Oh Canada

Kerstin had meetings and a conference to attend in Fredericton, NB this past weekend for work and he invited Alden and me to tag along. It was my first trip to New Brunswick and Alden's first international adventure. It was also our first family trip that didn't involve visiting other family. A vacation just for the hell of it! What a concept.
The music festival we attended was called Shivering Songs, which was a folk, singer-songwriter showcase for Canadian talent (and one guy from Maine). Kerstin feels that was a real shame and hopes that they will work with him in the future to bring more Mainers to the event. If you click the link above, you can listen to a few of the artists from the festival. The music was really good and we discovered lots of artists that we really liked. We recommend giving a listen to Joe Grass, Postdata, Mark Kozelek (Sun Kil Moon guy), David Myles and Olympic Symphonium, who organized the whole event. Great music! Unfortunately I couldn't attend many of the concerts because they ran too long for Alden's attention span or ran late into the night, but we did get to go to one concert at a cafe with Alden and we really enjoyed it. Kerstin will speak more about the music in his post.
When Kerstin had meetings to attend, Alden and I explored Fredericton, which is like a cute and charming version of Lewiston/Auburn. It was similar in size and scope and had a pivotal relationship to a river, but unlike Lewiston and Auburn, it had lots of class and culture with many fine shops and great restaurants and art. Alden and I got to check out the art gallery (pictured above), which he really enjoyed.
It was really bitterly cold up there, but we still insisted on walking everywhere because that's just what you do in the city. The nice thing was that the downtown was rather compact, so it never took more than 15 minutes to get anywhere. If you didn't have to walk at a 4-year old's pace, it would probably be more like 10 minutes from one end of town to the other. Very reasonable.

On Sunday, to close the festival, there was a big ole brunch with two bluegrass bands who entertained us all. There were several hundred people in attendance, many with kids who ran around and periodically danced to the music down by the stage. Alden met a little boy only 18 months old who was also named Alden and took a shine to him immediately. I spend a good portion of the brunch chasing after the two Aldens (along with his Grandmother, who I also got to know rather well). Everyone was so friendly and wonderful. Canada rocks!

Breakfast Poutines!!
I posted this picture for Aaron. He knows why....