After finishing my second session, during the long holiday, I traveled to French Canada by(on) school activity. I contacted with(x) China travel agency at first(first). They offered French Canada travel package at pretty cheap price, but I heard some bad rumors about China travel agency that they provided bad quality travel package. So, I chose school activity despite it was(Can't I use the clause after despite?) rather expensive.
We should have(had to) paid 299 dollars(?) exclude foods and some extra charges, but we didn’t need to make a plan and it was pretty easy way to travel to French Canada. What we had to do was just paying the money and following the tour guide. I didn’t have a enough time to make a travel plan, and I’m going to go to U.S.A in the middle of July by backpack trip, and I thought the self-making trip is enough for once – the U.S.A backpack travel. So, I decided to join the school activity French Canada trip finally.
On May 18th at 7 am, we met each other near York Mills station,(x) and set off to Ottawa at 7:30 AM. It took around 5 hours to reach Ottawa. In the bus, we were able to watch movies but there were just few tiny screens in the bus, so it was hard to watch the movies. Some people slept, since they had to wake up early in the morning. I saw the scenery out of the window. It was pretty beautiful. The weather was fairly nice,(x) and the clouds looked close to surface compared to Korea.
The bus run passing by a wilderness and it was also fresh(?). There is no wilderness in Korea. There are too many people in small area, so they have to live in apartments even to(?) small city. People live in everywhere, so there isn’t empty space. And(x) most of ground are composed of mountain, so I haven’t seen such a wide wilderness. It looked like just coming out of a picture. I had to stay in a bus for 5 hours, but I didn’t feel boring.
We arrived in Ottawa at 1:30PM. Ottawa was a beautiful city. It had a beautiful river in the middle of the city. We went to Ottawa Parliament. We would've like(liked) to enter the building, but there were so many people in a line in front of the building. We should’ve(had to) waited(wait) in a line about 30 minutes. We didn’t have a enough time, since we wanted to go to Tulip Festival, too. We were sightseeing the inside of the building very quickly. Even if it was a short time, we were able to see the whole scenery of Ottawa on the high floor of the building, and took some pictures.
Then, we had to run to the place we promised to meet with a tour guide. We had barely enough time to arrive in there on time. We had heard that Ottawa Tulip Festival is the biggest Tulip festival in the world. We expected to see a wide place with Tulips. But,(x) we couldn’t see. It was too far from our place. We should’ve taken a bus if we wanted to go to the biggest place. We didn’t have a enough time, so we just looked around a square near our place.
At 3:30 PM, we set off to Montreal and arrived in Montreal Hotel at 5:30 PM. We waited about 1 hours to check-in. I didn’t know the ins and outs of the situation, but probably there were some problems to make a reservation or something. I used same room with Ken and Jay. They’re both PGIC students. I recommended to go to the Crescent street for dinner by tour guide.
We went there. There were 3 Korean, 3 Japanese and 1 Chinese in our group. They were all PGIC students. Crescent street wasn't a street for dinner. It was a street for clubs or bars. It was somewhat expensive to have a dinner, but we'd have liked to enjoy the atmosphere of Montreal bar. It was a live music bar but it was too early to play a music, so we weren't able to see the live bands. But(?, I think, in this case, I should use 'but', because next sentence has a opposite context to the last sentence) we were able to have a dinner with nice atmosphere. We bought instant noodles for next day breakfast as came back to hotel. We should’ve had 11 meals during the whole travel, so we needed to save our money.
We were able go to nightclub or bar, if we want, at 10:45 PM. But we had already had a dinner in the bar, so we didn’t want to go that street again. We had a drinking party in our hotel room, instead. I had already knew 3 people in our group before I had joined the travel, but 3 people were new. It was a nice chance to meet new friends.
We wake up at 7:00 AM. next day. We had instant noodles. There were times for breakfast in our travel itinerary, and we were able to save times by having a breakfast by ourselves. Thanks to saving times, we were alble to go to Notledam Church meanwhile other people had a breakfast. I think Notledam Church is the one of a must-see place. I wasn't able to understand why there wasn’t a schedule in our itinerary for Notledame church. It was the most beautiful church, I’ve ever seen. Id have liked to stay in the church for a long time, but the schedule was quite tight, so I should’ve left church early. Then, we had a guided tour by bus. We looked around some place and had a lunch.
After lunch, we departed for Quebec city. I went to nightclub in Quebec at 11:00 PM. It was considerably nice club compared with a club in Korea. I had been to a hip-hop club once in a while in Korea, but it had been a small club. And I should’ve paid around 12 dollars for entrance fee, despite it had had just one floor with small space. The club in Quebec didn’t take a entrance fee and had three floors.
On the first floor, I was able to enjoy the live rock musics. They played famous musics like Ghost Basters and World Cup songs. I listened to the musics for a while and went to second floor. It was a place for dancing. I’m not good at dancing but I just enjoyed dancing. I’m interested in pop musics, so I was able to recognize some musics played in there. I didn’t go to a club for two and a half years, so it was fresh. The third floor was the place for watching people who were dancing on the second floor. I didn't stay in the club for a long time, but I was able to enjoy the atmosphere.
Next morning, we went to hotel buffet for breakfast. It was going to be free, but I should've paid for 10 dollars. Instead of free breakfast, we could get a chance for free riding of cruise in 1,000 islands. It was worth paying for 10 dollars. I was able to taste a variety of foods. I always had had cereals or breads for breakfast, since I came to Canada, so I had been somewhat fed up with cereals and breads. I enjoyed continental breakfast with omulet, bacon, salad, orange juice and so on.
After having a breakfast, we went to Chateau Frontenac. There was a Chateau Castle(It was a castle before, but now, it's just an expensive hotel) and beautiful streets. Honestly I had been a little bit disappointed of this travel until I came to Chateau Frontenac, because it had been just a little different from Toronto. There had been a beautiful scenery and building in Ottawa and Montreal, but it couldn't have met my expectation. As for Quebec, it was totally different from Toronto. It looked like a little Europe in Canada.
We had a free time in a treasure street after having a guided tour. The tour guide for Chateau Frontenac was really hilarious. He made us laugh with some jovial jokes. Everything was nice except weather. Frankly speaking, the weather was awfully foul. It rained heavily with strong wind. I didn't bring a umbrella and I used my friend's umbrella together. In the end of the free time, it was broken by strong wind, eventually. We were nothing but to be totally soaked walking the street.
I hanged around a treasure street. I found the church where the movie 'Catch me if you can' was filmed. The treasure street must be famous place, since it's so beautiful. I had a Quebec traditional meat for lunch. Actually it wasn't so good. It had too much seasoning. And I didn't hungry, as I had already had enough foods in the buffet for breakfast. But it was worth having a Quebc food, because probably it would be the last time to visit Quebec city for me. Anyway it was sort of stimulative.
After sightseeing the Chateau Frontenac, we went to Montmorency Falls. It was going to be a walking tour, but it rained so heavily, so we couldn't go there on foot. Some people didn't want to go out of the bus. They waited in the bus for the people who wanted to go to falls in spite of heavy rain. I'd have liked to go to falls and we used a cable car to get to the falls. Honestly, it was not so good. We dind't(didn't) have a enough time, since the people in the bus waited for us. And, above all, the Niagara Falls were much better than Montmorency Falls. What was worse, it was freezing cold. So, we stayed there for a short time.
We returned to the hotel. I was able to go to a club or a bar again, but I didn't want to go as long as it rained heavily. Instead of a club, we had a small drinking party in the room again. Next day, after checking out the hotel, we went to Montreal. We had a lunch in Montreal and had sightseeing the Montreal Observatory and the Olympic stadium for a while.
We went to kingston for 1,000 islands tour, then. There were so many islands in a small area. Some islands looked floating on the surface of the sea. We were able to ride a boat for free, since we should pay for buffet breakfast that was going to be free, before. In the boat, there were lots of Korean from Korea. They should've paid(had to pay) quite much money for short time travel(around 15 days). Compare with them, I was lucky. I paid just $299, since I set off the travel from Toronto. Staying in Toronto is a good chance to travel French Canada and Western America. We finished 1,000 Islands boat cruising in about 1 hour as a conclusion of the French Canada travel.
We came bak to Toronto around 10:00 PM. It was such a nice trip except weather. Probably I'm not able to go there again, since I want to go to many different places. It was my first long distance travel since I came to Toronto, and it gives me good experiences and memories. (In addition, pictures) I won't forget the memory of the French Canada travel.
