Sunday 11th June – Our first day apart in EIGHT MONTHS!

Actually, we can’t claim to have spent the day totally apart.  When Simon got up at silly O’clock he turned the light on and I spotted a spider on the wall (one of those with a LARGE body) and after Simon had left I couldn’t get back to sleep for fear of feeling spider legs crawling over me.  When I eventually turned the light on to evict said spider I couldn’t find the thing, causing further insomnia. Ridiculous!  The boys disappeared, off to catch a plane to Montreal for the Formula 1.  I shall give Simon a few lines to provide the highlights of their day….

Right, having missed the U.S Grand Prix last October, I was determined to make the Canadian one this year. As such, Ben and I had planned this trip months in advance. When it became clear my parents would be joining us this weekend in Toronto, it meant that I literally had one day to make this happen. This meant a 4am alarm call to catch the 630am flight out of Toronto. This got us into Montreal and into the circuit just in time for the first support race of the day. Amongst the on-track activities, were an ‘Historic F1’ race – Gilles Villeneuve’s 1978 Ferrari getting a big cheer from the Canadian crowd as it lapped the circuit bearing his name and the Porsche and Ferrari championship races also proving to be great to watch… Ben had bagged us great seats, in the grandstand overlooking turns 1, 2 and the pit exit. The F1 race proved to be a corker! Lewis won it easily, never losing the lead having started on pole, however, there was non-stop action with cars swapping positions all the way back down the rest of the field. In particular the Force Indias were having a great day, mixing it up in the top 5 and it was great to see Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel battle back to finish 4^th having dropped to dead last with a broken front wing on the first lap.

L-R: Bottas, Hamilton, Patrick Stewart & Ricciardo

Following the race, we were then able to get out on the track and get to the podium to see the top three spray the champagne – and see Ricciardo do a ‘Shoey’ (Drink his champagne from his shoe!) In a surreal twist, Patrick Stewart (of Star Trek and X-men fame) who’d conducted the podium interviews, then joined Ricciardo and drank champagne from his other shoe! Being this close to the pit lane meant Ben and I got to see Toto Wolf and Nikki Lauda give their post-race TV interviews, as well as seeing the F1 cars being bought back into the garages. 

Ricciardo 'doing a shoey'!

Lewis Hamilton raising his winner's trophy to the crowd

Upon getting back to the airport, we learnt our flight back to Toronto was delayed by an hour, however, this gave us a chance to do a bit of ‘F1 Celebrity’ spotting in the departure lounge, where I then managed to get the autographs of Ross Brawn and Christian Horner! This rounded off a great day and by the time we got home at midnight we were shattered, though we both agreed we’d do it all again in a heartbeat!

I’ll hand you back to Struth…

Meanwhile in Toronto, my alarm went off at 815am, annoyingly (still no sign of the spider).  I had to return the hire car prior to 10am but first I drove Si’s parents to the CN Tower to start their Toronto tourism day.  No issues returning the car and catching the street-car back to St Clarens, I was back by 10am for a much-needed cup of tea.

Char and I relaxed on the porch, left the house about noon and took a walk down to the Drake for brunch.  Today was scorching.  After taking a break from the heat in the air-conditioned restaurant we walked to a local bar where a guy Char knew was DJing on the roof top. Would you believe it, but the ‘no shelter roof top bar’ had absolutely no shelter on it?!  Apart from for the DJ of course...

Some of the Franklin's neighbour's beautiful flowers

We met Char’s closest friend Tracey and her husband, Jamie, for a couple of rum cocktails but that was all we could manage before having to bail to find some shade.  Char was dreaming about buying a paddling pool so we could return to the house and dunk our feet in it for the afternoon but this seemed like too much hard work.  Instead, we opted to re-stock their home alcohol supply at an LCBO (Liquor control board of Ontario) store and head home to set up on the porch for the rest of the day.  Tracey joined us and we’d kept in touch with Ann and Ray who arrived with us about 430pm.  They’d done very well, spending seven hours walking and touring the city.  They definitely deserved a drink!  We had a great time chatting and watching the neighbourhood pass by, opting for pizza and salad for dinner to really minimise the effort.

The porch - space to relax with friends, family and neighbours

Eventually, Tracey and Jamie had to leave to prepare for another week of work and Si’s parents opted to go to bed when we were informed that the boys’ flight back had been delayed by an hour at least. Char and I waited up as this would be our last chance to say farewell to our friends before we left tomorrow.

I suddenly remembered that the Stanley cup play-off game was on tonight… and it could be the decider!  Looking at my phone we discovered that it was 0-0 with only 5 minutes left to play.  This could be going into extra time.  We headed inside to catch the hockey.  The Pittsburgh Penguins managed two goals suddenly in the last couple of minutes to break the hearts of the Nashville Predators and win the Stanley Cup, in Nashville.  The first team to win two championships in consecutive years since 1998:

The game over, we directed our attention to watching an episode of Planet Earth which looked incredible on their extremely high definition curved 3D television.  Finally, we were joined by the boys around midnight.  They’d had a fantastic day, had both really caught the sun and were understandably knackered.  We said our goodbyes, everyone unsure about when we shall all be together again as we have no idea if we’ll be in the UK at the same time for our paths to cross or, if not there, where we shall meet up again?!