Wednesday June 8th
Across the border to Canada today, at Coutts, and into Alberta.
Barn in Alberta.

There was no visible USA presence, and just one Canadian border guard who only asked where we were headed. No paperwork required. Just a stamp in our passport.
Headed through unremarkable countryside towards Calgary, and found a Lonely Planet book about Canada. We had a bit of a walk around, but we drove through most of the City Centre whilst looking for a motel so didn't really feel the need to go exploring. There wasn't really anything we were desperate to see but the place had a fairly nice feeling. Unfortunately we're a bit early for the Calgary Stampede (a rodeo and festival).

Thursday 9th June
On the "Queen Elizabeth the Second Highway" to Edmonton. Once we'd found our motel, we got on their fairly clean and efficient LRT system to get into town, and visited Churchill Square and the Alberta Legislature, as suggested by our travel guides. There doesn't appear to be much else to see, but again a very pleasant place.

Churchill Square, Edmonton

Friday 10th June
Out of Edmonton, and picked up the Yellowhead Highway - to be honest, they just give roads fancy names to give it more character, just like they do in Australia. They also do the "biggest blank in the world" to try and get you to visit their towns - we've got the biggest pysanka, biggest piggy bank, and biggest artificial mushroom to look forward to!
Got to Saskatoon to find a dearth of hotel rooms as Garth Brooks was playing in town for a week - will probably be even worse next week as Justin Bieber is playing. But we managed to find a pitch on a campsite.

Saturday 11th June
The houses are wooden clapboard and so very pretty, with mowed lawns out at the front. But they don't seem to demolish anything old - they just let it fall down on its own.

Typical rural house.

They also appear to leave old vehicles to rust at the end of their garden rather than scrapping them like we do. Or leaving them just at the exit of the town. At some places you can see the change in car design over the years by the wrecks in their yard!

Onto the Louis Riel Trail and then onto Transcanadian-Highway. We're in Sasketchewan now, and it's very English-looking - rolling fields and cattle.

Sunday 12th June
Green countryside exists due to the weather, and we got a load of it last night - thunder, lightning, heavy rain - the works. The roof tent mostly copes with it, but it's not as waterproof as it should be, letting rain in now that the mattress isn't there to soak it up properly! Bit of a design flaw I think. As most of our stuff was a bit damp, we treated ourselves to a Travelodge in Kanora, which bills itself as "the Lake of the Woods".

Monday 13th June
On to the brilliantly-named Thunder Bay in Ontario, on the shores of Lake Superior. Passed by hundreds of lakes and acres of pine forest and it's definitely the prettiest part of Canada so far. And how we both expected Canada to look like - wasn't expecting the temperature to be in the upper twenties though.

Stunning scenery in Ontario.

And again.

We were intrigued by the little piles of stones we kept seeing alongside the roads, then we found out they're called Inukshuk (in Inuit), meaning "in the likeness of a human" and the meaning is supposed to be "someone was here" or "you are on the right path". Could have done with something like that in Mongolia!

Inukshuk in Ontario

Thursday 16th June
To Toronto, passing Lake Huron, and ticked the box for going up the CN Tower, once the tallest tower in the world at 1,815.4ft.

The CN Tower, Toronto.

The city is a lovely place, and has a pretty harbour front, with lots of cafes and shops. But like many cities they hate vehicles in the middle of town, preferring to push you onto public transport instead. We both thought it reminded us of Sydney - very cosmopolitan and youthful.

Friday 17th June
To Montreal today and Lake Ontario, and it's getting very French. In the rest of Canada, although there have been areas with English and French signs, this is the first place where there are only French signs. Fortunately, all of the people we have encountered have been bi-lingual. But there are so many recognisable names - today alone we have passed by Durham, Darlington, Peterbrough, Brighton and Bewdley. But we've also seen Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, and St-Louis-du-Ha!-Ha!.

Today I tried the Canadian delicacy "poutine" - French Fries, smothered in gravy and curd cheese. Sounds wrong, but is surprisingly tasty although probably not the healthiest plateful I've ever had.

Walked towards the Old Town, and had guided tour around the Notre-Dame Basilica - very impressive, with beautiful colours on the ceiling.

Notre-Dame, Montreal

Sunday 19th June
Short drive to Quebec on motorway today. Walked to Old Town, the Old Port and then around the Citadel. The city is a lovely place, and easy to wander around. Has a lovely relaxed feel, and very cosmopolitan like Montreal, and definitely more French than English. We went on a guided tour of the Citadel which was pretty interesting.

Old Town, Quebec.

The Canadians have been lovely, but tend to be quite high on the bizarre scale sometimes - lots of heavily-tattooed young lasses, all colours of hair on all sorts of people often blue-green, and no normal dress-sense whatsoever. We've seen a young lad on the subway just stood with his hands in the air for no apparent reason. Lots of people protesting about all sorts of things. They're definitely unique. Or "quirky" as some might say.

Monday 20th June
Stopped off at Parc des Chutes de Montmorency - allegedly a higher waterfall than Niagara. Pretty impressive anyway.

Montmorency Falls, just outside Quebec.

Then on to Riviere-du-Loup, which was a lovely small town, with its own falls.

Wednesday 22nd June
We set off from Fredericton alongside the River St John - a beautiful drive. Onto Halifax.

Thursday 23rd June
Decided to get Foxtrot washed and tidied up - we've had a power-steering leak for a while, and it leaves an embarassing small stain on the road every time we park. Then we had a run to Peggy's Cove on the coast - a lovely place and apparently one of the most photograped places in Nova Scotia. The area is famed for its seafood and lobster so we thought we'd better try it, but Sod's Law intervened and the place we stopped at had only enough lobster for one meal, so Bob had haddock instead. Very nice anyway.

Lighthouse at Peggy's Cove

Peggy's Cove.