Montreal

Better late than never. The trip to Montreal was very nice. It was about 250 miles away so we drove. Frankly, the northern NY and southern Canadian landscape is pretty unremarkable, very flat and boring. The city of Montreal is remarkable for it's architecture. I found it to be a very clean, very friendly city, although a few people have told me their experience is different, as least in regards to the friendly part.

The night we arrived, we walked down to Vieux Montreal, the old part of the city and stumbled upon a street festival celebrating the history of the area. There were vendors dressed in historic garb, demonstrating and selling traditional craft items. Andrew checking out a display:

We came across this interesting fruit/vegetable (?). It tasted like a cross between a grape and a cherry tomato. Any suggestions as to what it may be?

Canada has a large immigrant population. China Town was one of my favorite neighborhoods to walk through:

Vieux Montreal was especially picturesque:

I ended up not running. For all my good intentions, I really didn't expect I would. I decided to use these few days as a break and to give my legs some recovery time. Of course, I then went out and proceeded to do my best to completely walk every area in the metropolitan Montreal area. I was practically crippled every night :-)

However, the best part of the trip was the formal dinner on the last night. It was hilarious to watch a bunch of newly admitted FSA's throw down their calculators and pocket protectors

and cut loose for the evening, intoxicated on relief, the thought of no more exams and lots of free booze.