Life outside the walls

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Trip to the "Musee"
I escaped outside the walls!
Beautiful City!

The day started out with some gray weather that surprisingly turned sunny for a little bit. So I decided to take a little walk around the streets outside of the Old Walled City of Québec towards the Musee du Québec in the Western part of the City near the infamous battlefields where Wolfe and Montcalm died in I think the 1700's sometime. There are so many funky and trendy shops and cafes along rue St. Jean. I couldn't help but pop into a few along the way and did a bit of browsing since most of the things I liked were sporting really big price tags!

I eventually made it to the Musee du Québec (the Provincial Art Gallery) and "splurged" and paid the extra money for the audio guide. Especially since I saw the entrance fee for an adult is supposed to be $10. For some reason I was only charged $5. Then I thought, did she think I was a student? lol

I took my time walking through the galleries. There were some really nice pieces on display by Québecois artists but once again the modern art sections really baffled me. There is a permanent section/collection by Riopelle, a Québecois artist. The major works of display were these three huge triptychs (not sure if I just spelled that correctly) that sort of looked like modern graffiti since I think he did use spray paint. He used some ordinary and some not so ordinary objects as "stencils". One entire panel used, according to my audio guide, dead birds! Yikes! I can't even begin to imagine what his studio smelled like when he was working on these. lol

There was an interesting photo display by some highschool students. It was all in French but what I can gather is the photos were taken from October 2004 to February 2005 and they were of different places and things in and around the City of Québec. Pretty cool.

By the time I left the museum it had started to rain. Thank goodness for my water resistant jacket and only slightly damaged umbrella to keep me dry and my toque and gloves to keep me warm. I didn't let the wetness discourage me from walking around more streets, zig zagging my way back to my hostel. But not before a final stop in a cafe for a snack and coffee.

I don't have much planned for tonight. I was going to go on the night walking tour put on by the hostel but it's been cancelled because of the weather. So I guess I'll just pretty much hang around the hostel. I hear a movie is playing in the common room plus there are a couple of reading/library rooms to hang out in as well. So I should be able to keep myself busy for a while. Plus I have to make sure to pack up my stuff before bed tonight because my train to Montreal takes off at 8AM tomorrow. Wow, another City in my Cross-Canada train journey. As predicted, the days are passing quickly. I've been back in Canada about 2 1/2 weeks now and I have only about 3 weeks to go...wait I told myself I'm not going to count down the days 'til I get to Vancouver. Maybe I'll have a City countdown instead. Let's see where do I have yet to stop?? Montreal-Ottawa-Toronto-Niagara Falls-Toronto-Winnipeg-Edmonton-Home!

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