Visiting Matt Walter in Canada

Speedcubing is not only about solving cubes.. Through speedcubing, I also had the oppertunity to meet some great people. Matt Walter is definately one of them. I went to visit him at the end of 2006. Canada is a great country, and I really enjoyed visiting Matt. The trip was good, also because of his family... The Walters were all really good for me.	I remember the service on the first flight was excelent. The food was also pretty good.		In Washington DC, I had to get on a much smaller aircraft.
A lot of people are interested in the cube, but usually it's kids who can't keep their eyes off... I think it's because of the colors, and they just KNOW it must be a toy :).	The sky over Washington...	When I arrived at the airport, I found Matt and his father Ray rather quickly. They were so kind to pick me up from the airport. I immediately felt very welcome. We had to drive from Toronto to Southampton for about 2.5 hours.	The fireplace. Matt's parents have a very cozy home.
Maia, the dog. Same name as Matt's girlfriend, only spelled differently.	Matt and Scott. Scott is Tamara's boyfriend, and Tamara is Matt's sister.	Matt's home in Southampton.	Matt took me to Tim Hortons for the first time. I loved it! I took the 'Toated Chicken Club' sandwich :).
Just enjoying my meal...	I was a real tourist. I took pictures of everything...	Some guy gave Matt a call because he had a puzzle. He wanted to see if it's possible to produce it. As it turns out, the idea of the puzzle is well know. It's usually called something like 'Chinese rings'.	I tried to explain some blindfold cubing to Matt. He still need to practice it more!
Matt is trying some things I explained to him.	I also practiced quite a few BLD solves during my visit. I really think I gained some speed because of it.	Marlene, Ray and Matt taking a look at a puzzle I gave them. Marlene also gave us some 'lateral thinking' puzzles during dinner. One of them kept me busy for about 2 days.	We went out to celebrate 'wing-night'. Something the 'local youth' does in that area. Just drinking beer and eating chicken wings, basically. We went out early, so we had a lot of time to play a few games of pool.
Tamara setting up the game.	Sarah taking her best shot.	Tamara talking to her boyfriend Scott.	I think we were about to leave here, and Sarah looks a bit like she's waiting.. But then Matt kept on running into old friends.
	Because of the time difference, it wasn't hard for me to get up early the first morning. I took some pictures of the environment. The roads there look different from the roads in Holland.	Nice pattern of clouds in the sky.	Sarah trying out that 'Chinese' rings puzzle. Bob (the owner) let us keep a little while so we could try to find a solution method for it.
Matt took me to a beauful place called 'Lions head'. There were some rocks/cliffs there, so we had to hike around a lot.		I was quite shocked when I got this view. I was walking around on the cliffs surrounded by trees, and I didn't know I was this high, when suddenly I looked down and saw how high we were... That was pretty scary actually!	I was trying to make some good shots, so I gave Matt some directions. I still remember saying: "Can you move back just a tiny little bit more?". And Matt replying: "What.. Are you trying to get me killed?!".

	Tamara and Scott playing a card game. I think it was poker.		That day Dave Campbell showed up. He was there to stay for a day or three. We all had a lot of fun, the three of us.
Matt's mother had books about 'lateral thinking puzzles'. She practices those kind of puzzle with her pupils at school. (She's a teacher)	A close up of DaveC's hands. The header of www.solvethecube.co.uk is made using this very picture.	The three of us went to 'Boston Pizza' to bug Maya, who works there. We made her a little nervous, just by showing up.	On Matt's request, I brought her a little souvenir from the Netherlands. (Something she bought in the Netherlands, but lost it later on her trip). She was very surprised.
			Matt managed to take a cube out of the packaging at Wall-Mart. I then applied one of my favourite pretty patteren algorithms to it :).
Three cubers on a sofa.	Three non-cubers on a sofa. Tamara, Kateland and Maya.	Everybody gathering in the basement to watch a big fight.	The next morning, I went to a catholic mass for the first time in ages.
That night it was new years eve. Matt's parents went out to diner to a very fancy restaurant with a good friend of them. The kids were stuck at home. We played games, had beer and we all had a great evening. Playing games is something I usually do with my parents on new years eve, so playing games really felt good :). Thanks guys!			We took some shots at 0:00 to celebrate the new year.
	Before we went out to a bar, Tamara had to try this game... She was pretty tipsy while attempting this, and that is a nice way to put it.
	I can't remember what this is all about, but it's one of the most weird pictures I took.		We also did quite a lot of team-solves, which resulted in a new unofficial World Record!! I remember one solve where we almost broke 40 seconds, if it weren't for that ugly E permutation to come up... We immediately made agreements for what to do in that case.
Ray making a few piles of cards. They taught me a new card game. I remember it was fun playing it. I remember it was about guessing your score before playing, and then you could earn points if your initial guess was right.	Matt's mother apparently also enjoyed the game.	Packing for Toronto. With my new 2nd Generation Timer, I could put other things in my little Stackmat case :).	This one is shot from the rooftop of our hotel.
They even had 2 pools up there! Also, there was a video screen but there was usually just rubish on there.	Matt and Sarah, brother and sister, posing together.	We went to Eaton's Center; a big mall downtown Toronto. Christmas just passed, so there was still a lot of Christmas decoration everywhere.	Eaton's Center was quite big. Lot's of escalators.
Matt took me to a nice shop that had a few puzzles. I also bought a little wooden slidepuzzle there (it's called 'Klotski', maybe you know it).			This is a very nice shot. We had a lot of fun showing each other our best moves and tricks. And also on this picture: Heineken!! It's one of my favourite beer's, and it turns out to be quite popular and well known in Canada as well.
Another shot from the rooftop of the hotel, but this time it's getting dark.		The hotel was very fancy. Matt's cousin worked at the hotel, so Matt's parents got the hotelroom with a very generous discount. Thanks Robin ;).	We also went all the way up the CN Tower.
And once we got up there, Matt started joking: "I spy with my little eye..."	As you can see, this tower is really high!	I enjoyed making random pictures to capture what the streets in Toronto look like. I also like the colorful cab on this picture.
Later, towards the evening, we all went to Chinatown together.			We went to a very nice restaurant to have some real good sushi!
We tried solving the cube with chopsticks. I sucked at it, but Matt's really good.	The Japanese beer tasted very good.
We went to 'The worlds biggest book store'. I don't know if it's true, but this is how they call themselves. And I have to admit, it was huge. I bought a little book myself, about how men are from Mars, and women are from Venus. Still didn't read all of it.	That night, I was really starting to worry about Matt's morbide obsession with the cube. I had seen cube addicts before, but this was freaky.	He doesn't look very freaky here, but there was one picture where he really looks scary... Obsesively trying out all kinds of algorithms. I didn't upload it here, because I like Matt too much :).	Matt's parents were so kind, and they took me to Niagra Falls. It was a real nice place, but from all the things I've seen in movies, I actually expected it to be a lot bigger. But it was still nice to see such a famous landmark in real life.


		This is one of my favourites. Not a great picture, but I like the double-rainbow on it. If you look closely, you can see that on the second rainbow, the order of the colors is reversed... Can you explain why?	We went to the art gallery. The biggest part of the gallery was closed, which was a big dissapointment for everybody. We only got to see a glimps of the collection.
There was a huge corridor with art made by the public. Everbody can send in their own 'self portrait'.	We went to a very nice Italian restaurant called 'Alice Fazooli's'. This was Robin's idea. Robin is Matt's cousin, who arranged our hotelroom. Thanks again Robin ;). Even though it was Italian, they didn't have many pizza's. Most of it was Pasta.
	Breakfast at the hotel.	The hotel had a very good shuttle service to any location within a certain range.	We went to the science center, where the WC was held back in 2003. This security gard who saw me cubing on the escelator didn't just ask me to show it to him, he loudly gathered a crowd, and he made me and Matt race each other.
The audience counted and it took us 11 seconds... Or did they count a little too slow?
	Two models of the solar system. The earth in the middle (on the left) or the sun in the middle (on the right). Both models are accurate, and useful.	Back home in Southampton. Matt couldn't take it anymore. He just HAD TO solve that metal puzzle.	A few moments later, he really started to get the hang of how it works.
...And eventually, he even solved the thing!	Later that night, Matt took me to meet his friends. He's lucky to have some very nice friends. They were playing a video game, drinking beer, and discussing global warming.
	I even learned something new there; placing the cap of a beerbottle on your forehead. Not sure if that will ever come in handy in real life.
		As you can see the ambiance was really good.	We then went to this sketchy bar 'the bucket' again. I drunk beer like... forever there. And this guy Zack kept on ordering big pints of it.
For the last night, we went to Dave Campbell's place, because he lives relatively close to the airport. On our way, we stopped at Tim Hortons again.

And then Dave was so kind to take us out to dinner. The pizza's were great. When we entered the restaurant, Dava had to give our names, so he just said: "Cubers". And when it was our turn, Matt and I were quite surprised someone just called: "Cubers!!". :)		Models of the deserts, real size! That's actually a great idea, because on the menu they usually look a lot bigger than their real size.
Back at Dave's place. Dave had this wooden puzzle with 6 pieces, and Matt and I practice finger tricks for it and stuff! We kept on breaking each others record, until I got around 4-5 seconds, and Matt got down to about 3 seconds! On the previous picture, he made a pile of cubes to prevent me from peeking to see his new 'secret' method.	The trip back was awefull. 3 flights!! It made me so tired. In Frankfurt, I had to wait for like... 7 hours!	Finally, I got back home...
Home sweet home! Even though I really LOVED going to Canada, and Matt's family made me feel so welcome, I really loved being back in Holland again. The trip back was so long, but it was all worth it. My dad picked me up at the airport... And then the car broke down so it took me some time to get back home. Anyway, great trip! Canada is great!