Sacré Bleu!!

The Best Place I've Ever Camped

Traveling in America's Hat.

What is it about Canada? How come no one really goes there? The truth, for most New Englanders at least, is that Canada is no more than a 4 or 5 hour drive away from us at most. Yet for some reason, generally speaking, no one really ever goes there. Yes you can give the passport excuse, and while valid, it doesn't exactly account for why you didn't go there before you needed one. And honestly it's really not that hard to get a passport nowadays. If you've got $100 and an hour you can get one, and you probably should. But I'm not quite sure why no one thinks to go to Canada. It's a whole different country, in fact Quebec which is directly north of us, speaks French as a national language. It's the closest you're going to get to Europe without actually going, to well, Europe. Most of us either know someone, or have ourselves been to Montreal before. After all the drinking age is 18 which is reason enough to have taken a trip there to spend $18 on a pitcher of Bud Light because you didn't know any better. But there are a lot of other places within a reasonable driving distance worth traveling to in Canada, and last weekend I had the opportunity to visit one such place, Quebec City. I'll admit it was one of the hardest times I've had convincing anyone to come on a trip before, mostly because no one had ever herd of the place and partially because I didn't really have much of a plan going into it, and "just trust me" wasn't cutting it.
I don't know if any of you follow Red Bull, but they are a pretty amazing company. Not only do they give you wings but they also sponsor some of the coolest events on the planet. I'm sure most of you are familiar with last years Red Bull Stratos, which broke the world record for the longest freefall, BUT they also host a multitude of other extreme and downright badass events including cliff diving, Skiing, BMX, Stunt Plane, and an almost never ending list of other competitions. It just so happened that one of these, Red Bull Crashed Ice, was taking place in Quebec City this month, so the opportunity to knock off a bucket list item (attend a Red Bull event) and explore a new city, was too good to pass up. And luckily once again I've got some kick-ass friends who helped turn this idea into a reality (Patrick and Mark). So we rocketed 6 1/2 hours up to Quebec on a Friday morning to begin what was to be quite an interesting trip.
Everyone really does speak French there and it wasn't long before our twenty-something male brains were in an immature paradise filled with comical french accents and hilarious words. But to be fair, a country who's most popular gas station store is called Couche-Tard, is asking for it.
Canada largely isn't exactly known for their food and beer superiority, but if you take the time to do some research before you go, you can find some pretty decent places. Yelp and Trip Adviser are great resources for any trip and you should be able to get some good suggestions just by typing in your destination. Its quite challenging to find good places when everything is in French but we were able to find some good breweries in the area and a few decent spots to eat, Mainly La Korrigane, La Pape Georges, and Pub Le Mitan.
Along with the Crashed Ice event, which if I can sum it up into one sentence would be: A gigantic party filled with boose, neon lights, Dubstep, 100,000 people, and one awesome downhill Ice Skating track full of dudes cruising at no-tomorrowish speeds though a glorified castle town. The short version: It. Was. Awesome. I also got the opportunity to put the boots to good use and went on a frozen hike to Montmorency Falls, an 84 meter (or for us normal people 275ft) tall waterfall. That's roughly 100ft taller than Niagara Falls. It was a great hike that culminated with us sitting a few feet away from the base on a dome formed by the freezing of mist crashing off of the falls. Quite a spectacular view in which we were completely dwarfed by the falling water.
All and all a great trip, and Canada has yet again surprised me. Go visit. Besides being our hat, Canada has a lot to offer. Enough so that I might even be able to forgive them for Justin Bieber.

I also did another moderate hike at Ravenswood Park, in Gloucester MA. Pretty standard hike, nothing much to report. Cheers!

Milage: 8 Miles

Just a little guy.

Crashed Ice!

Bad Dudes.

Obligatory photo of Myself.

Over the Falls.

Illuminated Tree.

Waterfall Bridge.

The Gang.

Some Chap.

Flip Flip Flipadelphia!

Hey guys, I'm sure at this point everyone is thoroughly enjoying the cold weather and 16 hours of darkness a day. I know I am. This time of the year is a huge drag on the blog, and I always come up short on posts due to not really having much of a chance to get out there and hike. I would however like to correct that this year and I'm working on some ideas for ways to keep the blog supplied with plenty of new posts over the next few months, so keep checking back in for updates.
A few weeks ago (almost 2 months at this point) I went down to Philadelphia to visit one of my good friends. We were only there for three days but I'm confident in saying that I got a completely fulfilling tour of the city and what it had to offer. It was less of the traditional trip I usually post here on Wanderlust and more of a fast tracked episode of No Reservations sans Anthony Bourdain. We toured Independence Hall, saw the Liberty Bell and Benjamin Franklin's grave, then separated from every seventh grade class in America and explored the rest of the city. I'm notorious for making "Top Five" lists for just about eveything you can possibly think of so instead of talking about everywhere we went I'm gonna give you
Wanderlust's Top Five of Philly:

1. The 700 Club  is a night club with two floors, the first being a full bar with a generous amount of beers on tap. But it's the second floor that made me decide to put it on the list, it's set up as an old house with the bar in the kitchen, the dance floor in the dinning room and the DJ in the bathroom. It's a unique set up and is worth visiting.
2. The Foodery  is a deli/liqueur store with a selection of  over 800 beers from around the world on sale. The kicker? The beers are purchased À la carte and can be drank in the attached sitting area. Awesome.
3. The Shubin Theater,which puts on some kick ass improv shows, is definitely worth checking out.
4. Yards Brewery brews up some pretty tasty beers with names like "General Washington's Tavern Porter" and "Poor Richards Tavern Spruce" that pay tribute to Philadelphia's butt-load of American History. Oh and they also have an oversized bar with tabletop shuffleboard and some awesome artwork. Check. It. Out. 
5. Fairmount Park , the place where we hiked was great. It's located just outside of Downtown Philadephia and it does a great job of not showing it. It's quiet, has a ton of trails, the Schuylkill river flows through it, and it's easily accessible, making it a great place to do a bit of hiking if you're looking for some less metallic scenery. We did a small loop inside the park on our last day in the city and it was a great way to end the trip.

Runner up: Reading Terminal Market, a Market place in the heart of Philly with tons and tons and tons of things to buy and places to eat. Oh and it was on Man Vs. Food. Enough said. Try Dinic's.
So there is my Top Five, there is a ton of things to do and see in Philly, obviously, so if you get the chance to visit I would highly recommend it. While you're there though try not to hang out with anyone under a bridge, you might have to pay the troll toll. A special thanks to Erin Pitts for being a great friend and host/tour guide for our stay. 

Mileage: 2 Miles

Chub Toad.

Schuylkill river.

Weird Bugs.

 

Mt. Liberty

This past Columbus Day weekend I headed up to the White Mountains with a few good friends for a weekend of camping and hiking, during arguably the best weekend for fall foliage. Unfortunately the weather wasn't exactly the best, but that didn't stop us from doing everything we set out to do. As a precursor to this post, I'm moving and I've had very little free time in the past couple of weeks, and while I know I need to write some posts before the memory of the trips start to fade, I'm lazy and this post will prob suffer due to that. While we hiked a few short side trips along the Kancamagus highway, the main event was Mount Liberty, part of the Franconia ridge, which I've been somewhat obsessed with this past year as I've done Lincoln, Lafayette, Garfield, and now Liberty, along this ridge. The hike up wasn't too bad in my opinion (although a few members of the group might beg to differ a bit) we took the Liberty Springs trail up, not too steep and the rain held up for the most part as we made our way to the summit. While the main allure of hiking a mountain is for the incredible views at the top, there is still something to be said about a summit surrounded by fog, which is good because since it was in the clouds we couldn't see jack shit. After eating some heavily processed, loosely deemed chicken products and 3 pounds of golden grahams the rain picked up quite a bit and we were forced to make our way down the mountain. Now a hike in the rain sounds awful, but with the proper gear it isn't all that bad, but if your rocking some homemade jorts, a band tee shirt, and Wal-Mart brand boots it can be the worst experience ever, just ask Patrick. Although the jorts could have been replaced with a open-assed kilt, it probably wouldn't have made much of a difference, and needless to say by the time we made it back to the car, people were ready to go. After getting back we booked it to Oktoberfest at Loon Mountain, pounded some beers on empty stomachs that had just hiked 9 miles and swerved our way over to the Woodstock Inn for some dinner and further drinks, the best end to a day of hiking in the rain you could possibly ask for. The Woodstock Inn is perhaps the best restaurant I have even eaten at, and I've done so every time I've been hiking up there for this blog. I may or may not have already spoken about this place, but I don't care. Go there. Eat some damn meatloaf. Smile. Pass out. Thank me later. And if you don't like meatloaf, well then, get the hell out of here. I'm sure they make good Apple-tini spiced baby sauce that you might enjoy better. All and all awesome weekend with some good friends. Camping is just awesome, and it is possible and enjoyable to do so after Labor day, just as long as you don't wear white. Cheers!

Mileage: 9 Miles

Victors.

Gothic Peak.

Fall Awesomeness.

Strike a pose.

Fall is good.

"That's water"