Every man for himself

In order to get home to England, we first had to get back to Vancouver. Now considering Boston is on the opposite coast to Vancouver, this meant a whole day of travelling. Saying goodbye to Gav who was on his was to Toronto, myself, Simon, Andy, Ian and Liz set off by minibus to the airport. We didn't plan this out too well as we still had to travel for about an hour to get there. Then it was on the plane to Chicago, then on the plane from Chicago to Seattle. Here Simon paid extra money to get a bus straight back to Vancouver. He left us before we got our bags with the cry of "every man for himself". We made no attempt to follow as we don't like Simon.


The rest of us caught a public bus into the city and used all our remaining US money to buy a meal in a fairly posh restaurant. I'm sure they were really impressed seeing 4 people lugging large backpacks and suitcases into their restaurant and then ordering 3 starters between them.


We later got the bus back to Vancouver, then got on the skytrain and soon myself, Andy and Ian found ourselves back at the hostel where it all began. The year had come full circle. After a whole day travelling we could get some rest. Or so we thought. It turns out some French people had got into the room we were staying in and it took them about an hour to sort out another room for us. We were finally given a room with another old man who smelled heavly of cigarettes. Although he was a lot more pleasant than the old man who stayed in the room the next night. He was a racist hells angel who had been in hospital after hitting a moose.


Even though we were only back for a few days there was still time for more exciting adventures. After getting our bags stored in my old home, we bid a final farewell to Shuji. On the bus ride back, a police car suddenly pulled up infront of the bus and armed officers got on looking for three young males. Fortunately it wasn't us and three other young males were physically removed from the bus, thrust onto the ground outside and cuffed. One of them was valiantly trying to pull up his oversized jeans that had slipped down his legs.


That evening we met up with the fellow BUNAC members left in Vancouver at our favourite bar, The Kings Head.


Hey it's everyone for one last time. Except Keenie who's been cut off the side of the picture. Some would argue that just makes it better


To say a final farewell to Vancouver myself, Andy and Ian went on a bus tour round the city to say one last goodbye to some of our favourite places.


Goodbye Gastown. We even made one last stop to the Old Spaghetti Factory


Goodbye Dunismuir Street and all it had to offer


Goodbye Vancouver art gallery


Goodbye Granville Island


Goodbye Stanley Park


Goodbye building with green roof used as the vampire's lair in the short lived Blade tv series


Goobye Vancouver


The next day I waved goodbye to Chris, Ian and Andy as they caught their taxi to the airport. After returning from the shop I found Keenie wandering around the hostel. "Where is everyone" he said in a panic. He later rushed off to the bus stop. I'm sure he made his flight.


The day after that I met Simon at the airport and we finally left, we were on our way back to England. But no, even though we had left Canada the journey was still not over. There was still one night in London before we would have to say goodbye.

Where everybody knows your name

Perfectly timed for my 100th blog post, sees the last stop on our mammoth trip around North America. We arrived in Boston exhausted but sad as soon we would be going home. We didn't do too much, but did manage to visit the inspiration for the Cheers bar, get caught in a rainstorm looking for the site of the Boston tea party and saw some ships. Exciting stuff eh.


Fenway Park, home of the Boston Red Sox, a professional rounders team. Simon went to see them play on his own as we don't really like him


Where's this?


It's the Cheers bar, still no sign of Fraiser though


Another Chinatwon, I don't think we went in this one, you've seen one Chinatown you've seen them all


A big building. Don't really know what it is, so I'll just make something up. Inside this building live an elite squad of crime fighting chimpanzees. They travel the world in their magic space ship battleing the forces of evil to save the human race


A graveyard, full of dead bodies


A street in Boston with people and shops, be amazed


We went to see some ships. Here is a cannon. It would have been used to find heavy projectile balls at enemy ships, in order to sink them. Crazy idea


USA, USA, USA


With no tower, or mountain to climb you'll have to see the city from the ship


The ship itself, made Boston all worth it


That was Boston, impressed aren't you. But the trip wasn't over yet. There was still a few days left to say goodbye to Vancouver. This involved more crazy old men hostel guests, an armed police bus raid and one last trip to the old spaghetti factory

Crinque

Montreal followed New York as we ventured back into Canada. But this wasn't the Canada we had grew to love... here they spoke French. Luckily for us though, everyone pretty much spoke English as well, so no effort had to be made.

Before we get to Montreal a special mention must be made for the food on the train journey. It was served by a Chinese man who just seemed to shout at you like you'd done something wrong, but to be fair he was very efficient. Unofortunately for Ian and Simon they decided to buy the sandwiches which weren't just wet, but actually soaking. It was like someone had held them in a vat of grease and then packaged them up.

Moving beyond soggy sandwiches Montreal seemd to be a nice place. We didn't do too much as fatigue set in. Fortunately Montreal proved to be one of the places I was clean shaven and was unable to partake in the French beard/moustache combo that the others will now model for you.


Monsieur Bull, looking distinguished as usual


Monsieur Pope, in a slighlty homo erotic pose. Any excuse to show his untanned upper body


Monsieur Farthing, not your typical look for a North East boy


Monsieur Hodge, a new variation on the trucker look


The inspiration for the new looks, although one with more style


The Notre Damn Cathedral. Unfortunatley there was no hunch back. Couldn't even laugh at Keenie as he was on the train somewhere


Celine Dion got married in this cathedral, one of Andy's favourite recording artists


Everything in the cathedral was made of wood. Just like Tom Hanks performance in the Davinci code


Candles in a cathedral full of wood. That doesn't sound like a good idea. What if someone...


Ah ha take that Cathedral. If only Celine Dion was inside


With no tower to climb we made do with Mont Royale to give us our view of the city. They all look the same really don't they


vous et votre équipage entier êtes morts


That evening saw us go on the hostel pub crawl. We made lots of new friends, Brazil guy, Swiss guy, Korean guy, Abitron, horseface, Welsh medical students and the scary German guy. He's been to the one pub in Birmingham.


Andy looking worse for wear. He'd pick up soon though


Me and two of the welsh medical students


Chris arrived in Montreal having spent more money on a two week Canadian buss pass than we'd spent on a month long Amercian rail pass. Fool


Yes, that is your shirt Andy, put it back on for everybody's sake


Our hostel room, from every angle it's...

...a complete mess


The following day is probably best forgotten. We had an awful lunch, spent ages walking to a water park to find it was all pretty much closed and then I can remember going to bed.

Next it was the last new stop on the trip, Boston. Don't worry though, there's still the return to Vancouver and London to go.

Hey you, don't come back to New York

The next stop on our trip (how many more are there?) was a little known place called New York. I was initially unimpressed as unlike it's English counterpart, it contained no Yorvick Viking Centre. It did however contain many other things that no matter how impressive, could never match the thrill of sitting in a cart as you went round on rails to witness the wonders of York in the Viking age.

Apart from the pictures you are about to see we also went to see The Producers on Broadway. However to see the definitive production of this I must now fly to las Vegas to see the Hoff perform as gay director Roger Dubruis. The Hoff in a dress, the Hoff singing springtime for Hitler, surely the greatest thing in the world.

There were other things such as getting lost after getting off the subway. From this I discovered that spending 15 minutes walking around a dodgy area of New York late at night is not fun. But for the main enetertainment just look below.


springfield, springfield
it's a hell of a town
the schoolyard's up
and the shopping malls down
springfield, springfield
springfield, springfield
new york, new york
new york is that-a-way man
thanks k




Can't remember what this was called. Looks kind of stupid though. Perhaps it was one of their gods. New Yorkers were very primitive people

A more familiar and better looking view

Greed is good

New York wasn't very technologically adavanced. They still used ships with sails

Brooklyn Bridge. Named as it is a bridge that goes to brooklyn. Genius!


The massage chairs. Some people look too relaxed

Home of Donald Trump. He may have millions of dollars but I have the ability to grow my own hair

USA, USA, USA...

A time of rebuilding

Graffiti, New York style. Much like everywhere else then


Times Square. Couldn't find a clock anywhere

Sensory overload

Dark, gothic, stylish


It was in central park that Keenie left us for his epic train journey back to Vancouver. He was missed... only kidding, I hardly realised he wasn't there


The asylums day out went with little trouble


The Empire State building, famous for King Kong's death and endless ques

The closest to a giant gorilla I could find at the top

It's easy to see why Kong didn't survive. It's a long drop

New York in all it's glory

This thin building can be seen in Spiderman 2. More movie trivia

Grand Central Station. Another symbol of how unpatriotic Americans
can be


Does exactly what it says on the tin

Times Square at night, too many lights, flashing signs... can't handle it, aaarrrgggghhhh


And so that was New York. The next stop saw us head back to Canada, but this time to Montreal where you can look forward to silly beards, a cathedral and a pub crawl. Oh, and a surprise visit from another BUNAC member. But before we left New York we were given a nice send off by a homeless person in the metro. "Hey you, don't come back to New York" he said. But what was really nice about it was that he said it to each and everyone one of us. It's nice to see he made the extra effort.