Sunday, November 13, 2016

Palm Springs - An unscheduled visit to Toronto and Kyle

Fantastic new train service that takes you from the Airport right downtown


Union Station


Kyle and I at the CN tower, we are taking our luggage to his apartment before touring for the day


Kyle did not want to go on the train...






Andre could have spent the whole day looking at this wall of books


Good thing I bought that hoodie at the airport in Palm Springs, a little colder in Toronto!

Chinatown





Where Rick Mercer films his Rants









Saturday, November 12, 2016

Palm Springs - 1st Attempt to fly home

Up early for one last walk before we spend a good part of the day in airports
Condo next door

We went in to see the grounds next door

Our swanky condo

Packed up and ready to go


Yesterday I wasn’t able to get seats on our first flight without paying extra, so today we started off with a drive to the airport to get that sorted. Got checked in with 2 seats together in the plus section. I am very happy as we only have 45 minutes to make a connecting flight in Chicago, this will give us a chance to make it.

After the airport we head out for breakfast with Gilles and John. A full breakfast as we are not sure when or where we will be eating again today, maybe later tonight in Toronto?


Back to the airport for our dropoff and we are now waiting for our first of 3 flights today. We have had an absolutely fantastic week, if only it wasn’t so far away….


So, our plane left 1 hour late from Palm Springs, they said weather related in San Francisco that was going to be our connecting flight.  What a mess, most of the flight had connections to make.  Since we only had 45 minutes to connect in Chicago we knew that was not going to happen.

Get in line at United customer service, they said we needed to overnight in Chicago and then they would work on getting us home.  I want to spend time in Chicago, but not right now with the demonstrations going on with the Trump election.  So, she will get us to Toronto then home Monday night. NO, that won't work either, we both need to work Monday.  It took us an hour, but she did get us on a WestJet flight for Sunday night.

Arrive in Toronto Saturday at around 10PM, connect with Kyle who is here on his work term and arrange a meet for tomorrow.  Go to the Air Canada desk and they kind of take pity on us and give us a room and meal vouchers for the night.  Get to our room at midnight, we order room service, a long day with no food and lots of waiting in lines.  I then try to check in  for our flights tomorrow and find it has not been done correctly.  A couple more phone calls to WestJet and United and all is sorted, we are flying out tomorrow at 9:30 PM.  This took about 45 minutes and room service arrived just as I hung up and checked in, perfect timing!


Room service in Toronto after a very long travel day...



Friday, November 11, 2016

Palm Springs - Last full day

I can’t believe it is our last full day here already.

Andre and I are up early again today so we go for a walk for about an hour. There are lots of beautiful communities to explore, just pick which way you want to walk when you step outside and you have beautiful views of the mountains and lots of nice places to look at.










We head over to Gilles and Johns and do our own celebrity house tour. They have a book that has the addresses of celebrity homes, many you can’t see over the fences, but some are wide open to the street. Very pretty and expensive neighborhood. The proximity to LA made this once a very favourable place to have a home for the stars





We saw a roadrunner!

Liberace mailbox


Lunch downtown of beer and pizza then we are back to the pool for one last afternoon. I managed to get a load of laundry done, so we are arriving home with one suitcase of clean clothes.








It is hot, misters are on downtown

Not sure if we went here 2 or 3 times






Supper tonight is in, BBQ sausages, asparagus and potatoes.
It is Nov 11, an airshow is going on with the parade

Tonight we are going to see Kellie Pickler at a casino that is about a 30 minute drive from here. Turns out to be a good show. It is also remembrance day, and she does a very nice tribute and goes out into the crowd and hugs every veteran, it was very sincere and nice.

Home by around 11PM and off to bed, can’t believe the week has flown by so quickly.