FUTURE RELEASES

7/22 CSS - Donkey
8/5 BRAZILIAN GIRLS - New York City
8/5 THE GRATES - Teeth Lost, Hearts Won
8/19 THE STILLS - Oceans Will Rise
8/19 THE DANDY WARHOLS - Earth to the Dandy Warhols
9/23 MOGWAI - The Hawk is Howling

NOTE: This list will be updated regularly and I'll highlight the changes in bold. To keep abreast of updates to this post, consider subscribing to this blog's RSS feed.

We woke up early on Thursday (July 3rd) and took a Metro North train up to the Hertz rental location in White Plains. Renting in the city is very expensive so we opted to take a train to the northern suburb and begin our journey from there instead. The drive north was largely uneventful. We encountered a few spatters of rain but it cleared up by the time we crossed into Canada. I was a bit concerned about the border crossing because my passport had expired, but I had my driver's license and birth certificate on hand so we made it into Canada after waiting in line for about ten minutes.

Our trip coincided with the conclusion of the International Jazz Festival so the city was a bit more crowded than usual, but it was certainly more pleasant than our last trip in February of 2007. Montreal is beautiful in the summer and we all ended up with an even more favorable impression of the city than we had last time.

Beyond a doubt, the most surprising experience of the trip occurred at La Sala Rossa, a Spanish social club on St. Laurent Boulevard. The club serves as a venue for rock concerts by night and Matt and I had checked their schedule in advance and listened to sound clips of several bands playing on Friday night. The bands were playing at the launch party of a local self-described "smut 'zine" called Lickety Split (this link is Not Safe For Work). We thought we were in for a concert but it ended up being much more. The show included some provocative dancing by a local dance group called the Dead Doll Dancers (another NSFW link) and the bathrooms were "gender neutral" meaning it was common to see members of both genders in the same bathroom. We had no idea that it was that type of concert but it ended up being pretty harmless. Oh, and the bands (The Hot Springs, On Bodies, Call me Poupee and Hollerado) were quite good.

Saturday we visited Pointe-A-Calliere, the Montreal Museum of Archeology and History. The museum building itself evokes the old Customs House which stood on the site, and is actually built over its ruins. They have a tremendous multimedia program which gives an overview of the city's history and then visitors go under the building to view the ruins of Old Montreal. It was a unique way to preserve an archeological site and it made for an interesting way to learn about the history of the city.

On Saturday evening we saw a few acts at the Jazz Festival. Rupa & the April Fishes put on a great show on Saturday night. Rupa is a beautiful singer who speaks three or four languages. The show was electric and both the band and the crowd had a great time. The next act, several crowded blocks away, was Beast. The crowd for them was much larger, but we didn't care for the music at all so we left the festival and had some drinks elsewhere.

Sunday morning we went to St. Joseph's Oratory for morning mass. The church is located on top of Mount Royal. It faces the boring side of the city but the church itself is interesting. It's actually several churches built on top of one another. The church at the top of the whole complex is built in a very modern style and involves lots of concrete. In other words, it's big but stark. We went to the English mass in the lower crypt church instead.

After mass we checked out of our hotel and headed back to New York. The return trip did not go as smoothly as the trip up. At some point before the border, as we were driving down the highway, the engine stopped. The fuel gauge indicated that we had about a quarter tank left but this was obviously not the case. We figured the fuel gauge was faulty and resolved not to trust it for the remainder of the trip. Luckily, we were only about a quarter mile from an exit which happened to have a gas station so I walked to it and brought back some gas.

With the car filled up we got back on the road and resumed our trip, thankful that the car didn't have any serious problems. However, we were foiled again when we joined a long line of cars waiting to cross the border into the United States. The U.S. Customs Officers must have been looking for some bad guys because the wait was ridiculous. We ended up spending nearly SIX HOURS in line. There was no way to pull off the road and there was no food or water to be found. Someone with bottled water walking along the highway could have made a fortune. Of course the four of us found various ways to amuse ourselves in the car and at one point I took a walk along the road out of sheer boredom.

After the interminable wait and a successful border crossing, we stopped for food at McDonald's, picked up some snacks at the wackiest convenience store I've ever seen in my life, and hopped on the interstate, thinking we'd be back in New York by 2:00 AM.

Half an hour later, in the middle of nowhere, the engine stopped and we were on the side of the road again. As it turned out, the fuel gauge had been correct all along and we had a much more serious problem than we thought. Basically, the engine was just stopping as we were driving and none of us had any idea why. Thankfully, after about ten minutes, Matt was able to start the car and we made it to the edge of Plattsburgh, NY. We stopped there and Kristin called Hertz who informed us that a new car would be sent out from Burlington, VT. Burlington is not very far from Plattsburgh. As the crow flies, it's only about 20 miles. However, because the trip involved a ferry boat ride across Lake Champlain on a Sunday night, it took THREE HOURS for the replacement car to be delivered. By this time we were feeling just plain goofy. We looked at the stars, killed mosquitoes, sat in the middle of the road and talked to a few locals (luckily for Matt, one even offered to let us use his bathroom).

At midnight, we had the new car and were back on the interstate. I let my three friends, who had to work in the morning, sleep and I drove the rest of the way back to New York City, arriving as the sun was coming up around 5:30 AM.

And that, my friends, is the story of an awesome weekend in Montreal and the arduous journey home. What did we learn from trip? Never, ever, under any circumstances, should you purchase, rent or even ride in a Chevrolet Malibu.

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The United States/Canada border up in the Boundary Waters is a strange thing. In the area that we canoed, the border ran through the middle of Crooked Lake in most cases. Of course, there were no markings in the middle of the lake to denote the invisible line, even though being on the Canadian side of the lake is technically illegal (an offense which we and others committed countless times). On land, however, the border is marked by little .2 meter tall bronze posts (photo), which look like mini obelisks and have strange markings on them. As it turns out, the bronze markers in the Boundary Waters are just one of a dozen different ways of denoting the border between the two countries.

The lack of border security became a big joke during the course of our trip as I insisted on carefully looking at each canoe we passed to make sure none contained suspicious persons. Luckily, we didn't find any. The Minnesota chapter of the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps must be doing its job.

The latest art project does not involve bright orange fabric of any kind, but is far simpler. Four large scaffolds were erected in the East River and water began flowing over them this morning. Olafur Eliasson is the man behind "New York City Waterfalls" and he intends to make people aware of the water that surrounds them. After all, four of the city's five boroughs exist on islands - a fact that many New Yorkers are oblivious to, or at least don't regularly consider. I think the project is an interesting concept and I look forward to seeing if the waterfalls live up to the hype. From what I've read so far, people seem unimpressed.

As a side note, I narrowly missed being able to see a neat art project called the Telectroscope (a "tunnel" which linked London and New York) which was just recently taken down. I won't complain too much however, because I expect the waterfalls will make for more impressive photos.

UPDATE: I almost forgot to mention another unusual art project I saw in New York back in 2005: Robert Smithson's "Floating Island".

Here comes the shameless plug...

One invaluable resource for that first trip in 1998 and the many others that followed was the website eurotrip.com. It declined a bit several years ago but they are back producing new content, including podcasts, under the leadership of my good friend Matt in New York. The forums are especially active and contain great tips and advice for traveling (on a budget) in Europe, just like I did ten years ago.

Yesterday was "Year of the Rat" night at the St. Paul Saints game. Thus, in true Saints fashion, there were a ton of gags involving rats and not just the animal. As we walked into the stadium the sides of the concourse were plastered with photocopies of famous rats. The Rat Pack got several mentions, there was a guy dressed as Benedict Arnold and the entertainers at the game frequently mentioned the type of rat that snitches and goes into the Witness Protection Program. Their favorite target however, was Norm Green. Perhaps the most hated man in Minnesota's entire 150 year history, Green was the guy that moved the North Stars hockey team to Dallas in 1993.

The most amusing moment came during the "Is it a Fish?" game, in which a fan is given a bunch of names and he has to decide if it's the name of a type of fish or not. The final name the fan had to decide on was Bonpensiero. This name sounded vaguely familiar to me, but I couldn't quite place it. Then they showed a picture of the actor Vincent Pastore and I realized that they were referring to the character Salvatore "Big Pussy" Bonpensiero from the Sopranos, who betrayed the family by becoming a rat and wearing a wire. Of course he was then murdered and tossed off Tony Soprano's boat. So, although Bonpensiero is not a type of fish, he certainly does sleep with the fishes. Ha!

I was talking with my parents tonight about how inexperienced I am with this type of travel. Sure, I've been to Europe numerous times and stayed in hotels, hostels and train station floors. I've been all over the lower 48 states by train and car. But the Boundary Waters are a part of my home state that I've never seen, and the mode of transport - canoe - is one that I have very little experience with. Fortunately, my companions are very well versed in this type of travel.

Wednesday evening I took the list of supplies that they had given me and went to REI in Bloomington, the massive outdoor supply store with the indoor climbing wall that I had never set foot in before. I ended up buying about $400 worth of supplies. This may seem like a lot, but considering that the other expenses of this trip are so low, this will end up being a pretty cheap week-long vacation. Plus, the stuff I bought (rain jacket, pants, etc.) is tough, lightweight and packs down to practically nothing so it will be nice to take with me on future trips, especially in 2010 when I plan to walk the Pilgrimage of St. James in Spain with a few family members.

Yesterday evening we got together and packed up all of our gear. This took a bit longer than I thought, mostly because there is a lot of equipment that we need to bring with us. Here I was concerned about which rain jacket to buy when there are all sorts of other items, big and small, which need to be considered as well. Thankfully, the vets have all of that stuff covered.

Once we finished packing everything up, I hoisted my pack onto a scale: 50 pounds. Now, this is quite a bit heavier than what I brought with me the last time I went to Europe, but I took a walk around the block and found the load to be manageable. Of course, I'll be plenty sore after the first couple of days, but this trip is not supposed to be a picnic. Once our jaunt around the block was complete, I was given a quick tutorial on portaging, the part of the trip which requires one member of the group to hoist the canoe over his head and walk it to the next body of water.

Now all that remains is to actually get started. I'm eager to step outside my comfort zone and experience something new. This trip may become an annual tradition, or it may just be a one time thing. Regardless, it will be a completely new experience, and that's what makes it exciting.

Here's the playlist, in the order that it's playing right now:

Rain King - Counting Crows
English Summer Rain - Placebo
Let It Rain - OK Go
Spring Came, Rain Fell - Club 8
Only Happy When It Rains - Garbage
Lightning Is My Girl - Melissa Auf Der Maur
Rain - Corrs
Raindrops + Sunshowers - Smashing Pumpkins
Rain City - Turin Brakes
Umbrella (Feat. Jay-Z) - Rihanna
Raining Again - Moby
Still Rainin' - Lang, Johnny
Steel Rain - Cornell, Chris
Are You Lightning? - Nada Surf
Lightning Crashes - Live
Dreadful Wind and Rain - Jerry Garcia and David Grisman
Rainin' - Sponge
She Gathers Rain - Collective Soul
And It Rained All Night - Thom Yorke
Dig The Lightning - Robbers On High Street
The Thunder Rolls - Garth Brooks

On Friday I'm heading to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area in northern Minnesota for a week of canoeing. This is a remote region of Minnesota up near the Canadian border which has many of Minnesota's ten thousand lakes. It will be the first time I've ever done something like this and, frankly, I'm a bit nervous. My fellow travelers have been making this trip for the past several years but I was never able to make it because I've always had other plans. Since I'm the least experienced canoeist and camper, they've done most of the planning and I simply have to follow directions which is nice. Fortunately, they've planned a route that will give me a true taste of the wilderness but also includes stops at some historic places that have Native American pictographs. They're counting on me to document the trip in photographs and there will be no shortage of photo opportunities.

In early July I'll be flying to New York then taking a road trip up to Montreal with my friends Matt, Kabrina and Kristin. We'll be spending America's Independence Day in Canada which is a bit ironic. We traveled to Montreal during the winter of 2007 but our trip was cut short by a blizzard and I was sick one of the days we were there. I'm excited to see the city in the summer this time around.

After Montreal I'll be hanging out in New York City for a week, then taking a train 100 miles north up the Hudson River to Poughkeepsie to spend a week learning about Franklin Roosevelt at his home in Hyde Park, NY. That will be followed by a second week-long history seminar in Lower Manhattan where I'll be learning about Ellis Island. The Ellis Island workshop should be particularly good because our group will be given a tour of the unseen portion of the island - the part that has all of the abandoned buildings and is completely off-limits to the public. Unfortunately, I've already been forced to sign a waiver/agreement which limits photography at these sites. This means that any photos I do take cannot be exhibited, sold or even viewed by anyone other than myself. There is nothing that bugs me more than stupid photography rules and this is definitely one of them but I'll take what little I can get in this case.

August is still up in the air right now but might include the Lollapalooza music festival in Chicago. I'd also like to visit my godmother Sherri and her husband Bruce who are in the process of moving to from Oxnard, CA to Omaha, NE as I type. There may also be some more extensive travels in Iowa if I haven't used up my travel budget by then.

Keep an eye on this space for more posts and photos throughout the summer.

I'm also going to be ditching my New York cell phone number in favor of the local 651 area code. This will be a nice change because I also got a new cell phone to go along with the new number. Despite being a bit of a tech geek, I've only ever owned one cell phone and after several years it's a bit worse for wear. I'll pass along all the technical details of the new phone in a separate entry.

Finally, I went to my first St. Paul Saints game. Someone was nice enough to hook me up with some free tickets, and despite the 35 degree weather, the game was very enjoyable. Everyone is so nice at Midway Stadium and we feasted on beer, cheese curds and hot mini doughnuts which kept us warm. There were plenty of entertainers (including a pig) and promotional games to watch between innings and the freight trains passing by beyond the left field fence give the place a nice, homey atmosphere. I'll be going to another game in a few weeks and am excited to see what the place is like when it's actually warm and full of people. I expect the atmosphere will be even better.

Like last year, I spent a few days of this long weekend with my sister-in-law's family camping down near Rochester, MN. My family never did any camping when my brother and I were kids so most of my experience comes from camping with my friend Dan. Those trips involved tents, fishing and campfires on private land owned by his family. My sister-in-law's family does things a bit differently and brings their nice camper to an actual campground with water and electric hookups. It's not quite roughing it but for someone like me, who is basically a city dweller, it's a nice mix of the comforts of home and the things that make camping enjoyable. It's also a very community-oriented type of camping. Most of my sister-in-law's family's friends spend their holiday weekend at the same campground which means that there are a lot of communal games, good conversations around the campfire and, of course, the Saturday evening pot luck where everyone brings some sort of tasty dish to share. The foods at this thing always contain either meat or potatoes (and often both) with hardly a fruit or vegetable to be seen and there are often just as many deserts to choose from as main dishes. It's a veritable feast of Midwestern cooking.

While much of our time was spent relaxing with cold beverages, I also got to spend some quality time with my brother. We both brought our baseball gloves and it was nice to throw the ball around for a bit. We also teamed up for the annual blindfolded golf cart race. In this campwide event, the driver of the golf cart wears a blindfold and attempts to drive through a course while being told where to go by the passenger. Much hilarity ensues in this event and my brother and I certainly added to it by nearly crashing into another golf cart after crossing the finish line. But, to our credit, we did manage to avoid the forest. I can't say the same for my brother's wife who somehow managed to navigate her blindfolded sister into the trees, eliciting a roar of laughter from the spectators.

Soon after the golf cart fiasco I took off the blindfold for the drive back home. Just as I neared the southern city limits of St. Paul I watched closely as the odometer on my car hit 100,000 miles, an event which I captured in photographs as I was cruising north at 65 mph. Minnesota has a new law which prohibits texting while driving but luckily it doesn't say anything about taking pictures while driving. My car has served me well for tens of thousands of miles and hitting 100,000 was pretty neat.

I'm going to wrap things up here for now but I'll be revealing my summer plans within the next few days. Stay tuned (RSS)!