Maine via Salem

Saturday we drove 40 minutes North to Salem - the infamous witch town. It turns out that the witch craft was a whole lot of hysteria and there was no witch craft - surprise!

We visited the Witch Dungeon Museum, which wasn't really a museum at all, but had reconstructed the cells that the accused would have been held in back in those days, some smaller than a phone booth! In total, 19 people were hung and one man crushed to death all accused of witchcraft.

A scene from the Witch Dungeon of a man being crushed to death for witchcraft.

After Salem, we drove another 2 hours North to Portland, Maine. Portland was a really cute town. We stopped and had some lunch and a browse around, before taking a scenic drive another 1 hour north.

We got home fairly late, so after a yummy bowl of Pho we went to bed.

Sunday morning we went for a drive to Cambridge to have a look at Harvard University and Harvard Square. From here we went to the oldest baseball stadium in the USA - home of the Boston Red Sox.

Ted Williams - one of the best ever players for Boston Red Sox

Fenway Park - Home of the Boston Red Sox and the oldest baseball field in the USA.

After another stroll through Little Italy, and purchasing some yummy cheese and antipasto, we made the 8 hour drive home.

Cheers!

Thursday afternoon we drove 8 hours to Boston, Massachusetts.
Friday morning we spent the day walking the Freedom Trail - a trail through Boston that links the revolutionary historical sights. The day looked so nice, that we didn't take our winter jackets - big mistake! Although sunny, it was freezing! Anyway, the trail starts in Boston Common - Americas' oldest public gardens (which are over 100 years older than Australia!). We made our way via ancient graveyards, the town hall, to the downtown market place.

Paul Revere - one of the founders of the American Revolution. His house is also the oldest house still standing in Boston (1680).

We browsed around and stopped at the replica 'Cheers' bar, that the TV show Cheers is based around. We kept walking through the Northern end of town, otherwise known as Little Italy (which hosts the oldest tavern and restaurant in the USA), through to the Bunker Hill Monument. We climbed 294 stairs to the top for an awesome view of the city.

Bunker Hill Monument

We then walked back to the harbour front in search of a seafood restaurant being that it was good Friday. We had the best clam chowder ever which is served at all the Presidential conventions. $100 later, we walked to the original Cheers bar for a few more drinks (via a couple of Irish pubs to get out of the freezing cold).

Where's Wally? Ryan with the Cheers gang

We then went back to the food markets downtown (via some more Irish Pubs) and had a lobster bisque bread bowl for dinner.
We saw another bar was having an Easter egg hunt and 2 Playboy Bunnies, so we went there after dinner for more drinks (it was an expensive day!). In the end, the Playboy girls were quite average, we had no money and couldn't be bothered waiting for the Easter egg hunt, so we caught the subway home.

Later that night...

Wardy had a little spewy!

Trono

This weekend we ventured North, across the border (via some very friendly customs people - note the sarcasm) to Trono. We left home at about 8am Saturday morning and arrived at our very swish hotel, the Marriott - which we got for an absolute bargain - at 11am. We walked through town, and went to Chinatown for some lunch, including good old dumplings. Toronto's Chinatown is the largest in North America. After we stuffed ourselves silly, we made our way to the CN Tower - the tallest free standing building in the world.

Ryan in front of CN Tower

Firstly, we went up an elevator that looks outside as you go up - this took us up 342m to a lookout with some amazing views. There was also a glass floor that looked straight below you.

Kristy on the glass floor of CN Tower

Next we went up to a height of 447m to the worlds highest man made observation gallery for 360 degree views for up to 260km away.

View from CN Tower

We then went to look at Fort York, a fort that was built in the 1700's for battles, but it was really boring. So we stopped off at a bar for a couple of drinks.

A policeman of horseback booking a car - would love to have seen that chase!

We then thought we would head down to Air Canada Stadium to try and score some tickets to the sold out ice hockey game - Toronto Maple Leafs V Pittsburgh Penguins. We approached some scalpers. A crowd of them hovered around us until they realised we weren't prepared to pay $500 for tickets! We settled for watching the game at a bar.
After a few drinks, we caught the underground subway home.

Sunday we caught the subway to some markets downtown only to realise they were closed Sundays. So we walked through PATH - Toronto's underground network - to get to the Kensington Markets across the other side of town.

PATH facts:
* PATH is the largest underground shopping complex with 27 km of shopping arcades.
* More than 50 buildings/office towers are connected through PATH. Twenty parking garages, five subway stations, two major department stores, six major hotels, and a railway terminal are also accessible through PATH.
*There are more than 125 grade level access points and 60 decision points where a pedestrian has to decide between turning left or right, or continuing straight on.

We walked through the markets, then caught a Street Car (tram) and the subway to the top of town to Casa Loma - a castle in the middle of town.

Casa Loma

Casa Loma was built for a local Canadian man, and completed construction in 1914. It cost $3.5 million and took 300 men 3 years to construct . We got to explore secret passageways, towers and an 800ft underground tunnel that led to the stables. It was pretty cool. Turns out the guy who owned it went bankrupt and now the council own the property.

After a pizza for lunch we drove back home (via the even friendlier Customs people).

Erie News Just In....

This weeks breaking news story is about an Erie man who was arrested for abusing a 1 year old child. The child was walking through the house with a knife. The man took the knife off her and threated to cut her with it. The police were called and he was arrested. What the???

If I Could Turn Back Time......

Saturday was a really cool day. We drove to Cleveland, Ohio about 1 3/4 hours away. We got out and had a walk through the city. There is too much doing in Cleveland, except for sports. The were massive sports stadiums everywhere, and these things were huge (put Marathon Stadium to shame)!

It was then another 1 hour drive south, on the hunt for some Amish people. Ohio has the densest population of Amish people. The first county we went to, we didn't have much luck spotting any, so we pulled over and had a buffet full of traditional Amish flavours.

After lunch we drove about another hour - suddenly Ryan spotted a horse and buggy out the corner of his eye! It was Amish people at a service station. We stalked these poor people and done laps around the servo. Kristy Ward (PI) wasn't on her game though and missed some good photo opportunities. We weren't sure if we were going to see any more. So we kept driving along and all of a sudden - BAM! They were coming out of the woodwork! We saw lots of Amish people walking the streets, driving their horse and buggies and working in their yards.

Amish people on their horse and buggy

Next on the agenda was Ashtabula County - a region bordering Pennsylvania and Ohio, and renowned for its covered bridges. The bridges were just like in the movies (like Beetle Juice) and were awesome. We were a bit worried that some of them were going to collapse underneath us!

Covered Bridge

If you squint, you can see Kristy in front of the bridge

The Best Bar in the Whole World

Friday night after Ryan finished work we went to a bar for a few drinks. Turns out we arrived for Happy Hour. Happy Hour was half price drinks and a free buffet!!!! We had 6 drinks and dinner for $10! What a great bar! Think it will become our Friday night local, although Tuesday is all you can eat wings........

Fireworks Night

Last week we went to the local fireworks store. We were browsing the goods and the attendant came up and asked us if we would like some help. We said that we were just looking. He asked us if we were from out of town. When we told him we were, he took us out to the 'back' room where all the good fireworks were. We left with a big packet of Roman Candles costing around $12.

Kristy, cheryl and Casey about to let some crakers off

Friday night we decided to let some off.

We also had a chew on some chewing tobacco pouches (another freeby from St Patricks Day). The pictures below tell you just how good it tasted. Yummo!

I'm Bringing Sexy Back - Yeah!

Monday night we went and saw Pink and Justin Timberlake in Pittsburgh. We drove 2 hours and eventually found a park after we got through the traffic.

First up was Pink - she was fantastic and put on a really good show.

Next up was JT. We, well I (Kristy) was sooo excited! Justin wsa great too, although the slow songs went for a bit too long, but overall he was tops! He can almost hit those high notes as well as he can dance - and he is a bloddy good dancer!

He even had a back up dancer that looked just like Rhiannon!

It was an awesome night, and the concert didnt finish until 1130pm. We were then gridlocked in a carpark for about 1/2 hour until we left through the entry. We arrived home at 230am.