New York

Ahh New York, New York.  Our favourite city in the world.

We arrived in the afternoon and had to catch a bus into the city, our hotel was a small place on the corner between Soho and Chinatown.

It didn’t take us long to ditch our bags at the hotel and jump on the subway to Bryant Park. During the holiday season Bryant Park is turned into Winter Wonderland, with a free ice-skating rink and cool little pop up stores surrounding it, all under an array of Christmas lights.

We took the opportunity to go ice-skating in the park in New York and spent some time fighting our way though crowd to get around the rink. I was pretty disappointed when Sam was better than me, even though it was his first time.

It was spectacular skating around surrounded by the New York skyline, and the State library behind us.

It’s only a short walk from Bryant Park to Times Square so we thought we would have a look around. As always the amount of lights and people was shocking, the whole area has a glow and every store has a neon flashing light.

We spent the next day around the downtown area, after getting bagels for breakfast and walking through Tribeca and the East Village we found ourselves at the 9/11 Memorial Site. The new One World Trade building is now complete and actually being used and the new museum is up and running. Hundreds of people were lining up to get into the museum but we eventually got in and it was well and truly worth the wait. It is absolutely incredible, ramps take you down and the museum has been built below the two memorial pools, in the exact spots of each tower. There are so many incredible things that were recovered from the site and you begin to understand how important that day was, it becomes less of an American event and more of a Worldwide event.

We thought it would be similar to the old smaller museum, so weren’t expecting to spend too much time there, however we ended up spending about two and a half hours and probably didn’t see it all.

It’s amazing to see the progression that the Ground Zero has made, over four trips to New York it has changed from a hole in the ground in 2006, to a small museum and construction site in 2010, the memorial pools and a small museum to what it is now. It’s incredible; 13 years later it is complete.

We walked back to Times Square, before we realisedit was a Saturday night and the amount of people was absolutely ridiculous, we had to push our way through the throngs of people and stop at a number of restaurants before we found a place to eat. The subway home was a great relief for the feet after a huge day of walking and standing.

Sam had me up early the next day, dragging me out of the hotel before 9:30. We walked over to Tribeca again and got a bit to eat at the Chelsea Market, which is a really cool old warehouse filled with small independent shops, all of which were well out of our price range, so we stuck to bagels.

From there we walked along the Highline, the old raised railway line that ran through the city and has now been turned into a public garden. It’s amazing, a gorgeous garden surrounded with views of the East Village and Lower East Side.

It was about time to get off our feet so we decided to hire some bikes and ride around Central Park. Both of us (mainly me) were appalled by our unfitness but we made it through a lap of the entire park, which was a lot bigger than we had expected and remembered.

After braving about three actual New York streets we ditched the bikes and walked along to and down Fifth Avenue. A quick look inside Tiffany’s we were reminded that we had no money to spend and moved away from the shops. We stopped at the Rockefeller Centre, hoping to catch a look at the huge Christmas tree but it was still being decorated.

On our last day in the city we had breakfast at a cool little New York style diner, full of construction workers and four men behind the counter shouted orders at each other. The coffee was awful and Sam got bacon instead of ham and sausage, but it was awesome! Plus it only cost $12 for the both of us!

A quick trip to JFK and we are off to Iceland!

Across the lake in Central Park

Central Park

Riding in Central Park

Diner

One World Trade Centre

New York Stock Exchange

From the Highline

Times Square

Tribeca

Highline

Highline

Space saving car parks

Central Park

9/11 Museum

9/11 Museum

Highline

Tribeca

Montreal

It took us 5 hours on an incredibly uncomfortable hot bus to get from Toronto to Montreal, but we arrived around 2 o'clock. After we checked into our hostel in Old Montreal we decided to give poutine a try. As expected, the chips, gravy and cheese curd combo was amazing and has quickly become my favourite meal ever.

We spent the rest of the afternoon having a look around Old Montreal, walking along the cobblestone streets in the freezing cold. It felt as though we were walking through a small French countryside town, not a major Canadian city.
I loved how everyone speaks both french and english, it made me wish I knew another language!

The next day we got up early and visited Notre Dame, which was pretty spectacular. The inside is full of such incredible detail, from the staircase to the altar, it is amazing. We also had a look at the Chateau Ramezay which used to be the Governor of Montreal's home and endured 500 years of Quebec history. Benjamin Franklin stayed here when he was trying to convince the Canadians to join the revolution, the building was built during the French colonisation and became a university after Canada became part of the English Commonwealth.
It was a beautiful old building that felt very French, each room held a different era of the Chateaus history. It was awesome to walk through the building and get an understanding of the history of Montreal and Quebec.

We then had a look through the Bonsecours Market which used to be the main trading area in Montreal. It still holds a number of stores and has a design and textile museum on the bottom level.
While Sam had a look at the shops, I visited the museum, where there was a heap of cool clothes from the 20's and 30's.

We also visited the Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours Chapel, which is much smaller than Notre Dame and has a tower with views of the Old Montreal docks. There is also a crypt underneath the chapel with a large archeological site that is currently being uncovered.
The view from the tower was gorgeous and we were up there just as the sun became hidden behind the skyline of Downtown.

On our last day in Montreal we headed Downtown. We climbed to the top of Mont Royal, which is a huge hill that overlooks the city. It was covered in snow and felt as though we were walking through a winter wonderland. It was a long walk but it was definitely worth it. The view of the city was amazing plus the snow covering everything around was so pretty.

After that we had a look around the under ground city that stretches all around the downtown area. It's really just a huge underground shopping centre connected with a heap of subway tunnels.

We managed to have Poutine everyday, much to my delight and Sams dismay, plus on our last day we had a huge Canadian style breakfast with plenty of maple syrup!

Mont Royal

Mont Royal

Old Town

Old Town

Old Town

Poutine

Notre Dame

Notre Dame

Chateau Ramezay

Bonsecours Market

Toronto

So we arrived in Toronto safe and sound, though a little late (midnight) and went straight to sleep.

We had a slow start, forgetting that Sunday morning means waiting in line to get a table for breakfast! It snowed all day as we just wandered the city.

It’s a beautiful city, quite similar to Melbourne though a little bit nicer especially with the snow! We had an awesome day just walking around the city. The St. Lawrence Markets were closed unfortunately but we had a look through the Old Town area, which was really nice.

The Distillery District was also really nice. It’s full of old distilleries converted into art galleries, small shops and a few breweries and restaurants. We had lunch at a place called the Brew Pub, I had probably the best steak sandwich ever and Sam gave one of their own beers. 

We found a few cool little vintage stores and an awesome chocolate shop!

As we made our way back to the hostel the city was beginning to get dark and was lit up with fairy lights. It was freezing cold and the snow was heavy, but it was so pretty.  

We decided to go and see Niagara Falls on our second day in Toronto, so we organised a tour to pick us up bright and early and take us out there.

The tour took us to a winery on the way out to the falls, where we tried a few wines. This included an ice-wine, the grapes used for ice-wine have to be picked when the temperature is -8 and it is incredibly sweet, my kind of wine.

We also stopped off a small little town call Niagara-On-The-Lake which had a whole store that is dedicated to Christmas all year round.

The falls were incredible, they are so huge, it is spectacular. The rain stopped as we arrived and it snowed on and off the whole time we were there. It was freezing cold, but definitely worth suffering through the cold to stand and watch the ridiculous amount of water fall. 

The smaller America Falls are really cool, but they just don't quite compare to the giant main falls. 

Niagara Falls was a really nice way to end our time in Toronto, a city we absolutely loved, and we left just in time as the temperature dropped to -5 the day we left!

Niagara

Toronto

Distillery District

America Falls 

Niagara Falls

Niagara

Niagara

Niagara

Toronto

Distillery District

Disneyland

Our day began disastrously, we arrived at the airport just in time to check in for our flight from LA (John Wayne Airport in The OC) to Toronto, however we were unable to check in. Turns out our flight was not at 1:00pm today (Friday) it was at 1:00pm Saturday...
We were definitely not prepared to pay the $600 it would cost to change flights, so we found some WiFi and booked a hotel in Anaheim and two tickets for Disneyland!

Lucky for us Disneyland is open until midnight on Fridays so walking through the gates at 1:00 didn't really matter.
California is definitely the best Disneyland out of them all! It's bigger and better. Plus because there are more attractions and things to look at the lines aren't as long!

As it got dark the whole park was lit up with amazing lights, it was spectacular! The castle was covered in white lights that dangled down and looked like icicles, while It's a Small World was covered in multicoloured lights.

We sat and watched the Christmas Fantasy parade, which included all the favourite characters and impeccable details, it was awesome.
After trying a couple more rides we lined up in the 'Main Street' and watched the fireworks show.
It was amazing!
The fireworks were beautiful (especially the ones that weren't too loud) and the whole park was blasting music that felt like christmas, it even started fake snowing! It was a better fireworks display than we get at New Years!

Though the day started out super rough, it ended up being our favourite day so far. Now we are actually off to Toronto!

City Hall - Main Street

The Castle

Splash Mountain

Brave faces - Splash Mountain

The Parade

The Castle

The Tree

It's A Small World

Eeyore!

The Castle

Fireworks!