Off to the East Coast

As always, this is written by all five of us RANAD, RobAvivaNoahAaronDiane:
A tale of an acronym who decided to take the month of August to head over to the Canadian East Coast for yet another vacation.
So-o-o, let's get you caught up on what we've been doing of late. It took us 7 hours to fly to Quebec City; 9 hours door to door! We could have f@#$ing driven there in that same time! Why, fellow readers, you might ask? Well apparently it was "Monsoon Season" in the province of Quebec so our planes were grounded on various tarmacs due to outrageous rain along the way. But we made it to Quebec City just in time for a blackout that lasted several hours. This meant that both check-in and supper had a litle 19th century twist. We checked in by candlelight and were handed glow sticks and were sent to our rooms. Oh yeah, we had St. Hubert's BBQ delivered to our room where we dined by glow-stick light on the bathroom floor; a glorious supper with limited cutlery. At some piont or anoter during the blackout, Grandmommy (Eva P) arrived at the hotel, and we all tumbled into bed after a warm welcome.
Highlights of Quebec City... well it depends on who you ask. Aviva could give you the inside scoop on the workings of Hotel Dieu hospital. She spent chunks of the first day and a half getting herself diagnosed with mononucleosis (not the end of the world but still kinda sucks). Aaron, Noah, and Grandmommy spent the first day on the town exploring the city. They took the funicular up to the Haute Ville, saw the awesome vistas and the ruins of the original fortress, and had high tea at the Chateau Frontenac. From this point on in the trip Aviva has been joining us some of the time (often via piggyback) and some of the time has stayed back at the room.
Now back to the highlights of Quebec City. We toured the Citadel, and went to Les Chutes de Mont Morincy. We had thought to rent a van for this excursion for $150, but there were none available; so we had to resort to using public transit, which meant that on a $3 ticket we were able to go to Mont Morincy, go back to the hotel to pick up Aviva, return to Quebec City for supper, and return to our hotel for the night.
The next day as we were heading off to St. John's Newfoundland, we gorged ourselves on chocolate-almond croissants at the airport and scared off everyone else at the gate with our pig-like croissant-eating manners. We next parted company with Grandmommy and headed off for St.John's. During our layover in Montreal (which for some reason was further from our destination than our original departure point in Quebec City) we started reading The Hunger Games (an awesome family read).
St. John's: Yes, it's true, the stereotype about Newfoundlanders is correct; they are outrageously kind, or as Rob calls it "cult-like-love-bombing-friendly". Not only do the drivers let you in and stop for jay-walking pedestrians, but on one occasion on a main street, a guy in a pick-up truck ground to a halt, got out of his truck, walked over to our car, picked up Aaron's camera case that he had accidentally dropped out of the car, and asked us "is this yours?" Every moment is a chattable moment here - just when asking for directions or bagging groceries at the grocery store.
Our first day here, we went to the most eastern point in North America - Cape Spear. It is crazy gorgeous, so we took way too many pictures. All over the park their are signs clearly marking that you should NOT go off the trail as there are high waves and the sea can change suddenly. So, of course, we got off the trails, hiked right down to the waters' edge, and along a tiny grassy trail mid-cliff. To our mothers/grandmothers: it wasn't really THAT dangerous, but the story wouldn't be as good now, would it?
We also have been to Signal Hill, which over-looks St. John's Harbour, and for centuries was used by the military to send fire signals. But the most important signal to be sent there, was one to Marconi in 1901 -the first wireless trans-Atlantic signal from England. Today, we went to "The Rooms", a beautiful museum and art gallery where we learned about the history of Newfoundland and its strong Irish roots. They also had a visiting Art exhibit about the impact of oil on people and the environment. The artist chose St. John's as the first Canadian city to display the work because it is an emerging oil economy.
By the way, we have been eating really well here in St.John's. Who would have thought? Tomorrow we're off to Trinity on the Bona Vista peninsula to an authentic Newfie fishing village and for some local live theatre.

As always with love,
RANAD