Canada Trip - Old Quebec City - Day 2

After checking out on Monday our first destination was to check out the luxurious interior of the Hotel Frontenac. This place just exuded excess with painted ceilings, stained glass windows, chandeliers, armorial shields, gilt everywhere, and a bevy of staff. Even the fire hose had a stained glass door. The cheapest room appeared to be about 3 times what we paid for our cupboard. There are plenty of green public spaces with statues, and fountains, and did I mention cannons? From the battlements we could see the Lower Town along the River St-Laurent, and some of the archaelogical diggings there. We also found the earliest graveyard, which stopped being used in 1687. There didn't appear to be any gravestones at all. In the lower town some buildings had been painted with frescoes, and there were people in period costumes, quite a lively Market-square, and plenty of shops. The Hotel du Parlement is quite an impressive building with a huge fountain out the front. Eventually we headed back to the Railway Station for the trip back to Montreal, enjoying a lovely sunset on the way, and arrived back around 9pm.

Canada Trip - Old Quebec City - Day 1

On Sunday we took the train to Quebec City, specifically to visit the old city. It left exactly on time at 9am, and was extremely comfortable including power, plenty of legroom and free WIFI (QR, and even our airlines could take some lessons here). We arrived at the 'Gare du Palais' and a short uphill walk took us to the city walls (this is the only walled city north of Mexico), past some interesting street sculptures and a cute little electric bus. The city was founded in 1608 and is a world heritage site. The streets are in no order whatsoever, so it took a while to find the Tourist Info Centre, but eventually it was located. Passing some street performance in the square, we then took our small overnight bags to our hotel - Hotel Louisbourg, and were able to check in, even though it was early. The room was minute, and at the top of an old wooden staircase. There were only 4 rooms on each floor. As usual we went in search of a supermarket to get food. This was outside 'Old Quebec' and we had to somehow fight through a very large crowd of older people who seemed to be lined up to see a Johnny Cash show. We had an audio walking tour on the iPod, and a few different walking tours in a book, but kept getting lost with where they were up to, so we opted to wander around, and I listened to the MP3s at the relevant spots. Our tour took us along the edge of the escarpment on Terrasse Dufferin (a boardwalk), and the Promenade des Gouvernors (with 310 steps). This brought us to the Plains of Abraham & Parc des Champs-de-Bataille,, battle sites from 1759/60. From here we walked up to the fortifications and the the Citadelle, which we were surprised to find is still a military base for the Royal 22^nd Regiment. There was a sentry outside in camouflage uniform, and inside were two sentries in pill-boxes, they seemed to be keeping very still, and we eventually realised they were actually dummies! The one outside was definitely real. We have never seen so many cannons in one location! The streets were also crowded with lots of tourists, some being conveyed by horse and cart. A street performer put on a good show with acrobatics, unicycling tricks and juggling. There are some really beautiful old stone buildings inside the walls, but it is a shame where modern ones, which look out of place have been built.

Canada Trip - Montreal Day 8

On Saturday Darryl and I took the Metro into the city. We picked up our rail tickets and then made our way to the Jean Talon Markets. Walking out of the Metro we turned the wrong way so also had a look at St Hubert, where there were lots of Wedding, Formal Dress and Shoe shops. The Jean Talon Markets are a large fresh food market, with fruits and vegetables, cheese, seafood, flowers & meats. Shane joined us and we had lunch before heading to the Festivals. We watched some performances at the African Festival. Darryl seemed to enjoy it even thought he slept (he had been woken by some returning party-goers in the early hours and not been able to get back to sleep). I thought the first band was terrible, the second and third weren't too bad, although the music seemed more Latino than African. Shane got bored so went home early. Eventually we moved on to the Montreal Comedy Festival precinct, and got some freebies, watched 'Just for Laughs', and other street games and performers, before going home too.