Notes et des Photos from Recent Travel

We had a great time on our recent ski trip. For the first time, Steven and I took off and spent the christmas holidays by ourselves, and didn't try to get together with family. We went to Burlington, took the ferry cross Lake Champlain, had an awesome day of skiing, but then temps rose and the rain came. At least we got one good day in. Charming as Lake Placid and Saranac Lake were in the winter rain, we donned our passports and took off to Montreal, only 2 hours north, and had a wonderful time there for a couple days. Some of the highlights:

1. our host Joel at La Loggia who delightfully peppered every english sentence liberally with donc.

2. Au Petit Extra dans Le Village. Oh la la. Everything we ate in Montreal was un plaisir gastronomique.

3. Me, walking / tumbling (but not skiing) down some of the Whiteface trails that were ALLEGEDLY blue...some portions were waaay black my ankles tell me. I stuck assiduously to the green, thereafter, donc.

4. Our beloved Marche Atwater. I could live there. The camera was dead so we didn't get any photos.

5. Listening to Steven singsong Bonjour each time we entered a shop.

6. Le Plateau and Rue St. Denis et St. Laurent, and the conspicuous, wonderful absence of corporate America in these thriving merchant areas (one can't say the same thing for indoor Montreal, the giant malls and habitrails that connect much of the city in a winter-what-winter? kind of way all along rue St. Catherine).

7. the deliciously and absurdly named "Cafe Starbucks Coffee" we encountered a couple of times. there are a few, but they haven't taken over Montreal. One more downsizing and they will be gone. Betcha.

There's much more, but i'm too ADHD at the moment. Have a look at some pics... including the Adirondacks in the Adirondacks: