Today was a nice ending to an incredible trip. Setting the clocks back was great, so I got that extra hour of exploring time. Vicki and I went to the campus and she gave me a tour of the entire place. Part of the campus has that older brick look, while the other half has that newer cement building look.
They have pretty much everything that UCF has, plus all the stuff that I always wished it did. There were indoor swimming pools and an ice skating rink that is free to skate on during the winter. They even have a women's hockey team there. So badass. Apparently I said hockey weird. I think I must have said it with some kind of Boston sounding accent lol. They have intramurals there too, just like UCF, but they add some really strange ones, like underwater hockey and badminton haha.
I know it sounds ridiculous, but something that really sold me were the couches in the student center. They allow students to pass out on them in between classes and when cramming for tests. I can't even tell you how many times I wished there was something like that at UCF. Just somewhere to take a cat nap during a long class break, when it just wasn't feasible to go home and back again.
They also had this place called the Bullring where they have more couches set up, they sell sandwiches and such, and they have live music during the week. It was kind of a bohemian hippie type of place. I just got this overall laid back vibe being there. I thought it was beautiful too.
After touring the whole place, we stopped back at Vicki's for a short break. We chatted and did some researching online. It turns out that the university also has a criminology program, so even if I decide to do that, I could still go there.
We headed to downtown Guelph, aka 5 minutes away from her apartment. We went to a cute diner place and I treated her to lunch since she was pretty much the best couchsurfing host I could have imagined.
We went back to her apartment and just hung out and chatted more. I told her about all of my crazy cockroach encounters. They don't have them in Canada. Isn't that crazy? Oh and they have black and red squirrels! I actually saw more black ones then brown/gray ones while I was there.
More fun facts about Canada: they call soda "pop", the weather is generally given in celcius, distance is given in km, they use military time in a lot of places, and gas is sold in cents per liter. When you see a gas station it says something like '107.4' and you're like what? It's so strange. They also call spring break, reading week, because it's a week when they should be reading I guess. And one of the most popular places to go is Cuba! Yea it's so weird how the perception of a place is so dependent on where you live. Being from Florida, I don't think I'd choose Cuba as my top choice for leisure.
Well, at least I can truly say I've learned quite a bit in just 2 days. So far I'd say it was way worth the extra effort and traveling to go to Canada. Hopefully I'll feel the same way after all this traveling. I left Guelph at about 6:30 from the downtown station and said goodbye to Vicki. Hopefully she will come visit me in Florida one day.
I got to Toronto at a quarter to 8 and my megabus left towards Buffalo at 9. I got stuck next to some idiot foreigner who didn't understand normal personal space boundaries. He was all up in my area for the 2 hours until border control. Border control was ridonkulous. All the foreigners were getting grilled so hard. It made me feel good to see how secure we are. When it got to me he just asked what I was doing in Canada and if I brought anything back with me. The entre conversation and approval took like 30 seconds. It's official. It would be very easy to transport illegal stuff in between the US and Canada if you're a US citizen.
I got to the Buffalo airport at about 1 and I guess I just have to sit here until I can check in at 4 something. I'm honestly really worried about my bag being lost during my layover in Cleveland. I would freak out. Hopefully I'm not so unlucky. It doesn't help that part of it is kinda being held together by duct tape. It's been a long journey and that bag has really taken a beating. A lot like my feet. I've done so much walking in the past month. I got blisters early on but I actually just developed heel spurs, but only in my right foot. It hurts to walk and there's just these shooting pains to my heel out of nowhere. I guess it's good that it's only happening now that my trip has ended.
Man I can't wait to get home though. I miss my family, my mom, grandma, and sister. I really miss my friends too. I even miss my cats like crazy. You know what I can't wait to do? Drive. I am so thrilled to get home and drive my car.
Well I'll be home at noon, so if you want to see me this week before I go up to Orlando let me know!
Stay tuned for an additional post recapping the trip, calculating trip costs, and thanking the people who made this trip possible.
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