Canada: That place to the north

Oh, Canada!
We just got back from our trip to the great wilderness north of us - a land they call Canada.  It was a 10.5 hour drive from our home in America to our first destination in Montreal, QC Canada.  We took 12 hours to drive it because we stopped once in Palmyra, NY to see the church historical sites.  After a few days in Montreal - where the boys got to go to the Formula 1 Racing Grand Prix of Canada, we traveled 3 hours farther into the wild north to a small city called Quebec.  That place was amazing.  The city was so rich with history and beauty.  The buildings and streets of Old Quebec were breathtaking with their little cobblestones and old style buildings.  It was such a lovely place.  After only just a day there we embarked on our journey to discover America again and to tackle the 13 hr drive back home.  I have broken up our trip in pictures in the following posts in greater detail.

But first, a review of Canada. 
Maybe it was because we were touring the province of Quebec mostly, where they speak French but I was surprised how much Canada DID feel like a different country.  We have friends from different parts of Canada and it never seemed like they were very different in their culture to us.  So I expected to go to Canada and feel like everything was much the same as the US.  That didn't happen.  In fact it was sort of an unshaky feeling to have a gruff Canadian mounty question our motives for wanting to see Canada before letting us enter.  Then once you get in the scenery even looks different.  Untouched, wild and natural.  It was beautiful and it made me wonder if that is what our landscape would have looked like just south of the "border line" if we didn't have it all broken up into farms and ranches.  Though even as I was thinking how pretty and untouched it was I was proud of our industry down south.  It was a weird combination of feelings. 

Where Canada is wild and free in its wilderness - it is tight and restrictive on its taxes.  Woah!  There is like 3 different taxes put on everything you buy and gas is almost twice as expensive in Canada than it is in the states -25% of the price of gas being taxes.  Maybe we can work out a deal with Canada to let us go across for medicines cheap and them come across for cheap gasoline.  Maybe this is why even with a very stable economy Canada struggles to get and keep their dollar above ours in value.  Everything is more expensive in Canada.  It made me miss the "Land of the Free" terribly.

Canada is funny.  Everyone knows it.  That is why it is so easy to make fun of the Canadians - like call them America Jr.  There were so many funny signs and things in Canada that we were laughing the whole way -which helped a lot when we saw our vacation money go down the Canadian government tax toilet.  Anytime we needed the kids to do something or not to do something else we warned them not to do that because "Canada doesn't have...(insert any number of things: washing machines, etc)"  It didn't help the situation that they speak french in that part of Canada either.  The french are so easy to make fun of.  Be sure to check out the blog post on the funny things we took pictures of during our trip. 

The people of Canada were beyond polite.  They were lovely.  Everyone was so helpful and so courteous.  They are really a very nice people.  I wished we had more Americans like them.  Their real concern for others has spilled into other habits there.  We went to the grocery store there to stock up on delicious Canadian chocolates and other goods and EVERYONE there shopped with the reusable shopping tote bags.  They even had machines in the stores to recycle the cans - and its like the change machines at the stores - you deposit your cans and you get money back for them.  I can see how it makes people inclined to recycle.  There is a real "green' initiative there.  Recycle bins in your own hotel room?  Cool.

The french speaking.  Ummm I can't for the life of me understand french - the language takes 26 letters of the alphabet and chooses at least half of them to be silent and the other half to make the wrong sounds.  They speak it in Quebec and so luckily most of them could also speak English.  I had one time in the hotel in Quebec where I called the housekeeping to request something and the guy answered in French.  Usually then all I had to say was "English?" and they would respond in English.  However I think this guy did try to respond in English and for the life of me I could not understand a word of it.  I had to call the front desk to have them relay the message since I couldn't understand it at all.  It was like that part of Finding Nemo where Squirt (the little turtle) is giving instructions to Marlin and Dory on how to exit the East Australian Current and Marlin says "Its like he is trying to talk to me, I know it." {then to Squirt} "Look, you're really cute, But I cant understand what you're saying. Say the first thing again."

Click "older posts" to make sure you see all of our Canadian Adventure posts.