It was officially the first day of hurricane season and our day to fly from Grenada to New York City.
We awoke and lazed around watching American news on TV. Rather than walk down the 6 flights to the restaurant we chose to have breakfast in our room. It was quite enjoyable. We ordered a fresh fruit plate to share and a Spanish omelette. I was on the balcony watching the man struggle up the stairs carrying or tray. There is no hurry to keep the dishes warm because the air temperature doesn’t tend to chill anything.
After breakfast on the balcony we both went back to sleep for a while. We had discussed going for a walk but so far there had been three heavy rain showers go by so it was a good day to relax. Eventually we showered, zipped up our luggage and called for it to be picked up.
We discussed where to eat lunch and the unanimous choice was the airport. Although it was still quite early we headed out.
The airport was almost empty so our bags were checked in no time. When we got to the restaurant, it was a nice surprise to learn that they had free WiFi. The intent was good but the system was down so after eating lunch we just relaxed and read until it was time to go through security.
The flight from Grenada to New York City was great. We were served a nice dinner with champagne and shown a movie and a couple of TV shows that ended just as we were landing.
It was a little after 1AM by the time we retrieved our bags in New York. There was a lot of time to kill so we sat and had a coffee in the airport. While sitting we looked out the window at the taxi stand. The line up was so long that we decided it would be wiser to get to Penn station where we were to get the train to Toronto and kill time there.
We finished our coffee and got into the taxi line up. We should have realized that as usual, the queues in the U.S. move very quickly unlike back home. We were in a cab and on our way to Manhattan in less than 15 minutes.
The train station was a safe and interesting place to wait. We hired a red cap to help us with our bags from the cab into the station and again from the station into the train. It made travel much easier.
The train trip to Toronto was long and we were late arriving. Instead of a 12-hour trip, it was 14 hours. On the first part of the route there was a guide onboard who provided a historic commentary as we passed through small towns. When he left we napped on and off during the day and spent time in the bar car talking with other passengers.
At the end of our journey (10PM), we both agreed that the train trip was interesting, fun and inexpensive and we were glad we did it once. It will not be our first choice of travel in the future.
We are going to remain in Canada for the next five months. During that time, I don’t plan to write a daily journal. I will however make much-needed updates to the web site. It’s time to do a “six year update of what worked and what didn’t”. I hope to add some new sections as well, so my apologies to those who tell me they are living vicariously through our web site but all stowaways are now on shore leave until November when we will return to the boat.
