Robin took pictures of me with two regimental flags from NC regiments at the Civil War camp. You can see a "North Carolinian" in the background there.

This one looks very similar to the state flag I think.

Here's a video of the cannons firing in the Civil War one, to give you an idea of how it worked. I think it sounded much louder than it does on the video.

In this picture, all of the different groups have lined up for a final parade. The closest group was the oldest, but I couldn't place what group they were supposed to be exactly. I thought maybe the Greeks or the Celts. You can also see the Romans and way in the distance, some of the World War groups.

A couple of the knights were practicing before their big tournament, so we watched them hack away at each other. The taller one kept beating the shorter one when they sparred.

The civil war battle was by far the largest and most popular of the battles. You can see the union on the close side in this picture. In the far distance on the hill is the confederate artillery, which kept firing a lot. They even had little explosions happen in the grass sometimes. The union artillery was to my left when taking this picture, and they were incredibly loud. Despite their superior numbers, the union lost this battle. There is another day of the fayre today, and I think the union will win this time.


The union had a cavalry unit, but they still lost the battle. They had to rent special horses that didn't mind the constant explosions (which were really loud). The only problem with the cavalry is that they could not die. Because they would need to fall off their horse and then the horse would run around free, possibly hurting someone. So they never seemed hurt, even when shot at point blank range. Surprisingly, the cavalry did not attack the unguarded confederate artillery either. Oh well.




Here's the civil war camp. They eat and sleep here for the two days of the festival. The close side is the union, with the confederates in the rear.

Here are some giant cabbages from the vegetable contest. There were long parsnips and leeks too.


Here's a close-up of the city center.

This is one view of the fayre. The park is on a hill, so you cannot see all of the fayre from here. You can see the city in the background though.

In what can only be described as really bizarre, I went to the Sheffield Fayre yesterday and watched a US civil war reenactment. The fayre had rides for kids, a few animals, and lots of vegetables, but the main attraction was the large group of historical reenactments. There were romans, knights, WWI and II soldiers, and many more. However, the largest group by far was the US civil war soldiers (all British from what I could tell). You can read more about it at http://www.eventplan.co.uk/Sheff07.htm but I've got pictures to add too.

Here is a mini-movie I made while standing at the top of Niagara Falls

The latest thing to spring up at the university are lots of posters everywhere which explain why it is a waste of paper, ink, and money to print out the electronic newsletter. Somehow the irony of their actions seems to have escaped them.

The 7 hour bus ride from Montreal back to Toronto wasn't as bad as we thought it would be, and I think we both managed a little sleep on the bus. We stayed at the Canadian Backpacker's Inn for one night in Toronto, and got a newly done room which was much nicer than the first one we stayed in. I still think the Canadiana is the best (and cleanest) hostel I've ever stayed in. We went back to Sushi Time restaurant where we went when we were staying in Toronto. For about 20 dollars we got buckloads of great Japanese food, so we were desperate to go back.

The next morning we picked up our rental car, a Chevy Cobalt. It was a tiny car that somehow still got worse than 30 mpg during our trip despite its size. The traffic was horrible in Toronto, and it took forever to get out of the city, even on the highways. We drove up north to the Georgian Bay on Lake Huron, where we discovered that all the provincial parks in the region were fully booked for camping for the weekend (it was a Friday when we arrived). Luckily we called around and found a private campground called Wasaga Dunes near Wasaga Beach (the longest freshwater beach in the world apparently) which had some spaces left.

We went to the beach that afternoon but just to eat some food rather than swim or anything. That night we thought we had the perfect campsite with sand to sleep on, etc. However we didn't count on noisy neighbors arriving at 9pm and never shutting up until 2am. They did get quieter after I went and asked them to, but it was still annoying. There was a fire ban because the region had not had any rain in a month, but several people just seemed to ignore it. Luckily they had someone from the camp patrolling. We were also awakened by a scratching sound that I thought was a raccoon trying to get into car. It turned out to be a mouse that was trapped inside the hood of the car. I guess he was there from the rental place's parking lot. He escaped from the car on Saturday, running right past me which gave me a fright. Victoria was worried it was a bear, despite my assurances that it was highly unlikely a bear would a) make that little noise, and b) be in such a developed area.

On Saturday we went to the beach in the morning. It was very crowded, but still nice. We made sure to wear lots of sunblock as it was quite hot that day. I went into the water to go swimming, but found it was actually very shallow. It was only up to my shoulders about 500 meters into the water. It must have gotten deeper though as there were boats past that point. We had a nap that afternoon to catch up on some sleep. Then that evening we went to a drive-in movie theatre, which was a lot of fun. They showed two movies, License to Wed and The Bourne Ultimatum, which meant it didn't finish until 12:30am. They were both pretty good, though the latter was better.

Saturday's sleep was disturbed by a large growling sound outside of the tent. It seems our noisy neighbors left out lots of food on the table and raccoons were fighting over it or something. It was a bit scary, and Victoria slept in the car for a bit after that.

Sunday was spent driving down to Lake Erie in the south of the province. We were going to stay at a campsite but it rained all day, so we found a cute motel about 45 minutes from Niagara Falls instead. It took awhile to find one though as a lot of the region on the lake is not that developed until you get close to the falls.

Monday we walked alot around Niagara Falls. It was a nice sunny day and the crowds were out in force. We didn't do any of the falls touristy things like the boat ride to the falls, or the journey behind the falls, partly because of the 3-4 hour wait they required. We did decide to cross the Rainbow Bridge on foot and go to the USA. We had to pay 50 cents to cross the bridge, but it ended up being free as the change machine gave me extra money. I put in $2 and got back $2.50. We still needed another 50 cents for the machine so I put in a dollar and got back a buck fifty. It was very strange, and didn't work when we tried it with another dollar. So we went over there, saw the falls on that side and had a huge brownie sundae at Hard Rock Cafe. In the end we were in the US for about 2 hours or so.

We found a nice campsite called Jordan Valley Campsite which was amazingly pretty and the facilities were really good. There were not many people there so we choose a campsite close to the amenities. Unfortunately one group nearby was really loud so we decided to move to the far end of the campsite where we would be alone, though far from the toilets, etc. It ended up being the best night's sleep we had when camping.

Tuesday was our last day so we drove back (through more traffic) and returned the car. There was one problem with the car besides the mouse. The front left tire had a screw in it, but it didn't lose any air so the emergency assistance people told us to just keep driving it. I don't know if we ran over the screw or if it was already there, as it looked worn down and Victoria spotted it on the first day of the rental. In the end it didn't cause us any trouble but they made us fill out an incident report form, and seemed to be implying that they might want us to pay for it, which seems ridiculous. We spent most of the rest of the day going to the airport and waiting around, playing yahtzee (which along with poker and rummy kept us entertained throughout the trip) until we could check in to our 9pm flight. The flight was pretty uneventful, though it showed the movie Blades of Glory which I thought was hilarious. I had to keep from laughing too much and waking everyone up around me.

I slept a couple hours on the plane, which is unusual for me. Then we had the long trek back to Sheffield, barely missing the direct train by 3 minutes, meaning we had a more difficult way back, and had to change trains in Manchester. Of course the weather on arrival was cool with a light rain, typical of Sheffield. Can't say I missed the weather. We took a nap and hopefully I won't be too crazy with my sleep tonight as I am going to work tomorrow.

During the trip we had a bit of berry-mania going on, as there seemed to be fresh berries everywhere. Strawberries and raspberries were the most popular, but we also found blueberries for sale as well. It seemed throughout the trip we were always finding some berries to snack on or have in a dessert.

Our last night camping was near a place called Jordan that is famous for its vineyards, but we also saw many other fruits there, including apples, pears, peaches, strawberries, and raspberries.

In other fruit related news, I saw a tomato about the size of my head at a fruit stand near Quebec.

Yesterday we rented bikes from a nearby shop with a discount for people at our hotel (they pay the 15% tax for us). We took them out for about 5 hours in total, and used the city's dedicated bikes lanes to go to Parc du Mont Royal, a park for the "mountain" in the middle of the city. It was mostly uphill on the way and gave us a good workout. At least coming back was easy. The mountain's trail was 6 km, and it must have been at least that to get there. We also wanted to go to another island that wasn't too far, but it turned out we had to cross a really high bridge that cars go on, and we didn't want to do that so we turned around.

Today we slept in late and went to the Biodome, a giant zoo/aquarium sort of place with four major habitats (tropics, temperate forest, maritime, and arctic). All of the environments but the first (tropical) can be found in Canada. The tropical area had capyberas, sloths, and caimons running around, along with lots of birds and little monkeys. Then there was the Laurentian forest region, with otters, lynxes, and beavers. The coastal/tidal region had starfish and lots of really big fish. The final region was the arctic with puffins and penguins. There was also a temporary exhibition on animal mating rituals, which was really interesting and interactive. It was quite a neat place, but horribly crowded today. Strangely all the food options, including a large cafeteria, were shut down except a tiny cafe which had a really long line as a result. We were even eating there after the main lunch rush, so I think that must have been a nightmare. I think the Biodome building was an old Olympic structure, as it was next to the Olympic track stadium, so they made good use of it after the Olympics.

Tomorrow we will take a bus to Toronto and then the next day rent a car to go to Niagara and the Great Lakes, hopefully for more camping if the weather is good.

One interesting thing we've noticed is that nobody can understand Victoria when she asks for water at a restaurant. The British say water with a much weaker beginning (more like Hwater, while I think North Americans say it more like WAater or something). In the end I have to translate for her, even in the areas where English is the primary language.

Last night was unfortunately terribly noisy. Our cabin was right next to a patio where people were supposed to be quiet starting at 10:30. We waited until midnight, but people were still talking loudly so we asked the front desk to ask them to move elsewhere if they wanted to stay up. People mostly left but then some came back an hour later, and we barely slept any. Around 4am a huge group of people had formed in the courtyard and started playing music and carrying on. It was really disrespectful to those who were sleeping, such as ourselves. We got to listen to lots of exciting stories about how people had drank so much they puked. Was not much fun as we were exhausted from an early start yesterday. I complained to the desk again and we finally were able to get some sleep, only to be woken up early in the morning by a huge thunderstorm which carried on for a few hours.

As a result we got the front desk to move us to a room in the basement. It doesn't have great ventilation so it may get a little hot, but at least it is quiet. And the hostel did our laundry for us last night, so at least that is good having clean clothes.

Most of the day we have just wandered around and tried to rest where we can. We did walk to Chinatown and the Quartier Latin (where many students are). We both feel a bit jet-lagged from the night, but the bedsheets apparently aren't ready for our new room, so it is making things tricky with taking an afternoon nap.

I did manage to time most of our journey on the way back. Here are rough timings:

Halifax-border with New Brunswick - 2 hours
across New Brunswick - 4-5 hours
New Brunswick northern border to Riviere du Loop - 1 hour
Riviere du Loop to Quebec City downtown - 2.5 hours

That makes the total time about 10 hours on the motorway/freeway. Of course, stopping and getting on smaller roads meant it actually took longer.

We've made it to Montreal, after our drive back across New Brunswick. We stayed one night at a motel near Woodstock because there were massive thunderstorms that evening, so we had to ditch the camping idea. Last night we stayed in a campsite about an hour from Quebec, which was in a small wooded area surrounded by farms. It was pretty nice, and slightly less crowded than the other campsites we had seen. All of the campsites were in general quite packed.

We're staying at Le Sous Bois, a hidden hostel right in the old city of Montreal. I say it is hidden because we had a hard time finding it. It shares a reception with the hotel in front of it, but there are no signs for the hostel at the hotel. Luckily we did find it in the end though by using the street number. The hostel seems alright, though it is very popular, and our room is right next to the courtyard where people tend to hang out. I hope it is not too noisy as a result. I'm using its free internet though, so that is a plus.

We've now finished the Nova Scotia leg of our journey, and begin to drive back to Quebec, which will be a bit boring. We have to get it back by Sunday morning at 11 to return the rental car.

Halifax was nice enough, though the lady we were staying with at the B&B was a bit of a talker. The Citadel in Halifax was similar to the one in Quebec, but more like a museum (the Quebec one was a working military base so lacked most of the pagentry). The Halifax one had a changing of the guard ceremony, bagpipers and fired a cannon at noon. The Citadel was incredibly well defended historically to stop the Americans from taking over the last British interests on the continent, especially after the War of 1812.

The Halifax Maritime Museum was also interesting, with exhibits on a huge explosion in Halifax that was the largest manmade explosion before the atomic bomb. Some 2,000 people were killed and half the town was levelled. A ship carrying explosives and fuel hit another large ship and caught on fire. Then it drifted right up to the dock where spectators gathered to watch it. All the spectators were killed instantly when it exploded, forming a mushroom cloud. The lesson is that if you see something large on fire, get away from it, don't watch it. The museum also had information about the Titanic, as the ships that were sent to recover the dead were all from Halifax, the nearest port.

We also drove to Peggy's Cove and Lunenburg, which were nice little towns on the waterfront, but the weather was rainy and foggy, so we did not enjoy them as much as we could've. We spent a couple days up in Cape Breton, about 4-5 hours north of Halifax. We went on a scenic drive called the Cabot Trail, which goes around the cliffs that are next to the sea. On both of the hikes we took we saw some moose, including two baby moose. At the end of the longer hike you could see whales down in the ocean, even though we were really high up. With my camera's zoom I managed to get a decent picture of a whale, which I'll put up here later. It was really neat seeing the whales, as there must have been over 30. There were whale watching boats down below right next to them, only meters away. If we had more time, I would've been interested in doing that too. Perhaps instead of driving, we should've flown from Quebec to get more days in Nova Scotia. I would've liked to spent more time on Cape Breton Island, and possibly the west part of Nova Scotia too.

Last night we drove back towards the airport, staying at Dolan's Inns in Pictou, which was a tiny waterfront town with a good atmosphere but an ugly factory across the harbor. Now that we've dropped off my parents we're going to start the long drive back.