It's been a busy weekend, but I don't seem to have a lot of photos to show for it!
Friday night, I took part in "Tour la Nuit", a night-time bike ride, where they close off a whole bunch of streets, and do a group ride. It was a perfect night for it, clear and mild!
They were expecting 15,000 riders, and I would venture to guess that there were a lot more!! The (somewhat blurry) photo above is just a very small part of the line-up before the ride - that crowd went all the way around a large park, and up some of the side streets. The ride was 20km long, and by the time we (a friend from work & I) got past the start (1-1/2 hours after the first riders), the first riders were already finishing! So, in effect, there was a pretty full street all the way around the course. Great fun!
There was a day-time ride today, 52km long, where they typically have 30,000 riders - I didn't go on that one.
Friday night, I took part in "Tour la Nuit", a night-time bike ride, where they close off a whole bunch of streets, and do a group ride. It was a perfect night for it, clear and mild!
They were expecting 15,000 riders, and I would venture to guess that there were a lot more!! The (somewhat blurry) photo above is just a very small part of the line-up before the ride - that crowd went all the way around a large park, and up some of the side streets. The ride was 20km long, and by the time we (a friend from work & I) got past the start (1-1/2 hours after the first riders), the first riders were already finishing! So, in effect, there was a pretty full street all the way around the course. Great fun!
There was a day-time ride today, 52km long, where they typically have 30,000 riders - I didn't go on that one.
On Saturday, we took a drive east along the south shore of the St Lawrence river, and saw some charming villages! However, the road there, though quite narrow, had normal speed limits (90km/h in the country, 50km/h in the villages), and was quite busy, so we felt a bit rushed, trying to avoid being "that driver" backing up traffic, so my photography was pretty hampered. It was very enjoyable though!
One interesting stop we made was the village of Verchères where we found this statue of Madeleine, a 14 yr old girl who, in 1692, took command of Fort de Verchères, and together with her two younger brothers, an old servant, and two soldiers, managed to defend the fort against an attack by the Iroquois for 8 days. Our main question was "WHERE WERE HER PARENTS AND THE OTHER SOLDIERS!?!?!?!"
Saturday evening, we went to friends of ours at the west end of the island of Montreal, for a delicious dinner, and to watch the Canucks beat Boston. It was a great evening! Two more wins for the Stanley Cup!!! GO CANUCKS!!!! (and next year, GO JETS GO!!!!)
On the way there, we snapped some pics of the construction site where I'm working. Sure looks like a forest of cranes there! One more is still to come, making a total of 10. The concrete work is just reaching ground level at some parts of the building.
Today we went to see a 'performance art' feature called "Bodies in Urban Spaces", which involved a bunch of people jamming themselves into parts of buildings, in some very unusual positions!
We were a whole bunch of spectators (around 1000) following them around town for a little over an hour - they would do a position, and then as soon as the spectators moved on, they would run ahead and get into another position. One of those very unusual events that we keep coming across in Montreal! Such jois de vivre!
There were around 20 performers, and they got a good workout - I hope they got massages and chiropractor treatments after that!!
6 comments:
No kidding...where were her parents? Although I'm pretty sure that Emeth could take out some Iroquois at age 2.
And seriously, some of those people look like stuffed Halloween yard decorations stuck in those buildings.
Sheri-Lee
That's hilarious! I saw a person stuffed into a building here once, but no one enjoyed it.
Heh, L, yeah, some people don't 'stuff' well.
S-L, I came *this* close to poking the guy sticking out in the air at an angle, cuz he looked so fake.
There were 17,000 riders on Tour la Nuit. And 25,000 on Sunday for the 52km ride.
How do you get Emeth to go to bed on time, if you're afraid he could take out a bunch of warriors?!?
He knows that I have personally taken out an entire tribe of warriors...so he minds me well. :)
Sheri-Lee
My buddies & I often wedge our selves in buildings & stuff. Jim
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