Tag Archives: three wheeler

Monday 17th August 2015 – LAST NIGHT …

… could have been a night just as good as the previous one, and that’s exactly how it was heading. And then it all came to a sudden halt at 01:30, for Bane of Britain here had forgotten to switch off his European alarms.

If I had had a quid for every time that I’ve done that while I’ve been in North America I would be dictating this to half a dozen secretaries draped all over my knee and thereabouts. You would think that I would have learnt by now, wouldn’t you?

To make matters worse, I was away with the fairies somewhere at the time, and by the time I’d composed myself afterwards, it had all gone.

I was still up before the alarm at 06:00 (I’m doing my best to keep to some kind of semblance of time) and after breakfast cracked on with a few things.

And here I am, on the bus heading towards the railway station. First stop is Namur and the Walmart, which comes up with a cap at $5:00, a big bottle of water, and 150 sheets of A4 paper at just $0:10 in the back to school bargain sale and you can’t say fairer than that. A useful thing to have around seeing as how I’ve forgotten my graph paper.

Back on the metro to Berri-UQAM and the long long walk to the coach station to buy my ticket for Florenceville tomorrow. $114 – arrgghh – and that’s with the senior citizens discount too. Heaven alone knows what it might have been at full price. But with 10.5 hours on the bus (changing at Riviere du Loup) it’s not really all that bad, I suppose. But 22:30 I leave, 09:00 on Wednesday I arrive – I am not looking forward to this, but since they ripped up all of the trains there isn’t much of an alternative.

So I had a really good chat to Rachel on the phone, giving her enough advance warning so that she can flee the country, and then a wander through all of the galleries – or, at least, as many as I could find. It’s cooler in there than outside.

That cheap technology shop near the railway station had nothing of interest although I did start to notice in one or two places that Government energy stickers are slowly starting to appear in the shops. A sign of the times, hey?

new ford transit montreal quebec canadaAnd look at this! This is not a new Ford Transit but a replacement for the Ford F-series panel vans. And if you are wondering why many of the very useful white-van-man features of the previous Ford Transit have mysteriously (and surprisingly) disappeared from the new version on sale in Europe, then look no further.

They don’t have white-van-man in North America. His equivalent over here drives a 4×4 pick-up and that’s where you will find the interesting bits and pieces. White vans here are just used for furniture removals and parcel deliveries and a little bit of urban maintenance and so are a completely different breed.

So if any North American has had a hand in designing the new Transit, that will explain why, as far as facilities go, the new Transit is essentially a backward step. I’m convinced that Transits of the model such as Caliburn
 actually had a white-van-man on the design committee and it’s sad that Ford Europe doesn’t have the muscle to have pushed forward their observations to whoever was on this global design panel.

Abandoning another good rant for now I head off down the rue St Catherine where there’s a big new shopping mall type of place on the right as you go down the hill. All clean and bright, with a Subway sandwich place down in the basement. Ahh! Lunch!

fountain food court shopping mall rue st catherine montreal quebec canadaAnd for the first time ever, since I’ve been visiting a Subway, when I asked the Serving Wench for my 12-inch with just crudites (yes, if it’s crudities you want, then I’m your man) she did not ask me if I wanted cheese with it. I made a comment about it, to which the aforementioned replied "well, I’ve been working here for quite a few years now so I’m used to it"

They had a fountain here too so I took a photo of it seeing as how pretty it looked, and as soon as I had started to leave, it erupted, so I came back for another photo.

giant chess board rue st catherine montreal quebec canadaBack outside and down the street they had the giant chessboards out again and so I watched 3 or 4 games in the company of a woman, and we were exchanging comments about the games. One game was ultra-defensive and everyone lost interest after a while, including the two players who abandoned the match.

Another one was however quite exciting. It was a younger girl against an older man and was played in what you might call something of an aggressive spirit, swinging like a pendulum from one way to the next as they traded piece for piece. She made a couple of moves that had mystified me, but then suddenly she caught his king in a trap against her pawns. By this time he just had his king and a knight and she a bishop (or fou as they are called in French, so I discovered) and a king, and they both had four pawns each.

What helped my concentration was that there was an ice-cream parlour right next door, and I can thoroughly recommend the coconut milk sorbet.

Further down the road in St Catherine Est I came across a bookshop selling second-hand books and CDs and so that’s me spent up yet again for another year.

chapel of notre dame de lourdes rue st catherine montreal quebec canadaThe Chapel of Notre dame de Lourdes was erected to the glory of Mary so we are told (but just WHAT is the Glory of Mary?) thanks to the generposity of the local people.

However that generosity does not extend to giving out help to those who ask for it. There’s a big sign outside saying that it is forbidden to solicit alms either outside or inside the Chapel.

Just what kind of Christians are these?

three wheeled batmobile rue st catherine montreal quebec canadaMy reverie was interrupted by the rather bizarre noise of something different coming down the street. Luckily I had my camera to hand to photograph it.

I couldn’t get close enough to this to see what it was, which was a shame, but it looked very much like a three-wheeled batmobile to me. It bore something of a close resemblance to The White Swan that we saw on the Saguenay Ferry in 2011.

3725 rue st denis montreal quebec canadaI had my falafel for tea as well. I walked right up the bank to the rue Sherbrooke and then rue St Denis to where I had had my tea one night in 2014.

Just up the road from here is this magnificent building, the address of which is 3725 rue St Denis, and one day I’ll find out much more about it. It has to be something quite important or have an interesting history.

The metro from Sherbrooke brings me all the way round to the metro DuCollege, and then back on the bus. And I ended up being guide to a couple of French tourists from Picardy on the same bus who were trying to find their hotel.

I had a shower, for by this time I was steaming and then to bed for my last night for a while in Montreal.

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Monday 9th September 2014 – HALL TOWERS …

eric hall mars hill road upper knoxford new brunswick canada… is looking rather worse for wear these days. It seems that a little bit more of the gable roof has disappeared. So much for my plans to donate it to a worthy cause. I tried several of these historic villages to see if anyone wanted it, but no-one did, even if I offered to pay the transportation.

I only hope that if it does fall right down, it’ll fall across the border into the USA. Usually I seem to be able to attract trouble without going out to look for it, so a frontier incident or border war should be right up my street.

Talking of frontier incidents and border wars, last night I was working for the STIB – the Société de Transports Intercommunale de Bruxelles as a bus driver. They started me off on an easy route, just following one main road, but even I managed to complicate matters and deviate from the plan … "no surprise there " – ed.

The next day they were planning to send me out driving the route 23. I’ve no idea where that goes to but last night in the Land of Nod it was the bus that hugged the roads back and to across the linguistic frontier between Flanders and Wallonie. That was a route that was the subject of endless confrontations between drivers and the public as a French-speaking driver would be harassed by the Flemish and a Flemish driver would be harassed by the Walloons, and there was no way of having a typical Belgian compromise and splitting the route. Putting an Anglophone driver on the bus would be a red rag to everyone.

However the depot where the 23 was garaged was also the subject of complications. It was far too small for the purpose of garaging the buses that were needed in the vicinity – just an island dividing two carriageways, but neither the Flemish or Walloon communities would agree to its expansion or its displacement elsewhere as it would give some kind of advantage to the other community.

Sounds just like real Belgium, doesn’t it?

saint john river florenceville new brunswick canadaRegular readers of this rubbish will not need to be told where the Saint John River might be. It’s in a steep-sided valley, and although it is nothing like as steep as the valley of the Sioule near home, it’s steep enough and you’ll be able to guess quite easily.

Yes, it was cold during the night and when I took this photo, at about 08:30, it was a mere 7°C.

I went to see the guy who was supposed to be looking for a vehicle for me, and his (rather predictable, I’m afraid) response was “ohh, I forgot all about you after a month or so”. It seems that it’s too much like hard work for a businessman to haul himself out of a chair and earn a couple of dollars these days. Rather sit at home and let the dollars flow through his fingers. What a sad state the Western World is coming to when businessmen can’t even be bothered to earn some money.

I tell you now, customer service in North America is disappearing rapidly down the tubes. It’ll be like Belgium soon.

So after checking on Hall Towers, I crossed the border into the USA. I went over at Riviere de Chute, the same crossing point as last year, and it was the same miserable old whatsit on duty, but just for a change he was cheerful and happy. No idea what was happening there.

So negotiating the Amish horse buggies I arrived in Presque-Ile to some devastating news. The huge Salvation Army Thrift Centre has closed down. I had a pile of good books and music from there last year and this was my main reason for going.

cook florist presque ile maine usaStill, I could always go to the local florists and buy some suitable flowers to express my feelings, but if Cooks Florists had any flowers to express the feelings that I was having right at that particular moment I would have been very surprised indeed.

I wonder if there’s a Trading Standards Bureau in the USA that checks for misleading advertising. I think we should be told.

Still, not to be outdone, I went old-car hunting, and look at this!

h m vehicles freeway presque ile maine usaThis is a Freeway, a three-wheeled vehicle made by a company called HM Vehicles in Burnsville, Minnesota. That was a company that made vehicles for just 3 years, 1979 to 1982, before closing down.

This vehicle is one of only about 700 ever made, so it’s as rare as hens’ teeth, and what remains of it, because you would need to be dedicated to have a go at restoring this one, is available for purchase at a mere $2500, or near offer.

I suppose that there would be some takers at that price, and I might be interested myself. It would fit into my suitcase and would probably come within the weight of my baggage allowance too.

frazer nash metropolitan presque ile usaThat wasn’t the only interesting car either. There were plenty of others, including this one. This is a Nash Metropolitan, either a Series III or a IV, and the claim to fame of these cars is that they were built by Austin at Longbridge for Nash, the American car company and were imported for sale in North America – the first car ever to be totally built abroad on behalf of a USA manufacturer. There will even probably still be the old 1489cc BMC B-series engine in there.

A few were sold in the UK and people with long memories will remember the pile of them dumped and abandoned for years on the waste land at the side of Grocott’s garage in Wistaston, Crewe in the late 1960s and early 70s.

I could cry when I think of that, how rare these cars are now.

I headed on back to Canada afterwards, and at the frontier I was once more given a hard time, this time by a Canadian border official. I just don’t understand what it is with border officials. Do they have to undergo a surgical operation to remove their goodwill, good humour and pleasant disposition before they are appointed to a post?

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