October Expenses

Well, we obviously can't afford to keep coming back to Ottawa. Just kidding, but it does seem we spend more money sitting in one place than we do when we're traveling! It was all worth it of course...we had a fun month and it was great to see all of our Ottawa family and friends again.

We spent a total of $2,350 for the month. Definitely above average. But not one particular category was way out of whack, it's just that they were all slightly higher than normal and when you add them all up...well, they add up!

Would you take the bus, or the train?

One of the things we're going to have to decide on during our upcoming trip is whether to take the bus, or the train. If everything else is equal, we like to travel by train. We just think it's more relaxing, and you've got more space to get up and stretch your legs if you want to.

But, the train isn't always faster, and it can also be more expensive.

Busy last few days

It's been a busy couple of days for us. Trying to squeeze in some visits with family and friends while we get the chance because we're usually only in Ottawa once a year at the most. The next year will be a little different because of course we're back here at Christmas for two weeks, and then again next April.

On Friday, we went for lunch with my mother and my sister. Thanks Mom!

A little info about our next trip

Since we're going to be spending most of the month of November in the country of Romania, we figured we should give you a bit of a primer about the country itself.

Probably the first (and maybe the only) thing you might think of when asked about Romania is Dracula...and/or Transylvania. Most everybody will have heard of those two things that are closely related to Romania, and especially at this time of year, given that we're only a couple of days away from Halloween.

Shouldn't we be half way to Mexico by now?

That's what I was thinking to myself as I watched the snowflakes coming down yesterday.

They had been calling for a big rainstorm starting yesterday afternoon, but at the last minute they changed it to snow. And they called for between 3-7 cms (1-3 inches)!

Sure enough, the big wet flakes started to accumulate on the ground.

Change of plans...

Had an email yesterday from our couchsurfing host in Bucharest (we arrive next Wednesday) saying that they've had a problem with the heating in their house and that it won't be fixed until November 4th.

She said we were still welcome to stay with them if we were prepared to put up with some cold in the house. The temperature in Bucharest right now has highs around 10C (50F).

An Afternoon at a Nordic Spa

Today's blog post is written by Ruth for a change....

Yesterday, Lindsey and I had a mother daughter day and spent the afternoon relaxing at a nordic spa in Quebec.

A while back Lindsey found a special on Groupon for 4 hours at a nordic spa and a 4 course dinner at a restaurant nearby for a total of $80 CAD ($62 USD) for the two of us and asked if I would like to join her for the day away, of course I said YES!

Just grandpa and the grandkids

We dropped off our rental car yesterday, a day earlier than scheduled. When we booked it, we had forgotten that Ruth and our daughter Lindsey were going to be away for the day today. So it was more convenient to bring it back yesterday. We didn't really have any pressing use for another car until Friday anyhow.

So this morning, Ruth and Lindsey took off for the drive up to a day spa in Quebec about two and a half hours from here. They'll enjoy a massage and hot pools and then dinner later this afternoon. Just a mom and daughter day away!

Things are coming together

Spent a fair amount of time this past weekend organizing some accommodation for our six week trip to Romania and Moldova. We leave a week from tomorrow!

We arrive in Bucharest, Romania the afternoon of November 2nd. We've got a couchsurfing host arranged for three nights there...a younger couple (32) with their two cats. And then on the 5th, we take the train to Brasov.

Looking forward to visiting the Republic of Moldova

A few days ago, my mother had given us a newspaper article from a couple of months ago that she had saved for us. She knew that we were planning to visit the country of Moldova.

Because Ottawa is the capital of Canada, most other countries have their embassies located here. And this article was about Her Excellency Ala Beleavschi, the Ambassador from the Embassy of the Republic of Moldova to Canada.

We escaped!

It's been raining pretty steady for the past couple of days. But, the only thing you can change about the weather is your attitude towards it, so we had to come up with some indoor things to do.

That's pretty easy with our grandkids. They don't mind playing indoors. Cameron (5) is in school for most of the day, and Sadie (3) is pretty easy to keep occupied.

RV'ing in Iceland!

Of course RV'ing is a popular thing to do in both Canada and the United States. But we've learned that the RV culture is alive and well in many other countries too. We have camped ourselves in Africa and Mexico, and we're about to embark on a two month RV excursion in Spain.

But one country that we keep dreaming about exploring with an RV is Iceland!

Sherman's twin brother!

It was a nice day with a clear blue sky and we wanted to see more of the fall colors. So we had planned on having an early lunch and then going for a drive up to the ski resort area at Calabogie, Ontario.

But I had to wait for an important phone call at 1:00pm, so we rescheduled our time and had lunch at the normal hour and then took off after lunch. We'll tell you more about that important phone call on Saturday!

The little black car

A couple of months ago I saw a car rental deal, and I booked it. Originally, the plan had been to rent a car and drive down through Toronto to Pelee Island and visit our friends Heinz and Uli. There are some other people we could have visited along the way, as well as Ruth's sister and her husband.

But as the date drew closer, we simply didn't feel like doing the drive.

Pinterest?

It's a lot of work to run a daily blog like we do. We still enjoy doing it so we'll keep at it for a while yet! But between writing the blog, answering comments, posting to facebook and answering emails related to the blog...it's quite time consuming. Then, there's a raft of other social media possibilities that are expected of you and so far we've tried to avoid them because they simply take up more time.

Can't bring ourselves to "tweet" on a regular basis, so other than an automated tweet once a day when we post the blog, we don't use twitter. Facebook has worked well for us though. We get a lot of readers through Facebook. But one that we've always wanted to try is Pinterest because we've read that other travel bloggers have had a lot of success with it.