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8th Annual Gathering of the Gargoyles
Montreal, Quebec, Canada 
August 6-8, 2004

As seen through mine eyes.

Monday, August 9, 2004

The Gathering was over and it was time to head home. Vash, Sean and myself 
headed down to the hotel's restaurant for some breakfast. We ran into a few 
other con attendees and sat down for breakfast. I checked the scores for the 
previous night's Red Sox game. They won against Detroit, so that put me in a 
good mood. (Oddly enough, as I write this, are in the middle of a 4-game 
series against Detroit at home.)

As we were checking out I ran into Karine who was leading a group to La Ronde, 
an amusement park in Montreal. I asked to if she'd be around for the 2005 con 
and whether or not she'd bring her son along. Yes on both accounts, to which I 
made a preemptive apology for just wrecking the pronunciation of his name. Even 
though my ancestry is half French, I still can't figure out just how to 
pronounce French words. Vash tried to teach me a little, but about all I picked 
up was that names ending in a consonant almost never pronounce that last 
consonant. Maybe I'll take a French class before the next con so I can pronounce
both her and her son's name properly. I figure its the least I could do after 
she put together such a great con.

The plan was to leave by 10am, but we wound up leaving the hotel around 11. It 
was a journey in itself to find our way out of the parking garage. The hotel 
garage was a small subsection of a much larger underground garage. We were given
a ticket, then entered into the larger (and more clean) garage where we had to 
give the attendee our ticket to get out. 

Bam. We're on our way. Navigating the autoroutes wasn't a big problem and the 
signs for New York certainly didn't hurt either. We made it to the border within
a half hour. At the border we stopped at the duty free shop to exchange all our 
Canadian currency back into American. Once we got out of the shop we got into 
line for customs. We were in line for maybe 45 minutes, the customs agent 
quickly checked the trunk, then we were on our way.

It was nice to know that the trip back would be about 400 miles shorter, and 
thus a bit shorter in time.

Down through I-80 in upstate New York, we were treated to some great 
landscapes. I tried to get a bit of it on film and Vash helped out so I wasn't 
driving all over the road. We passed a sign for a "Gore Mountain" but the video 
camera was off at that moment. I think we've got a shot of the thing on camera, 
but we didn't really know which mountain was "Gore Mountain". Seems every con I 
find something related to s8. Although the 1997 con's find, a sign that said 
"S8" inside a subway station, takes the cake.

We got into traffic early on and that ate up about an hour. It turns out a bus 
had caught fire on the highway. It looks like it started in the luggage 
compartment, but it may also have started around the tire.

Smooth sailing down through I-80 as we headed into Albany. I had Vash and Sean 
keep their eyes peeled for more I-80 signs. I wasn't going to get lost again. 
We found the correct ramp to take to continue on I-80 and picked up our toll 
ticket. As we got in line for the toll, my low-fuel warning came on. Uhoh. I 
had been hoping to make it past Albany before I refueled. If I pulled that off 
I knew I could get home without having to stop again. As got back onto I-80, 
we saw a sign for the next service station to be 18 miles away. Was there 
enough gas for 18 miles? We'd find out.

Turns out, yeah, it was enough. I filled up the tank and found that I had about 
half a gallon left in the tank when we pulled in. Now these toll-highway rest 
areas are an odd thing. It's all one-way roads, with the gas station coming 
after the food and services building. Well I hit the gas station first (not 
knowing how much gas I had left). We couldn't get back to the services building.
So we grabbed an "employees only" parking spot at the gas station and headed 
back to get some food. 

No worries. We were in and out inside of 30 minutes, and back on the highway. We
were across the Tappan Zee bridge and into New York City by early evening. Vash 
helped me navigate through the various parkways, and we made it into The Bronx 
and I dropped Sean and Vash off. I was now on my own.

I quickly found trouble as I made a wrong turn to get onto the Pelham Parkway. As 
I backtracked, I took just about the same route we took when we left the Bronx on 
Thursday. However, I started to get nervous as I saw signs telling me that the 
I-95 on-ramp was closed. But there was a detour, and after a few moments of worry 
I was on I-95 and on my way home.

I got home a little before 10pm, just enough time to get to the grocery store 
before it closed. I grabbed something to eat and finished about a third of it 
before falling asleep on the couch.

It was a long drive. It was an experience. But I'm really glad I made it to this 
year's con. I had the best con experience at this year's con and really enjoyed 
it. I can't wait for 2005. It's going to be huge.


- Eric "Gorebash" Tribou