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Published: April 4th 2011
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Chateau Frontenac
from the Plains of Abraham Our journey to Quebec City actually went off without a hitch, but I can’t remember the last time I felt so unsettled before a trip. We decided a couple of weeks ago to make this trip. Quebec City had been on my wish list for a long time and I decided if we came in winter we could see the famous ice hotel. To actually book the ice hotel is very expensive unless you get a last minute deal. So, I decided to take a chance on the last minute deal, but even though we planned to stay there during the week, it didn’t work out. That was roadblock #1. Then we had trouble booking a rental car, and we had trouble booking other hotels. When you hear that the “busy season” in QC is June – September, don’t believe them!!! I honestly started to believe that this trip was just not meant to be. But, as usual, we were not deterred. We moved forward with a hope and a prayer that it would all work out.
Now, admittedly, the hotel thing ended up working out. I really wanted to stay in the Chateau Frontenac because I’ve always heard that
Samuel de Champlain
Monument to the man who founded Quebec in 1608. it’s THE place to stay in Quebec City. Thinking we would stay in the Ice Hotel during the week, I tried to book Frontenac for the weekend, but it was sold out. However, since the Ice Hotel didn’t work out we were able to get Wednesday and Thursday night at Frontenac. As an added bonus, it was $100CAD/night cheaper during the week than the weekend. So, instead of the ice hotel, we have a lovely, warm, and cozy room overlooking a very icy St. Lawrence River. And even though things did not work out EXACTLY like I hoped…the alternative seems to be working out just fine. So far.
Today we took the opportunity to sleep a little late. Once we were finally up and about, we had a muffin and hot chocolate at the Starbucks downstairs and then headed out to begin our tour of Quebec City.
First, we decided to do a walking tour of Haute Ville, or Upper Town. There is quite a bit of construction around the hotel, Terasse Dufferin and Place d’Armes. I never figured out what they are working on, nor was it the only construction we would run into today. We did
Notre-Dame
Basilique Notre-Dame manage to see the monument to Samuel Champlain, the man who founded Quebec in 1608 in Place d’Armes between work equipment and dumpsters.
On our walking tour, we saw Maison Kent, said to be Quebec’s oldest building and where France signed the capitulation to the British forces. We also saw the Basilique Notre-Dame. It was very pretty, though it doesn’t match the magnificence of the Notre-Dame in Montreal. The Chapelle des Ursulines was closed, but we did observe the Cannonball lodged in the base of the trunk of a tree along Rue St-Louis. Apparently this cannonball may have landed there during the Battle of Quebec in 1759. On the other hand, it may have been placed there on purpose to keep the wheels of horse-drawn carriages from bumping the tree when making tight turns. Just before Porte St-Louis (which was also undergoing some renovation), we saw the unnamed monument with busts of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, which commemorates the 1943 meeting in Quebec of the two leaders. We did walk up to La Citadelle, which was built to fend off an attack by the Americans that never happened. Still, it is home to the Royal 22e Regiment,
Le Cirque
Statue celebrating the city's connections to le cirque and its performers. which fought in both world wars and Korea. In the summer, you can see the changing of the guard, however, in the winter there is only one tour a day. We were an hour early so we kept going. Unfortunately, by the time we made it back, we were too late.
Outside the wall, we walked down Grand-Allee (which I later learned means Grand Aisle) and stopped at a bistro for lunch of soup and sandwich. On the way, we passed the Hotel du Parlement, the government building which houses the National Assembly. Apparently they were not in session because the crown on top was not lit.
After Haute Ville and lunch, we headed back toward Frontenac to the funicular to take us down to Basse Ville, or Lower Town. I actually thought this little part of Quebec City was really quaint and fun. I’m not much of a shopper, but if I was, I would have had plenty of opportunity down Rue du Petit-Champlain. It is a pedestrian-only street and allegedly the oldest street in North America. We passed by the Royal Battery where cannons were installed in 1712 to defend lower town from the British. They
Hotel du Parlement
Hotel du Parlement houses the National Assembly got their chance in 1759, but the English victory silenced them. From the Battery, we walked over to Place-Royale and checked out the bust of Louis XIV, whose palace in Versailles we visited in France a couple of years ago. The square is said to be the birthplace of French America.
We managed to get past the construction of Lower Town and find the Old Port. They don’t shovel the snow from this area, but it was packed down well enough to walk around. We went to Pointe-a-Carcy and admired the statue of a sailor that is a memorial to Canadian merchant seamen who lost their lives in World War II.
We made a pit stop back at the hotel for a rest and refresh before heading out to Aux Anciens Canadiens for dinner. The restaurant is said to be “traditional Quebecois” and so we decided to try it. I had the Quebec meat pie. Quebec meat pie is made of a ground meat and was in a scrumptious pie crust – very flaky. It was served with several side dishes, including a boiled potato and a sprig of broccoli, both of which I found to be a
Rue de Petit-Champlain
At the end of the street. Check out the icicles!! little bland. Then there was some cabbage that tasted like it was made with maple syrup maybe, but I’m not a connoisseur of cabbage, so I’m not sure. Last, but not least, there was what tasted to me like pears, but Joe said he specifically tasted apricots. Whatever the fruit was, it was mixed with tomatoes, so since I don’t care for tomatoes, I didn’t care for that either. Dessert was sugar pie, another regional favorite. It was very good, but VERY sweet!! Joe had a Bison Burger – mainly so we could try the poutine. Poutine is French fries with cheese curds and brown gravy and is the national dish of Quebec. For some reason, I always imagined the gravy to be cream gravy, but I had recently read that it was brown gravy, so at least I wasn’t surprised. He had apple pie and ice cream for dessert.
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