John Mahoney

Sleep at Roland's, eat at Bogart's

MONCTON, NB | Traveler, if you need a safe haven a few minutes walk from downtown, and you desire a modicum of elegance, stay with Roland & Alice Leger at the Canadiana Inn, #46 Archibald, off Mountain Street. Ask for Room #1. Or #12.

I'm writing this in the double living room. It's filled with exquisite Victorian furniture. My light this early Wednesday morning comes from the chandelier and the stained-glass Tiffany lamp on the drop-leaf table I'm using for a desk.

On the wall in front of me, a portrait of Queen Victoria as a young woman. The heavy gilt frame is approximately four by five feet. On the desk, a small book of poems -- Flower of the Mind is open to a poem by Edmund Spencer:That may our comfort breed...

Our king-size four-poster was very comfortable and I was reluctant to leave it to do this thing. The Silver Fox remains behind, waiting for coffee call.

Polished hardwood floors and period carpeting, charming breakfast room, second storey roof deck for sipping red wine and Irish whiskey (b.y.o.), private baths. Spotless inside, unassuming outside, urban setting, some street sounds, Roland is a soft-spoken Acadian grandfather of six whose photographs share the walls with British royalty and charming maidens of a long-gone past.

$75 plus tax. Lay down your weary head in style until early November when Roland and his wife do the snowbird thing in Florida for five months.

You'll have to eat and all four of us give Bogart's Bar & Grill a big 9 out of 10. Hell, the snails in garlic, the pear poached in red wine, and the cappuccino were so good, make that a 10.

Background: Guy buys restaurant, needs a new name for it. Calls his son in Florida, asks for suggestions, Kid says, "Call it Bogart's, Dad." Elapsed time -- three minutes.

Moncton is about 250 miles from St. Stephens, at the border with Calais. Yesterday it was fog-bound and spitting rain. We took the Fundy coast road part of the way.

We stopped at St. Martins for lunch, at the Cave View Restaurant. Art and Judy had a so-so chowder, Jane and I had a chocolate milk shake. We looked at the small cave in the red cliff. We got the hell out of town.

We drove to Sussex. The women wanted to check out the stores. The brochure said it has a typical small-town business district. Art said, "Oh God, let this be the outskirts..." We got the hell out of town.

Some New Brunswick names I love: Poodiak, Anagance, Petitcodiac, Shubanackadie...

I think today's Order of Battle calls for crossing Confederation Bridge to PEI.

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