The cauldron known as Egypt boiled over last week. I close my eyes, and I conjure up the time I spent in Cairo a few years ago. It is already a hazy memory, but a new light is shining on that time. Continue reading →

I’ve gone ahead and signed up for an account on CouchSurfing.org to give something new a shot.

So you out there in Internet land – tell me about your CouchSurfing experiences, cause I’ve only heard good things thus far.

My apologies to my mother and my grandmother, who both apparently are regular readers of this humble blog. You might wish to skip over this entry. This entry is for everyone else out there, but the two of you can just go over to some other corner of the Internet right now, OK?

The rush I get from travelling can only be described as teenage romance. Continue reading →

I exhale slowly, cautiously. My face dips below the surface of the lake. I blow gently out of my nose, wiggle my jaw back and forth. I slowly descend, the visibility is low. Continue reading →

Apparently… most people who come across this blog get here because they have searched for the following terms:

-Traveling (or travelling) monkeys
-Filthy toilets

Now my toilet at home is far from filthy, and my traveling monkey lives at my old job, so I’m not sure how I feel about this.

Now you know!

I apologize for the low quality resolution on this photo, but this constitutes a pretty good end to the day at work:

Also for your viewing pleasure, a Banksy original:

Cell phones take the lousiest photos.

There are a few things in life that get me swearing like a truck driver from Rimouski, pondering the finer things in life. And ever since I relocated to Toronto, I miss certain comfort foods from my past more then I thought I would. Bagels. Poutine. Blanche de Chambly. Very carbohydrate intensive indulgences – and my waistline certainly reflects these indulgences.

It’s not my fault. I lived in Montreal for most of my life, and certain deliciously cheap indulgences were abundant. Street meat in Toronto scares me when I’m sober, and reminds me not to eat meat from a sink-free source. Continue reading →

It’s pretty hard to write a travel blog, like I’ve said, when you’re not currently travelling and have no tangible plans to hit the road.

But… I did hit the road recently. It was a pretty quick process – in about a 4 week period, I quit my job of almost 7 years, packed up everything I own (aside from the random crap we abandoned on the floor of the old apartment, but that’s not relevant here), found a new job in a new city in a new industry, and left Montreal behind for the slick streets of Toronto. And I never thought I would up and leave – everyone had me pegged as a Montreal-lifer. Indeed, I was coming pretty close to it: I priced condos, looked into mortgage options. Continue reading →

It has magically come to my attention that I haven’t been posting much lately. It’s not easy to maintain a travel blog when you’re office-bound – not as easy, at least. The adventures are no longer fresh in your memory, distorted by time, space, jet lag. The longer it’s been since I’ve traveled, the harder it is to write, especially since there are no grand adventures in the works in the near future. In fact, Chiquita isn’t even sitting on my desk these days; she’s preparing for her adventure to Bangladesh, but she’s leaving me behind. Continue reading →