Halloween is huge here, even though it is not until the end of the month. Shops devote huge sections of their space to sell decorations, there is spooky stuff everywhere, pumpkins line people's front verandahs and a lot of people have gone overboard with decorations...
Trump vs Clinton
If you were going to guess on who is going to win the upcoming presidential election based on how many supporters put your banner outside their house then Trump would be frontrunner by far. Throughout our travels we have seen thousands of Trump banners on business premises and residential front lawns (in some streets house after house had a Trump flag) but have seen maybe a dozen or so supporting Clinton.
We have also seen a few signs like these...
Does Trump really have that much support or do Clinton's supporters just not like to put their preference forward? The media certainly seem to be backing Clinton, but I'm not sure about the people on the street. A number of people we have casually asked about the elections don't want either to be elected. That seems to be a very sane response.
THE TOWN OF Lake Placid, New York
On our way from Montreal to Gettysburg, PA, we saw a sign to Lake Placid so we took a detour. It seemed to take forever, through snaking roads through mountains and forests and we were a bit worried that if Lake Placid turned out to be a dump we had a long way to go back to civilisation.
We worried needlessly. It is a lovely town that twice hosted the winter olympics and had great lodges and motels. We stayed in one next to the Mirror Lake. We took the photo shown above at dusk as we heading out to a local blues bar for dinner.
The crappy photo below was taken on the way back. I wonder if the bourbons I consumed with dinner had something to do with the problem I had keeping the camera steady?
Last photo before leaving canada
We couldn't resist taking this photo just before the Canadian/USA border. We have no idea what the sign relates to, it just seemed to be standing there waiting for me.
Notre Dame Basilica, Montreal
This cathedral was on our list of things we must see while in this area of Canada. The interior is awe-inspiring. All of the bright colours and intricate details should be too garish and overwhelming, but they just seem to work.
Old Quebec
We caught a ferry across the river to Old Quebec. It is a charming (not a word I use often) place full of quirky old-world buildings. Very european, and reminds us of a Harry Potter village. Of course it had to start raining the moment we arrived.
Update: 16 October
Today we drove from Edmonton, New Brunswick, to Quebec. The scenery along the roads in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, while quite beautiful in Fall, consists mainly of being surrounded by trees, followed by trees, then more trees. The drive today was quite a different story. Beautiful open rural landscape, lakes and mountains and the roads had such little traffic. It was a great trip!
However, all signs are only in French. This makes driving so much more fun! We did think of using the Google Translate app on my iPhone, but decided it was more fun to guess the english translations.
This sign was interesting. We wouldn't have thought they have a lot of trouble with people feeding the birds along the freeway...
Update: 15 October
We had lunch at the Old Boot Pub in the tiny village of Gagetown. Not as bad as it looks. It was their last day open before closing for the season so there wasn't a lot left on the menu.
We are finding a lot of places are closed, or closing, this weekend for the season. We assume they will open again when the weather gets warmer. Even most of the tourist welcome centres are closed.
It wasn't until I had almost finished drinking this chocolate milk drink the Vyv noticed the brand name. It gave her a little chuckle.
I am not at all keen on driving around this part of Canada at night. These signs, complete with flashing lights, are everywhere.
Thankfully the only Moose we have seen is this old bull moose in a wildlife centre. He is massive. In a car verses moose incident I don't think you would walk away unscathed.
Update: 14 October
We visited the Halifax Citadel. It was fortified in 1749 when the city was founded and has been at various times rebuilt for the American Revolution, The War of 1812, the American Civil War and was even garrisoned in World War 1.
It has great views over the city and would have a formidable place to try and over-run. However no battles were every fought there.
The good old 78th Highlanders Regiment of Foot were stationed here from 1869-1871. Those Scots certainly got around. There is definitely a very Scottish influence to this part of Canada. There are even towns called Glasgow, Aberdeen, Inverness etc.
These guys are wearing the kilt for period effect but we did see a guy in his 30s wearing one on the streets today.
We did a walk around the cemetery where some of the Titanic victims were laid to rest, many of the tombstones have no names as they were unidentified.
Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia, Canada
We heard so much about Peggy's Cove in Nova Scotia we drove a couple of hours to visit it. Quite beautiful and eccentric but we lost count of the tour buses coming to visit it.
This one wasn't smelly...
This is the first skunk we have come across that isn't lying squashed on the road. They are cute little critters but the smell of a dead one on the road is absolutely terrible and seems to follow you for miles. This one looks harmless though.
Only in Canada...
Canadians are well known for being nice people. Where else would you find a sign like the one above?
We also saw streets with these bright red fire hydrants on each section by the footpath. For some reason they thought the red hydrants were so hard to see they added small red signs with a small picture of a hydrant on it to make them easier to find. I guess city councils are the same everywhere...
How to spoil the beautiful scenery...
We travelled on a lot of small country roads through New Hampshire. Some of the roads unpaved. All of them had beautiful scenery but there is always someone to spoil it.
These photos were taken of one property in Haverhill. The junk basically forms a fence across the front. We imagine that the neighbours aren't too pleased.
Update: 10 October 2016
Over the last two days we have been travelling through the states of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine heading eastwards, and the rusty Fall (Autumn to the rest of the world) colours all around us look amazing.
We searched out two of the many old covered bridges that still remain in this area. This one is in Newry, Maine, and goes over the Androscoggin River.
The scenery at the bridge site may be beautiful, but it is getting very cold. We had to don our warmer clothes for the first time during the trip as it was about 4 degrees mid-morning and reached 12 degrees by mid-afternoon. We expect it may get colder the further we head east.
8 October: A quick visit to Niagara Falls
I had completely the wrong idea of what Niagara Falls was like but Vyv had been there 10 years ago with her brother Martin. I thought it was located out in the country somewhere, I didn't know it was really in the centre of the city of Buffalo.
Finding the Falls was pretty easy, just look for the water spray above buildings. The city in the background, over the river, is the Canadian city of Niagara Falls.
While there we saw our first black squirrel. We don't care that the Americans consider them vermin, we think they are adorable.
The Olentangy Indian Cave in Delaware, Ohio
After leaving Florence (in Kentucky) heading towards Buffalo (in New York state) we came across this old cave. Once used by indians as storage and a place of refuge, it is now a small tourist attraction that has somewhat seen its better days. It was cool, damp and some passages were quite difficult to negotiate. Still, it was a fun distraction.
I had my doubts, but it was worth the visit...
Vyv was keen to visit the Ark Experience, as she had read about it in a magazine. I was very dubious because it is built by Creationists to explain their view of Noah and The Flood. It did not sound like something I would really want to see.
But, as much as I hate to admit it, this was one of the many, many times I have been wrong in my life!! It was actually brilliantly made and presented. The design and craftsmanship on everything was excellent. They really spared no expense, although the landscaping is yet to be completed.
The Ark cost $100 million to build and the exterior is clad in Radiata pine imported from New Zealand.
The interior scenes of life on the (mythical) ark are works of art in themselves.
But their Creationist theories just went a little too far. So now Noah took dinosaurs on to the ark??? As stupid as that may sound, it would make a hell of a movie. The dinosaurs escape on a ship where there is nowhere to run... a great horror movie would pretty much write itself.
Nashville
Karl would have been disappointed with us if we hadn't gone to a live music venue for dinner in Nashville. Good food and good music, although we did leave when they announced OPEN MIKE time. Might have been fun but we imagined karaoke quality singing.
I had to check out the Johnny Cash Museum while we were here, since he was such an early influence on my musical tastes. I remember listening to him on the radio and watching his TV show as a little boy.
It was well worth the visit!
All we knew about Nashville was the music side of things. One thing we didn't expect was this full-sized replica of the Greek Parthenon in the city centre, built in 1897 as part of the Tennessee Centennial Exposition. It was quite a majestic sight.
Earlier in the trip Vyv got to act like a cougar and hold hands with a very young Elvis. Here she tries something more age-appropriate...
Vyv and I love the American Pickers TV show so we couldn't resist visiting their Nashville store, located in the historic Marathon Motor Works building, while we were there. It was fun checking out some of the stuff we remember seeing in various episodes.
Vyv loved this guitar sculpture. Probably because it so closely matched the colours and pattern of her blouse!
A very random encounter
We stayed one night in Paris, Texas, and in the morning Vyv went to pack the car while I checked out. With her usual difficulty with anything technical, she had problems working out how to unlock the passenger door (you have to push unlock twice) so another guest came to her aid. He turned out to be one of the members of the band Three Dog Night. At the same time, I was meeting the rest of the band at reception.
They had played a gig in town the previous night. I would have gone along had I known.
Such is life...
Update: 4 October
We went to Tupelo, Mississippi, to visit the birthplace of Elvis Presley. The house he was born in has been preserved, along with the small chapel his family went to.
It is hard to believe that families lived in homes this small. Just two small rooms and a communal outhouse.
She finally gets to hold Elvis's hand, even if it just a 13-year-old Elvis...
While visiting a private military collection in Tupelo, I was tempted to trade in our Hyundai Sonata rental for something a little bit more macho...
We had never seen tobacco growing before.
The smell of the leaves hanging drying in the barn was very potent.
The plants also grow a lot bigger than we expected...