Roadtrip en Gaspésie

Finally another post! There’s a lot to tell you but I didn’t find the time to write it down… Today, I had to hand in two assignments and I’ve been travelling the last two weekends.

Thus, only two assignments and three exams left, yeah!! For one of the assignments, I had a meeting with the professor last week. I met him in his office in the hospital and I can tell you that people are crazy here because of the swine flu. Securities control that you disinfect your hands before you enter the hospital and patients younger than 18 years are not allowed to receive visitors… Well, I didn’t catch the flu and I was really happy after the meeting because I discussed a scientific topic in French – something I wasn’t able to do before I came here.

Mainly, I want to tell you about my crazy road trip to Gaspésie. This trip really deserves to be called road trip as we drove 2000 km in two and a half days!!! I guess that most of you have never heard about the region Gaspésie, so maybe you like to have a look on the map to orient yourself: http://maps.google.de/maps?hl=de&tab=wl



We rented a used minivan at a company called “rent a wreck”, doesn’t sound very trustworthy but we had no problems although a little warning light showed us that the car should soon be checked by a mechanist. I really enjoyed driving after three months without a car and made 800 km. I’ve been driving an automatic car for the first time but apart from one full braking because I mistook the brake for clutch, everything went pretty well.

We left Montreal at 1 pm on Friday and reached our first motel at 10 pm. Thus we drove many hours in the dark and passed deserted villages where we couldn’t see a single person on the street. We stopped just in time at McDonalds to buy our “dinner” before it closed at 9 pm. You see, we were in the middle of nowhere (Rien sur 6 km) and were curious about what we would see the next morning.

The waitress in the motel told us the that the most beautiful part of the Gaspésie starts right there, so we had not missed very much while driving through the dark. The road we took on Saturday followed the coast and the landscape was amazing.

After all the hours in the car, we did some hiking in the national park of Forillon.

We spent the second night in Gaspé, the metropolis of the Gaspésie with 15000 habitants. As it’s already complete dark at 4pm there, we wanted to go to a restaurant (not only fast food) around 6. We could not eat in the restaurant that was recommended in my guide book because all tables were booked. Hallo, at 6 pm!!! It seems that people there have supper at 6 and go to bed at 8 what explains why we couldn’t see anyone on the streets the night before. Finally, we found a very nice and low priced restaurant where I nearly stole a knife. After leaving the restaurant, I put my hand into the pockets of my jacket and found a knife in my left pocket! Don’t ask me how this could happen?! For a moment a was hesitating if I should just go away or bring it back what would be kind of embarrassing… but honest as I am, I went back and explained the situation to the waiter ;-) As we didn’t know what to do the whole evening in this hick town (there is a cinema but the only film was the Micheal Jackson film) we returned to our motel after dinner and adjusted to the locals going to bed at 10 pm ;-)
Thus, we left the motel the next day at half past 6 but unfortunately, I observed after 20 km that I had forgotten my mobile phone under the pillow. I guess the others would have liked to chop off my head as we had gotten up at 6 to leave early… On the way home, we stopped in Percé to see the famous rock in front of the coast. Unfortunately, it was raining the whole day…

But we had a great time in the car anyway listening to the same 4 CDs for the fifth time ;-) One song will always remind us of this great trip and I won’t deprive you of listening to it too… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ByV2m8kdDA8
It’s too late to tell you about my last weekend because I have to get up at 7 am tomorrow…

Last but not least (still remebering something from my English lessons at school but today I have the impression that my English is really bad), to see who is still reading my blog, I’d like to ask some initiative of you… I’m still cooking nearly every day and really enjoy it but sometimes I run out of ideas. So please send me your favorite recipes, some easy everyday meals. I’ll try all of them and send you a picture afterwards ;-)

Hope to hear you soon...

geli

Halloween and football

Bonsoir tout le monde!

Nothing special happened during the last week, I had my last midterm exam on Monday, and the lack of events and work made me feel a bit homesick… Actually, I do miss you!!! I already met lots of people here but sometimes, I’d like to have a real good friend by my side…

As you all know, last night was Halloween… well in Germany you usually go to normal parties but in North America, Halloween is much more important. It’s the only occasion in the year for costume parties (like our carnival). Unfortunately, I didn’t have the opportunity to go a private party of Canadians (as the party I intended to go to finally didn’t take place) but nevertheless I had lots of fun.
Friday night, the other exchange students from Munich came to my place and we had a pumpkin cooking evening. Pumpkin cream soup (excellent recipe) , another pumpkin dish (quite difficult to describe), homemade mousse au chocolat (I loved it although I don’t like sweet things that much), wine cooler with pineapples (lot’s of alcool; German: Bowle, I’m not sure if the translation is right) and beer(not as good as German beer)… Yummy!!

Yesterday I watched my first football match, one of the must-sees as it is part of the university culture and a really big spectacle. I went there with a French girl a know from one of my courses. The first picture shows the team of “my” university – Les Carabins - entering the field. By the way, the building in the background is the music faculty.

No football match without Cheerleaders…

Well, that’s me enjoying the football match. You’ll have to get used to this appearance, it’s my winter coat that makes me look like twice my normal size ;-) Yesterday, it was only to support our team by dressing in blue but sooner or later, I’ll have to wear this coat every day…

Last night, All Hallows’ Eve, I went to a theatre showing the Rocky Horror Picture Show!! Quite spontaneously, I decided (or maybe I should say that I was persuaded) to try to get a ticket immediately before the show. Thus, I had no time to go shopping for a costume (suspenders etc) but I tried at least to adapt a little bit to the costumes of my friends what meant neither jeans nor skirt… Those of you how know the film will recognize Frank on the left.








That afternoon, I enjoyed the nice autumn sun and walked along the “Canal de Lachine” that allowed ships to bypass the Lachine Rapids in former times and was important for the shipping traffic to the great lakes. Thus, an important industrial site developed in the surroundings but the canal was closed to shipping in 1970. Today, you find ruins of corn silos and factories in that area…

Another strange thing observed in Montreal to finish this post:
All night clubs and bars have to close at 3 am and there are only illegal clubs that are open from 3 am till the next morning. Nevertheless, clubs are quite empty if you go there before midnight what means that you have only two or three hours for dancing. Party till the first train is not possible here =( And although all club close at 3, there is no metro at that time. You have to know people living next to the club or you have to take the taxi. Fortunately, I can walk home from the Plateau (the “Schwabing of Montréal”). After two months, we accepted that there is no party till dawn but last night the discussion about it rose again. Contrary to Europe, we changed to winter time last night what means that we gained one hour last night. This could have been the only night that clubs close one hour later but actually that’s not the case. Anyway, I didn’t find yet a club where I would really like to stay till 5 am but I continue searching ;-)

Bonne nuit!! Miss you
geli