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Yesterday I went to Ottawa for a day trip, taking Via Rail, mostly to do Resource game things like build some mines and attack others, but also to walk around and see what there is to see simply by walking around.

I took the 203 bus to the Dorval terminus where I then had to wait around 20 minutes for my train to arrive, here it is arriving:

You can see by the cloud cover that it wasn't a clear morning; there was a risk of showers both here and in Ottawa in the first half of the day with a lower chance of showers in the afternoon. My train left on time at 9h24 and arrived in Ottawa on time at 11h04. 

Once I got into Ottawa, the Via Rail station is 6km away from Parliament or a more central part of Ottawa, so my original plan was to walk into the city and then take the O-Train back to the Via station; so I took a pedestrian bridge over the highway and went into the Overbrook area of Ottawa. This is where I built the majority of my Resource mines, I did this first so that the purpose of this trip could be fulfilled and then with subsequent time can walk into the more tourist part of Ottawa.

Then I crossed the Rideau River on a pedestrian bridge; here is the river looking south:

It may be difficult to tell, but in that collection of birds in the above photo there was a mix of sea gulls and mallard ducks. Then I walked westwards to Elgin which I took north when I came to this Aboriginal War Memorial:

Continuing northward on Elgin I came to the WW1 Memorial and as I was arriving a changing of the guard was just finishing. In the first photo below you can see a guard on the left and right of the memorial.

And then finally I made it to Parliament which has been and continues to be under renovation; it was nice to see that the exterior scaffolding was down:

From there I walked a circuitous path to a Subway resto where I ate and rested for a short while and then plotted my walk back to the Via Rail station since there was plenty of time before by 16h07 departure time and I was eating close to 13h30. Of the routes Google chose I took the longest one and walked back to the train station, arriving at about 15h.

 At 15h20 there was an announcement that anyone with oversize luggage should bring their large luggage to gate two. Many people misinterpreted this to mean that people should queue for boarding, and so then more people queued. As a day tripper I had no luggage so I stay seated; and even if I had large luggage I'd have checked it at gate two and then sat back down for boarding.

So twenty five minutes later they started boarding the business class passengers and then immediately following it was all of the rest of us. I stayed seated expecting to board at the end of the queue, but then I saw a passenger struggling with his luggage that opened up a spot in the queue that I jumped into, and then I boarded without any problem.

My mobile device was down to 35% power and so when I had arrived in the station I did not use it in any way and just whiled the time away looking and listening at my surrounding environment. Once they scanned my ticket on my device to board I used it to listen to music on the train ride home knowing that it wouldn't matter if the device went down to zero power (which it didn't).

The sky had cleared mostly on the train ride home; here is a photo along the way:

As we approached the island of Montreal there were dark clouds and the ground had evidence of having been rained upon. I found out today that just before my train arrived yesterday it had torrentially rained for a short period and there was still the remnant of very light rain that ended soon after I disembarked.

I checked my transit app and found to get home, there was actually an Exo train that would work best, so I went from Via train to Exo train to get home.

Overall it was a positive trip, I would do it again.

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On Saturday this past weekend, I had booked a few months in advance a day trip to Quebec City, mostly as part of my Resources game to go and attack some mines and build some of my own.

I took the train there and back, riding economy on the way there and business class on the way back, the train trip both ways cost 212$. 

The train wasn't full when we left Central Station, conveniently it had double seats on the left and single seats for solo travelers like me, on the right:

Each seat had an above the seat storage spot and a below the seat storage spot. There was also a way to check more significant luggage that would go on a different railcar and be taken out at your destination by Via rail crew.

On the first roughly ten minutes of the ride we parallel the REM and an REM train passed as we were exiting. My mobile device camera wasn't quite at the ready when the best photo would have been taken, but I did catch it here as it was moving faster and further ahead of us:

There were two or three additional stations before the long stretch to Ste-Foy where additional passengers boarded and so the economy part of the train became more full.

Quebec City, way back, used to be a walled city and the walls in some parts of the city are still very visible:

I got a Chic Cola and a La Fumée poutine at Le Chic Shack:

I did not like the Chic Cola, and the poutine was okay, but wasn't traditional in any sense. As I walked around the city both before and after I saw many other places that had a more traditional poutine that I would try if I ever do this trip again.

It was very windy and light rain fell almost for the entire five hours I was in the city, so I did not end up taking as many photos as perhaps I would otherwise have done. Here, for example, is the National Assembly building of our provincial government:

As I had been continuously walking, and the city topography is very up and down, after about four hours of this I had had enough, so I went back to the train station at about 16h15 for the 17h45 scheduled departure. Had it not been rainy and windy, there were numerous places where I could have taken a seat outdoors to rest for half an hour.  The Quebec City station, like a few others, had a business class lounge, so I went in there and as a benefit, for free I consumed a Coke. The train only departed at 18h06 and in the business class railcar there were only four passengers. The railcar itself was not different in any way from the economy car, however, there was a proper meal included and numerous passes by the server to provide alcoholic or non-alcoholic drinks of your choice, all included in the fare.

Via Rail has ordered and has already received some brand new train sets but not enough yet to replace every scheduled route. It seems that originally the morning train was supposed to be a new train set, but it was announced on the train that unfortunately it wasn't ready yet. This made no difference to me, I got to where I wanted to end up and got home too.

Fortunately when I got back to my city I was able to catch the metro almost instantaneously and then the bus home again almost instantaneously, and so I got home with hardly any delay at all once we arrived back in Central Station.

I quite enjoyed this trip and I do believe I would do it again, hoping for better weather. The train ride there and back was pleasant and of a very nice duration of between three and four hours. I liked taking business class on the ride back as that ride was during what would be my supper time and so it was nice to have a nice meal. In economy I could have bought a sandwich and a drink but these would have been simple caliber.

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Yesterday, I went to Kingston, Ontario.

About a half hour before I was to leave my apartment I noticed that my credit card was missing. I had used it just the previous evening paying for ordered in pizza, but I could not find it anywhere. I searched high and low, and fortunately had a backup plan that I had 45$ in cash that I just happened to have. So in the end I left without my credit and with the 45$.

I took the Exo train at 8h30 which got me to Dorval at 8h39, walked over to the Via Rail station and read my book (Dracula, by Bram Stoker) until my Via Rail train #63 arrived at 9h15 and I boarded.

The train was perhaps 70-80% full; I was sitting at the window and also at Dorval a woman came on to the train who had her seat next to mine. Early on in our trip she asked an attendant if she could have a different seat. For the duration of the trip to Kingston, her request was not accommodated.

She ordered a bagel with cream cheese; and the way it was provided is a clue to me to not order it in any of my future rail trips. The bagel was provided whole and the cream cheese in separate small disposable pouches, so she was required to cut open the bagel with flimsy knife and then open those pouches. The only way to buy food and/or snacks on the train is with a credit card, so I bought nothing.

I read my book in the 2:20 train ride duration with occasional breaks just to look out the window. A few minutes before we arrived in Kingston I asked the woman next to me to allow me to pass, and then I walked to where the exit was and disembarked once we arrived.

It took me a moment to gather my bearings as to where I was to go next, which I had memorized, but within a minute I was on my way. From the train station heading out then left, joins up with Princess street, which I walked the length of until getting into the central part of Kingston, about 6km.

I had pre-planned going to Harper's Burger Bar and found it without a problem, and was fortunate in that at the time I arrived, there was no queue and there were plenty of tables available. I had to show proof of vaccination and approved ID (I had both ready) to get in. I ordered The Anytimer drink (a bourbon lemon/lime drink), Beyond Burger and creamy coleslaw. It was all good, and they had no trouble accepting the cash I brought. As I was waiting for my order and then eating it, the restaurant gradually filled up, and as I was leaving, there was a queue outside.

Next I walked down to King street and took King street heading west. My whole reason for this trip was to demolish some opponent mines in the Resources mobile device game, so in that general area I found a few opponent mines I was successfully able to attack. As I walked west on King there were a few spots where I detoured down to the water. There were a lot of Queen's University students milling about, always in groups of at least three, and at most 15. It was a lovely early fall day, it is not surprising they were out and about.

Finally I got to the section that I really wanted to get to; an opponent called 'FurFactory' had perhaps 60 mines all with really low defenses. So I worked my way through that neighbourhood and victoriously attacked all of them. Once that was done I started to very gradually wind my way back in the direction of the train station. Along the way, using the Resources game, I would scan to see if there were any resources to mine and built a bunch of mines wherever I find the resources I was after.

I ended up back on Princess street and stopped at an Esso station convenience store and with the remaining cash I had bought a sandwich and a Coca-Cola, the latter of which I began consuming immediately, the former I put in my back-pack to eat on the train. Then I made my way back to the train station and arrived about an hour before train 66 was to take me home.

While waiting for the train, I continued reading my book, when it arrived I boarded without incident, and as before, a woman was seated next to me who asked to be seated elsewhere (as there were some empty seat-pairs nearby) and she was granted the move, so I had my window seat and the seat to my left was empty.

I ended up finishing my book with about an hour left in the train ride and just listened to music for the remaining time. At Dorval I walked back and managed to catch the 203 bus just as it was destined to leave, so I had to wait exactly zero minutes, heck, even zero seconds. I got home without incident.

It was a lot of walking, perhaps about 16km worth, and the weather was nice, it was around 20C and somewhat windy with the occasional cloud blocking the sun. I had my earbuds in listening to my music from the Kingston train station until I got to Harper's Burger Bar, but then did not put my music back in until I got back to Princess street later in the day. I quite enjoyed the whole experience, I think I'll do it again, irrespective of the Resources reason to do this.

dropping the camoflage for a Dorito

Taking a snake from a child who didn't want to eat it reminded no one of the idea that a moderately sized black hole some seventeen million light years away could have done a better parking job at the nearby Walmart.

The men's Olympic triathlon begins within the next half hour; so I am taking this pre-triathlon time to compose and post this blog post. What is good about the CBC coverage is that they have on replay full events, so I do not need to be conscious at 2am my local time to watch the table tennis that starts at 3pm Tokyo time. I had hoped to go to the Tokyo Olympics, but this isn't happening (no one is going/has gone) due to the state of the pandemic in Japan. The next opportunity to attend summer Olympics will be in Paris in 2024. Perhaps I will see about attending those Olympic games.

The antidote that was used to save the election officers from having or catching frost bite need not have been administered this August, considering how low the chances are of there being any frost. It would be foolhardy for anyone to hold an election in August; too many people in this hemisphere are on vacation in that month, and also; there is no frost.

I have made plans to go to Kingston, Belleville, Oshawa, the Saguenay, Drummondville, Quebec City, Rimouski, Rivière du Loup, Gaspé, Percé, Campbellton and Bathurst. Most of these are accessible by Via Rail while the remaining are accessible by Orléans Express. The purpose for all of them is to play the Resources game to attack some existing opponent mines and to build mines of my own. In a few of the cities I've planned to visit I've done some research to see what else I can do there.

In Campbellton there is the Sugarloaf provincial park. In Bathurst there is the Youghall beach. In Rivière du Loup there is the Parc des Chutes as well as Park of the Pointe. In Rimouski there is Beausejour park. In Percé there is the view of Percé Rock. In Gaspé there is the Gaspesie Museum and Forillon National Park.

In some of the cities I go there and go home in the same day. For example, of all of the ones listed, I have booked a trip to Kingston for late September where I take a Via Rail train that gets me there around noon, and then a train that leaves there at around 18h to get me home at around 21h. This gives me six hours to go down to where I know there are dozens of mines to attack.

I have not yet booked any of the other city trips. I see no reason why some of these I can't do through the fall and winter; though the trip to New Brunswick I'll wait until next summer as there is a beach visit involved.