light rain pelting us in the face. Nonetheless, I faced into the wind and enjoyed the ride. (I am something like a dog hanging his head out a car window when I'm on a boat, I guess, since The Hubby had long ago turned his back to the wind out of sheer discomfort and couldn't believe I was still riding that way!) Also, I really had to pee. When we got off the boat, and got out of our gear, I could hardly walk up the hill to find a restroom. Luckily, we did find one in the Interpretation Center. Seriously, it was painful. Nice.

But soon, I felt much better and we warmed up a little while finding souvenirs for the kids. As an example, the girls got cute T-shirts with drawings of beluga behaviors labeled in French!

It was a good day (except for the bladder issue)! I felt so good out on the water, and was so glad that I still enjoyed it after all these years, and had even retained some of my knowledge of whale behavior. I was happy.


We drove back to Quebec City and had a nice evening walk, and then the next morning headed out of the city, stopping by Ile d'Orleans. The island has been settled since 1535, and is an agricultural center but has retained many of the older farming techniques.



We then went back to Montreal, and hiked up to Parc du Mont-Royal to see the view at Kondiaronk Belvedere and the Chalet du Mont Royal. Eric and I travel well together, but neither of us knew where we were going as we were hiking, hiking, hiking up, up, up through the trees on a trail in the park, and we sure did bicker at each other. I let off some travel-fatigue steam at him, I'm not proud to say.

We eventually found the Chalet, and saw this sight, which cheered us up fast!


During the rest of our final evening, we walked around a bit in the Underground City, but my body was so tired that it wouldn't let me go on any further. Shower and bed were all it would allow, and then we woke up in the morning to the quiet of St-Jean day. Eric went out to that yummy bakery and got me a last cinnamon roll, and then it was off to the airport.

It was a full day of plane travel (which I really don't mind when we're without kids - sitting and reading or doing crosswords for a few hours is actually kind of a gift!), and then we walked in our front door and were greeted by our children running at us and tackling us with hugs. Julianna cried with joy ("I'm so happy I'm crying!") and wouldn't let go of me, so I carried her around for a while. Katie and Nick were full of smiles and giggles at seeing their long-lost parents! It was great to see their sweet faces again!

Canada Days (Pt. 2)

As we drove into Québec City, I was strangely quiet, since some part of me was worried that the city wouldn't live up to my cherished memory of it. I had only spent one evening there, fifteen years ago, but I spent it with the new friends with whom I had spent two weeks studying whales in the St. Lawrence river. The whole experience had been mind-blowing, and life-defining, for li'l 20-year-old Barbra, so it would not be a surprise if the City had been viewed through rose-colored glasses that evening. Still, I did cherish that rose-colored memory. Would reality get in the way and muck it up?

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The uneasy feeling in my stomach disappeared when we walked through the door of our room at L'Auberge Saint-Pierre and I saw that we would be spending three days here:



And this was the view out our windows:




I opened the windows and leaned my head out over the street, looking at the river, at the town of Levis on the other side, and at the buildings on our street, these lovely streets of Lower Town in Old Quebec. Breathing in deeply, I felt a relaxation, and then an energy flow through me. I was feeling so revitalized, so exhilarated!

Hand in hand, we headed out for a walk. Down the stony streets of Rue St-Pierre, turning onto Côte de la Montagne and then across at Rue Notre-Dame, which immediately greeted us with this mural:


I snapped photo after photo as we walked on, through Place Royal, up Rue Sous-Le-Fort, and wound our way through Quartier Petit-Champlain.




I ran down toward the waterfront, Eric laughing from behind me at my exuberance, and shot more photos looking back toward the old city, gasping at the sight of Upper Town perched atop the hill above Lower Town.


Even the public bathrooms are beautiful.



I needn't have worried; not only was the city as beautiful as I had remembered, it was more beautiful. I love to visit places where I feel transported - to another culture or to another time. Québec City does both! I can imagine what life was like in the 1700's as take in the scenery, and the town has 400 years of culture - descended from the French, but long ago transformed into something unique to this region alone.

That first evening of our arrival in Québec City, we stayed in Lower Town. We ate at Lapin Sauté on Rue du Petit-Champlain, and enjoyed our French fare of white sausage with apples, potatoes, and fennel and perfectly cooked duck confit. For dessert, can you believe this: maple syrup crème brûlée. Unbelievable...I can still taste it if I close my eyes and remember.

After dinner, we explored Place 400e at Vieux Port, the headquarters of the celebration for Québec City's 400th Anniversary (1608-2008), which is taking place all this summer. We talked with one of the young people handing out pins in honor of opening night of "The Image Mill" (Le Moulin à images). It is an enormous projection of images related to the city and its history, projected onto a row of grain silos across the water.

The next day, we walked all over. Up the hill and all over Upper Town, through the city wall at Porte St-Louis, past the Assemblée nationale and down Grande Allée (where we passed the most beautiful McDonald's I've ever seen), by the Armory that burned and collapsed this April, up the hill overlooking the Plains of Abraham, down the Terrasse Dufferin and through the shops of the Château Frontenac.







That afternoon, we were back at Quartier Petit-Champlain sharing a maple cone (maple-vanilla soft serve with maple-caramel swirl and maple sugar candy perched on top!). The evening saw us enjoying another French dinner, this time near our hotel in the Rue St-Paul area, after which we took the Funiculaire up the hill and enjoyed nighttime walks down the Terrasse Dufferin (watching the lightning upriver) and through the Rue de Buade area. There are street performances all over town, and we saw several large and small performances organized by museums and the 400e celebration. We don't know French, but we enjoyed the spirit!




I'll save the details of our next day for next time, but our last evening in Quebec found us on the Funiculaire to Upper Town once again, exploring the Rue St-Jean area, enjoying a street-side drink in a pub, spying on another (large) street performance at Place d'Youville, admiring the theatre (Le Capitole de Québec) where Les Misérables would be opening (shortly after we left - yes again), and saying goodbye to this town again, this place that I now loved even more than I had before! In my eyes, its beauty is unmatched, and this time I got to share it with my Eric!


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In the final chapter, we embark on some road trips (will bickering ensue?), and the old nervous worrying returns. How will Barbra handle it? Will there be bloodshed?

Canada Day

Today is Canada Day, so it is fitting that I reflect upon my trip to Canada today. It's also not-so-fitting a day for it, since we were visiting Quebec. Quebec's national holiday is the Feast of St. John the Baptist (La St. Jean-Baptiste), celebrated on June 24. The day we left. Yeah, that was some poor trip-planning research on our parts. It would have been nice to have been there on that day, not flying out of the airport in the A.M.!

We arrived in Montreal late the first night, walked from our hotel to find a bite to eat, and slept in! Umbrella in hand (and good thing, too), we walked down to Vieux Montreal ("Old Montreal") to have a look around.

We saw lovely old buildings and a stunning basilica. Basilique Notre-Dame has a main altar that, due to the sheer size, detail, and dramatic blue lighting, can't be adequately captured on camera.


There is also a newer chapel (where they hold regular services) that is made of different shades of wood. We took pictures of the stations of the cross to show Katie, since we thought she would be interested in the French.



What really struck me about the basilica were the stained glass windows depicting scenes from Montreal's history. I was unaware that Catholicism had played such a large role in the founding, and was really struck by it. They looked like the Pilgrims, but they were Catholics!

That day in Montreal, we also enjoyed a delicious lunch in a sandwicherie/cafe (smoked salmon sandwiches, homemade minty lemonade, amazing brownie, and "Jazz in the 80's"), hiding out from a rain squall (in a Starbucks-yeesh), exploring narrow cobblestone streets, historic structures such as the Hotel de Ville (City Hall), a nap back at the hotel, a delicious dinner back in Vieux Montreal at Gibby's (mussels, steaks, lemon sorbet for the palate, their famous pickles, and for dessert? Hot apple croûte with ice cream and caramel), and a nighttime stroll back to our hotel through both old and new sections of the city.





The next morning, we slept in kinda-sorta, found a bakery for a divine cinnamon roll and flavorful fresh squeezed OJ breakfast, and then headed out of our hotel and over to Montreal's Olympic Stadium area on our way to Quebec City. We wandered around in the Botanical Garden and Insectarium, as well as riding the stadium's funicular to take in the sweeping view.





Eric drove us to Quebec City, and I will admit to you that at this point, I was experiencing nerves.

You may wonder why. Why would I be nervous about Quebec City on my anniversary vacation? I agree, it's silly. I worry too much.

Some part of me was worried that Quebec City wouldn't live up to my memory of it from 15 years ago. It's a cherished memory, one I didn't want tarnished if the city was not quite as amazing as I remembered. Maybe I had built it up in my memory all these years. Maybe no place can live up to that standard...

And what if the reality made the fantasy in my head disappear and fade away? I couldn't verbalize it at the time, but I was uneasy during that drive that day.

Stay tuned to see how it turned out...