O Canada

A long, full and eventful day in beautiful, sunshiny Canada!

Feeling refreshed after a gloriously long sleep, I joined Kristi on her 6.30am run. Running is a good way to see a place, especially early in the morning when the light bathes everything in a delightful glow.

A quick breakfast then onto Niagara Falls because, you know, I'm a tourist and it was high on my list of things to see. It was big and loud and, well, full of water...which is everything you really want in a waterfall. We went on the Maid in the Mist (check), wore a poncho (check) and got a good soaking (check).

From there we drove out to one of the wine regions and lunched on a selection of beers and cheeses. Kristi assures me that we will be making a return trip to the wine region for the somewhat dangerous combination of a bike ride and a wine tour.

From there we took a hike down into the Niagara Gorge, which was very fun and thankfully shady. We watched some jet boats for a while with a combination of fascination and terror.

A quick 10 mins rest before Laurie arrived and we took to the deck with G&Ts (a drinking habit we all blame on Zambia - it's the quinine, you see). Good to have deep, thoughtful chats with Laurie, interspersed with the pleasure of shared memories. I expected no less from an evening with Laurie. A quick 'touch of Indian' in town before driving out to Laurie's for a quick tour of their place and a brief catch up with Kris before I passed out.

A good day.