We headed to Québec City on the 21st of June right after hs' medical anthropology lecture =)
At Gare Centrale, I was so excited. Even over the information board. T'was my first trip out of Montréal by train, you see.
We reached Québec City at around 9pm (it was just starting to get dark), and had a few nice uphill climbs before we finally reached the hostel: Auberge internationale de Québec! Well I shouldn't be grumbling because it was perfectly located and it was one of the better hostels we stayed at during our travels. Apart from the uphill climb, that is. Gosh, what a lazy bum I am. After we dumped our luggage, we headed out to walk around the Old Town: appetizer for the following day's travels! We wandered a little out of the Old Town by following the crowd and general noise level to see a stage and some performances.... in French. Obviously we didn't know what the crowd was roaring in laughter about, so we didn't exactly stay for long. I think it was part of the Just for Laughs Festival..? [edit] hs says its another comedy festival because Just for Laughs is Montréal only. [/edit] hs was saying that if we actually got caught in some prank in Montréal during this period, we might actually be on TVs worldwide! Yes.... endless re-runs on TV Mobile in sg... urhm... maybe no thanks. =P Dinner was at McDonalds because it was the first restaurant I saw when we turned into the Old Town and I instantly had a craving for it. We stopped by a little provision store to get some water, and the store owner was really friendly! He tried to sell us beer, but all we wanted was water. I can't remember the conversation, but it was really funny, because he had this look of mock? disbelief on his face. "water? just water?"
Speaking of which, McDonalds in Québec seem to have really great chicken nuggets. I kid you not. It was my first meal in Montréal after my harrowing luggage experience and I wasn't feeling too happy about my entire trip although I got to see hs in person for the first time in 5 months. The succulent nuggets were the 1st thing that cheered me up. Hot, tender and juicy on the inside, and nicely textured on the outside. At first I thought it was just unique to that particular McDonalds on rue St. Catherine, and then I ate at another branch, and in Québec City too and IT ALL TASTES LOVELY!!
I'm waxing lyrical about chicken nuggets. HELP.
Their fries aren't as good though.
The next day, after a good breakfast at the hostel, we erm, tried to find our way to La Citadelle, where according to Lonely Planet, was a changing of the guard ceremony at 10am in summer. We didn't get there in time - in fact, whether we even ended up in the right place is suspect, but we did get a breath-taking view of the Saint Laurent/Lawrence river.
After that, it was essentially the Lonely Planet suggested walking tour, with plenty of deviations along the way. Yea, well, we aren't that well versed in Québec history, nor can we speak enough French to confidently navigate our way outside the Old Town, nor did we have a lot of time, so we decided to do the simple touristy stuff.
A nice shadow shot. Its still early in the morning and the birds are singing and I'm typing rubbish~~
A very pretty restaurant window. The prices were prettier. Ouch.
I think this is titled, urm, sans titre (Untitled), a sculpture by Jules La-salle honouring the women of religious orders who came to Québec and educated the French and First Nations girls. I don't know how the balloons got stuck there, or who did it, but its a pretty nice effect, don't you think? Plus the next day was Jean-Baptist day and the place was generally in a festive mood. The majestic building at the back's the Château Frontenac , a really luxurious hotel. And when they said that the toilets were meant for hotel guests only, they really meant it: access was by hotel card only. I managed to use it only because someone coincidentally opened the door just as I reached it, but too bad for hs. =P
We were strolling down some road when this guy painting that door hailed us from across the road and struck a pose! I must say that I was very amazed at the warmth and friendliness of the people in QC and Montréal, I can't think of any place I've been to so far that actually makes you feel this welcomed! Its like, people can just strike up a conversation with you, like the grocery store owner from the previous day, or this man during the Montréal fireworks festival(?) who came up as hs was trying to take a picture of Vieux Montréal all lighted up and said "Yes, take a picture! I've lived here all my life, and this is one of the prettiest views of Montréal! Go ahead! Enjoy!" There's just something about living in Montréal (I can't say much about Québec City because I was only there for, 2 days?) that, I don't know, makes you feel really cheerful and happy about life and all ready to reach out to the next person! (Okay I digress a lot)
Fire escapes. The first few were fascinating... after which.. urm. Yes. Heh.
This. is. a. university. building. Laval University, in the Latin Quarter. I don't want to start comparing university buildings, it'd break my heart. Sighhhhhh. Isn't it pretty?
Just another of the charming doors that are everywhere in the Old Town. Its so... countryside-ish and idyllic looking.
Oh, we noticed wet spots on the floor near those window flowers sometimes, and eventually realised that if one's really lucky, one could receive, uhm, a shower of blessings. This observation came about because we narrowly missed one. It happened in Deutschland for me too. Pretty flowers essentially means that some maintenance must exist, especially in the late mornings.
I wanted a picture of this because as a 3year old kid I took a picture at Sentosa with a similar looking canon. It'd be interesting to do a comparison, 17 years on =) There were many canons located around the Old Town: a testimony to all the clashes between the British and French in their history. Québec City is really steeped in history - its really unfortunate that we can't appreciate the significance of much of it because we aren't schooled in it.
According to Lonely Planet, this is a very unique house. Because it has Roman and Gothic arches, an Art Noveau balcony, a renaissance ledge and a medieval château tower. Can you spot them?
This, if my memory doesn't fail me, is the back of a restaurant. To be fair, its one of the prettier ones - we did walk down a few back alleys that weren't quite as pretty.
At rue St-Antoine, where the city marked the shoreline of the St Lawrence River during the history of the settlement. 1600, 1700 and 1800. Today, the shoreline is a good distance away.
If hs' is in one of those pictures and these pictures were taken with his digital SLR, it means only one thing: I TOOK A PICTURE USING A DIGITAL SLR!!!! WOOHOOO!!!! That's my first picture!!
The very picturesque rue du Petit-Champlain, said to be the narrowest street (and one of the oldest) in North America. Tis part of the Old Lower Town. And when it was thronged with tourists, it really isn't funny.
When they say Old Upper Town and Old Lower Town, they literally mean it. Loads of steps and slopes to climb, and if you don't plan your trip properly (like us) or if you get lost (like us), you are so going to end up with wonder calve muscles, which will promptly degenerate into fat if you don't keep up the exercise (like me.)
Can you spot the real and the fake? Its a wall mural!
Heh. =)
The Église Notre-Dame-Des-Victoires (Our Lady of Victories), which dates from 1688 and is the oldest stone church in the US and Canada. When we doubled back in the afternoon, there was a wedding party there. It was really pretty.
Le Petit Cochon Dingue: lunch! At the Vieux Port.
It seemed like a good idea to dine al-fresco, because of the lovely weather and the equally lovely scenery, until we realised that the road was actually pretty heavily utilised by huge container trucks. It is near the port, after all. Notice that hs was drinking apfelsaft! After all my whining about how much I miss apfelsaft after leaving deutschland, he included them in the weekly grocery shopping list and we finished the 1.5l bottles from Provigo really quickly. And kept ordering apple juice when dining out. I miss the Provigo apple juice....!!!!!! ARGHHHH.
Big bird on the loose! Stop the pecking!
An archaeological dig just next to the Château Frontenac. Like I said, loads of history. Parts of the Terrasse Dufferin were cordoned off because of it, but it still is a pretty place. It would have been prettier if it wasn't so cloudy that day, but I'm not complaining. Its still incredibly pretty. I think I wanted to have ice cream here but the crowd was horrendous, so I give up that thought. Or did I? Hmm.
Because we wanted to uh, go off the beaten path. I cannot describe the feeling of seeing all these buildings and flora and fauna. I don't know, I've always thought that the vegetation in temperate countries look a gazillion times nicer than the tropics (I KNOW that the tropics have greater biodiversity, but I just prefer the quiet beauty of the temperate regions. And tundra.)
Dinner was at Casse-Crêpe Breton, because it was one of the cheap eats that wasn't fast food, and it was near the hostel. The crêpes were sooooo good mmmmm. Essentially you made your own crêpes by selecting the ingredients from a menu, and the price was proportional to what you selected. It was an eye-opener for hs, who said that he never ate a crêpe before. Then because I insisted on doing some shopping, we headed to Simons, which was there since 1870. I didn't get anything, because there was a smaller selection than what was available in Montréal anyway. I think hs got some socks. Heh.
Night time Québec City. It was cold. I was cold. But it was oh-so-pretty.
We headed back after a while - I can't remember now, I must have been really tired.
The eve of St Jean Baptiste day! We should have planned to stay in Québec City for the celebrations; it would have been grander than that in Montréal. That was sadly evinced by the fact that most people were coming into Québec on the day that we were living, and nearly all the hotels/hostels that we passed by had signs that stated that they were full. It also meant that we couldn't have extended our stay anyway.
Outside the hostel - what a rare successful self shot!
We spent the morning shopping. Hs got a really funny shirt of a beaver with a twig behind its 2 front teeth with the caption "Dam it!" We spent SO much time in that shop looking at displays (think they are called war dioramas), trying on stuff (well, hs was told that the hat he tried on was for females, much to his embarrassment and to my amusement), laughing at really great T shirt captions, ogling at pricey Inuit carvings of polar bears...
And there were so many shops selling medieval related stuff! Some of the jewellery were really pretty and I was sooooooo tempted but the prices were a huge deterrent. The dresses were so nice too! (The little girl in me is fighting to get out)
I was excited that day, because we were going to try rabbit's meat!
Le Lapin Sauté. It was expensive (by our budgets, anyway) but worth it, because I wanted to try rabbit meat. Isn't the sign absolutely adorable?
I had a very interesting conversation with my mum that morning. I msg-ed her saying that I was in Québec City and that I was going to try rabbit meat for lunch, and she msged back saying that since I was born in the Year of the Rabbit, I shouldn't be eating it because it's inauspicious and blahblahblah. I gaped at the logic for a while before sending "Erm, so since you're born in the Year of the Rooster, stop eating chicken, okay?"
Rabbit meat's really interesting. There isn't a strong taste actually - I'm not sure if the bak-kwa taste was due to the rabbit or to the method of preparation, either way, it tasted great with the preserved sweet onions and radish. -mops up drool on keyboard-
I wasn't too fond of the cheese, nor the slices of paprika drenched in oil. The tomatoes on focciata bread were good, though. AND that huge piece of bread there? It was freshly baked: warm to the touch, absolutely soft on the inside and nicely crunchy on the outside. It was heavenly with spread butter. I could just have that for the entire meal!
After lunch it was about time for us to head to Gare du Palais, so we trudged back to the hostel, collected our luggage and walked past the hordes of Quebecers gearing up to party the evening and night away, some of whom wished us a happy St Jean Baptiste Day. (It rhymes!)
Yay Québec!
Hs said he wanted to take pictures of the station, so I was left sitting there with all our luggage.
Oh, before that, we bought one final McDonald's meal to eat on the train (but we finished it up while waiting for it anyway). Chicken nuggets <3 and the lemon tea isn't the crappy kind that sg now serves. I have got to stop extolling the greatness of McDonalds.
And so it was back to Montréal.
And so we wandered down a random street stuffed full of cafes, restaurants, eateries...
Graffiti that cracked me up! Its pretty smart. I wonder if the lamp works at night =P
A random pretty picture that caught my eye. The thing is, Montreal (or Quebec as a whole) is essentially a mixture of North America and Europe. Which makes it all very interesting. (Insert -I want to come back for exchange!!!-)
We finally hit Rue St Denis. I wanted a mini French-English dictionary since about a week ago, kinda like my Oxford German-English dictionary but I couldn't find it in the Indigo (bookshop) along St. Catherine's. (That's the Montreal version of our Orchard Road, except that its waaaaaaaay longer than little Orchard - I'd elaborate in a while) Finally settled on this little one; its not a direct match, but it has little snippets of life in France at the back, which would make for entertaining reading. Or so I thought. NowI think I should have gotten the other version. The little dictionary of german proverbs is really cool! Heh. Little gems like "Die Irrtümer des Artztes deckt die Erde" (The doctor's errors are covered by earth) - LOLLL!!! And yup, sien, there are latin books and dictionaries so you could consider going.
He had to leave after a while so I spent some time in the Librairie browsing. Then I wanted to head to St Catherine's but I took a wrong turn somewhere and ended up in The (gay) Village. Pretty evident from all the rainbow flags. However, there were too many beggars around and shifty looking people and I got freaked out and decided to bail out at the next Metro station I see. This is the parting picture - even the Metro station for the Village's decked out in rainbow colours. hs was fascinated though, says he's never been there.
Even the Metro looked a bit creepy. Long paths, echoes, and few people. Ugh.
We decided to try ice wine today! After all the hooha in germany about how cheap ice wine there is, how rare and exquisite it is and how dreadfully expensive it is in singapore, I was naturally curious to know how it tasted like. It was with much glee that I lernt that the 2 best ice wine producing countries in the world are germany and.... canada. =) Since local produce are always cheaper than imports, surely there must be some reasonably priced ice wine somewhere... right? Yep. At the giant sized Société des alcools du Québec (SAQ) somewhere downtown. We went at closing time, so I guess the staff was in a hurry to get us out. We asked for ice wine, and the staff recommended this little bottle for $60. Overestimate la. Eventually settled for the cheapest one at $22. Wine drinkers would probably laugh at our little cheap bottle but hey, everyone's gotta start somewhere.
Ice wine!! Forgive me if the picture is a bit blurry - I'm a bit tipsy. I don't drink because I absolutely hate the smell and taste of alcohol (don't tell me alcohol's odourless and tasteless because I can smell and taste it.) but ice wine's really sweet. Definitely my favourite so far.
And so we wandered down a random street stuffed full of cafes, restaurants, eateries...
Graffiti that cracked me up! Its pretty smart. I wonder if the lamp works at night =P
A random pretty picture that caught my eye. The thing is, Montreal (or Quebec as a whole) is essentially a mixture of North America and Europe. Which makes it all very interesting. (Insert -I want to come back for exchange!!!-)
We finally hit Rue St Denis. I wanted a mini French-English dictionary since about a week ago, kinda like my Oxford German-English dictionary but I couldn't find it in the Indigo (bookshop) along St. Catherine's. (That's the Montreal version of our Orchard Road, except that its waaaaaaaay longer than little Orchard - I'd elaborate in a while) Finally settled on this little one; its not a direct match, but it has little snippets of life in France at the back, which would make for entertaining reading. Or so I thought. NowI think I should have gotten the other version. The little dictionary of german proverbs is really cool! Heh. Little gems like "Die Irrtümer des Artztes deckt die Erde" (The doctor's errors are covered by earth) - LOLLL!!! And yup, sien, there are latin books and dictionaries so you could consider going.
He had to leave after a while so I spent some time in the Librairie browsing. Then I wanted to head to St Catherine's but I took a wrong turn somewhere and ended up in The (gay) Village. Pretty evident from all the rainbow flags. However, there were too many beggars around and shifty looking people and I got freaked out and decided to bail out at the next Metro station I see. This is the parting picture - even the Metro station for the Village's decked out in rainbow colours. hs was fascinated though, says he's never been there.
Even the Metro looked a bit creepy. Long paths, echoes, and few people. Ugh.
We decided to try ice wine today! After all the hooha in germany about how cheap ice wine there is, how rare and exquisite it is and how dreadfully expensive it is in singapore, I was naturally curious to know how it tasted like. It was with much glee that I lernt that the 2 best ice wine producing countries in the world are germany and.... canada. =) Since local produce are always cheaper than imports, surely there must be some reasonably priced ice wine somewhere... right? Yep. At the giant sized Société des alcools du Québec (SAQ) somewhere downtown. We went at closing time, so I guess the staff was in a hurry to get us out. We asked for ice wine, and the staff recommended this little bottle for $60. Overestimate la. Eventually settled for the cheapest one at $22. Wine drinkers would probably laugh at our little cheap bottle but hey, everyone's gotta start somewhere.
Ice wine!! Forgive me if the picture is a bit blurry - I'm a bit tipsy. I don't drink because I absolutely hate the smell and taste of alcohol (don't tell me alcohol's odourless and tasteless because I can smell and taste it.) but ice wine's really sweet. Definitely my favourite so far.
