Cheesy chips Québécois style

A lovely post from Steph - rather than freezing our butts off in the UK, we could be getting uber-cold in Montreal. Sounds so good though!

Today, while wandering around Soho looking for an appetising lunch, I found myself far removed from the elbow-shoving, bustling masses intent on finishing their Christmas shopping, as I stared wistfully up at the sky. What a gorgeous day. And it’s fresh, wintry blue-sky days like today that take me back to a two-week Christmas break in Montréal.

OK, so the freshness of a Montréal winter day differs from a London winter day by about 30 or so degrees but you see where I'm going with this. The air is in fact so cold that inhaling becomes almost euphoric in its freshness and you can't help but marvel at the magical frozen stalactites that have formed in your nostrils. After ten minutes you begin to suffer a lesser-known ailment known as face ache and after fifteen minutes... well, who knows because by this point you're indoors gasping.

It is cold in Montreal.

So you will often spot chilly Montréalers warming their tummies with a bowl of local delicacy poutine. This holy trinity of fries, gravy and cheese curds is the quintessential Québécian comfort food and is best enjoyed with a mug of beer.

And what more could you want from a winter break? Check out these bars as recommended by Vicky Baker in today’s Guardian and I defy you not to Google ‘cheap flights Quebec’. Let me save you the trouble: head straight to Zoom Airlines or Canadian Affair. Don’t forget your mittens.

Far from the wild...

This is a sort of train of conciousness from my friend Sarah who works with me... She went to see 'Into the Wild' and I think she may have enjoyed it... Over to you Sarah!

I watched Sean Penn's Into the Wild, got home, dug out my rucksack (Bernie) and thought about whether a mozzie net would come in handy in Alaska. I stood there for about ten minutes; net in one hand, sleeping bag in the other, trying to figure out how much warm clothing I'd be able to fit if I took my second-hand Eurohike two-man tent with me. I went online and started googling 'cheap flights Fairbanks' whilst eating a bowl of Shreddies (perhaps my last for a long time if I could find a flight that left the next day).

I knew I should really be brushing my teeth and getting a good night's sleep so I could crawl out of bed the next morning for work (I hate getting up early) but I figured if Chris Mccandless aka Alexander Supertramp could give up everything and just take off - why couldn't I? This 23-year-old nomadic creature trekked his way around the States with little more than the clothes on his back for nearly three years. No real work, no responsibilities, no one to answer to. I missed that. I missed that year and a half between the lazy life of a student and the full-time regularity of ninetofive-living when I took off with my sister into the unknown. Into the wild. Well, perhaps not the wild but the busy streets of New Delhi and beyond.

I checked my diary and figured with the two weeks' holiday I have left to take I could do a whirlwind tour of all the open spaces and inches of snow the Last Frontier has to offer. Find some firewood, build my own hot-water shower, kill a moose. How hard could it be? I'd come back all refreshed from my dangerous adventure with a healthy tan, a smaller waist and a beard, plus, it's not like I'd have many expenses whilst I'm away - a machete, a gun and a few cans of lighter fuel ought to do the trick. Who said roughing it was hard work? Sounds like a dream to me. Now alI I need to do is find some kind of abandoned vehicle to sleep in...

I switched on an episode of the West Wing whilst I tried to figure out how much it would cost to hire a centrally-heated campervan with off-road capabilities for two weeks. In between marvelling at the beauty that is Bradley Whitford and Richard Schiff's furrowed brow, I got thinking about a rainy weekend I spent in Nha Trang on Vietnam's stunning coastline. There's something so brilliant and comforting about being half way round the world and renting a DVD player to watch episodes of your favourite shows. You probably couldn't do that in the wilds of Alaska, and I bet they don't have Marmite. I found Marmite at the Lazy Gecko cafe by Boeung Kak Lake in Phnom Penh and I think partly because it was so far from home, and partly because I'd been eating A LOT of curries - it had never tasted so good.

I found the cheapest deal for my flight to Fairbanks. £1,310 with Air France, leaving the next day. Only the flight left at 6.30 in the morning, and I hate getting up early. So I put my rucksack away and settled down to watch President Bartlett and the boys do their thing with a packet of peanut butter M&Ms and thought of it no more for the rest of the night.

I'm worried that somewhere between receiving a monthly paycheck, shopping regularly at Sainsburys and falling in love with a number of fictional TV characters, I've lost my sense of adventure.

Anyone for two weeks at Butlins?

The first book review - Are you experienced?

This is a great review that my girlfriend wrote for Real Travel Magazine of her favourite travel book, 'Are you experienced?' by William Sutcliffe. It is the perfect 'lazing in a hammock' read for any book loving traveller! Thanks Stephaz!


Nineteen year-old Londoner, Dave, decides to embark on a pre-university gap year in a Swiss ski resort. That is, until best mate James, who is about to go trekking in the Himalayas, mocks him royally: “Do you want to learn Fwench David? Something pwactical for your CV?"

Screw Switzerland – Dave has to prove everyone wrong so he agrees to travel around India with James’ gorgeous girlfriend Liz. He is scared witless and hasn’t a clue what to expect but the thought of spending months alone with Liz (who he suspects fancies him more than a little bit) is too much to ignore. And so begins this hilarious traveller’s satire.

While sari-clad Liz’s idea of self-discovery involves washing lepers and practising ‘Intimate Yoga’, Dave struggles to shake his cynicism… not to mention a bad case of Delhi belly.

Sutcliffe does an impeccable job of depicting the glorious ‘backpacker’ stereotypes we are all so familiar with. While Are you Experienced? is predominantly a hilarious travel book (which is quite rare), it is also clever and at times, touching. Even though it was published 8 years ago, it certainly hasn’t lost its edge.

I can remember reading this book in one sitting aged fifteen, and thinking ‘wow, I wish I was brave enough to go to India’. I re-read it last summer, in the back of a dilapidated old car on the way to a deserted Goan beach. It is one of those cult travel books that will forever grace the backpacks of travellers worldwide.

The first post - wow!

I guess 'hello' is as good a place to start as any so hello and welcome to my new blog. I had the idea for The Two Week Backpacker one lunchtime after struggling to find inspiration and ideas for backpacking holidays and that don't involve paying a tour company thousands of pounds but also are a bit off the beaten track because I don't want to share a beach with a fat bald englishman in an England shirt doing the dance from Gazza's hit 'Fog on the Tyne'.

I mulled over where I could find such nuggets of advice and I thought who better to ask than the great global travelling community. People have been everywhere, maybe they can help me choose where to go? Maybe they can save me money and maybe, just maybe, they would like to send me stories about places they have been so other travellers can read them! I thought to myself that this idea had everything - friends, travel, adventure - brilliant!

So, here we are at the birth of The Two Week Backpacker. This is only going to work if you send me stuff to post as I haven't been everywhere. I have been to Malaysia, Egypt, Singapore, Germany, France, Thailand, Australia, Jordan, France and Wales but there is more, so much more and I want to learn about it, if you want to share it. So please email me your pics (up to 2 per story), your travel stories (condensed) and any tips, advice, links to great sites or anything travel you have found that is cool to djennay@hotmail.com and let's make this baby work!