Bonjour!

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Thursday started early, but I almost missed it. When setting an alarm on my phone, it defaults to the current day so I had two 4:00am alarms set for the wrong day. Fortunately, I had a dream where I missed an alarm for something because I had decided to sleep outside for some reason. This started me awake at 4:15am, which was really lucky! I was able to get ready in time, even considering that the airport shuttle arrived early.

There’s not a lot to say about the flight to Toronto. It was on time and good enough. Once we landed, I had about an hour’s wait until the flight to Quebec city boarded. This flight was on a small turbo-prop plane which made sense when we landed at Quebec city airport – it was like a regional airport in Australia. Fortunately there were plenty of taxis waiting so I grabbed one to head to my hotel in the “old city”.

My driver was a nice Serbian chap who offered to take me via a slightly longer way by the river and point out a few sights along the way. I accepted and it was worth the extra $5 or so. I told him that my reason for visiting was that I am a history buff and when we drove through the Plains of Abraham Battlefield Park, he finished his bit about the battle with “You probably already know that though”. I said I did, and mentioned to him that not only did both generals die (the French general survived a day or so before succumbing to his wounds) but they both died happy – the British general Wolfe was happy that his army had won, the French general Montcalm was happy that he died before the British entered the city. The cabby liked that.

The old town is the part of the city that is within the city walls. It is the only walled city in North America. The original settlement is down by the river, but the old town was the inhabited city that the British took from the French in 1759.

My hotel was in a great location, right in the centre of the old town. It was quite nice, but different from all of the hotels I had stayed in so far because they were all very modern. This hotel had all the modern amenities but featured nice old style décor. I spent the rest of the afternoon having a wander around town near the hotel, and did a little souvenir and postcard shopping before heading back to my room.

My plan for the night was to write all the postcards I had bought in Canada for the first postcard run. It’s a difficult task to try and think of what to say because everyone is (allegedly) reading this blog! In between the postcard writing, I headed down to the hotel’s restaurant for a delicious steak, cooked to perfection.

The next day I slept in to about 8 and then headed out just after 9 without having breakfast. I wanted to send my postcards before heading up to the citadel for the changing of the guards ceremony which was at 10. Sending the postcards was easy and pretty quick because the post office was empty. In fact, the city itself was pretty empty – I guess all of the tourists I saw the day before were still in bed.

I walked up to the citadel via the Chateau de Frontenac, possibly the most photographed hotel in the world. Despite its name, it was never a castle and was originally built as a hotel. The copper roof has just been replaced so it looks particularly shiny on one side and will not look like this again until it the roof is replaced again.

I walked up the hill from the chateau and arrived just outside one of the walls of the citadel. The citadel is attached to the walls of the city and was built in 1820. Even though Quebec city was besieged six times, first by the British and then by the Americans, the citadel was built after these occasions and thus never used. Today it is still the home of the Royal 22nd Regiment, the only Canadian regiment to use the French language. It is also houses a residence of the Canadian Governor General.

Once I arrived at the citadel, I heard announcements for the changing of the guard ceremony and had to walk half way around the citadel to reach the entrance. It was only half past nine, so I had plenty of time. I bought my ticket, which included a guided tour after the ceremony and waited with everyone else until we were allowed up to the parade ground. As it’s a military installation, you are not allowed to wander around by yourself.

At 10 o’clock we were lead up to the parade ground and watched the ceremony. The regiment is affiliated with the Royal Welch Fusiliers (a British regiment) so they wear the bearskin cap and also have a goat as their regimental mascot. All of these featured in the ceremony, as well as the regiment band. Unfortunately the loudspeakers were not quite in sync so it was really hard to hear the announcements of what was happening, and of course the commands were in French so that was no help to me either. Still, it was very interesting to see.

Next we split up into smaller groups for guided tours of the citadel. My guide was Alex and he did very well. He showed us what each of the buildings are, what they were originally and told some interesting stories. And a couple of jokes, some better than others. The tour included the regimental museum which was split over two buildings and detailed the history of the regiment, with medals won in the world wars and other conflicts.

When the tour finished, I bought a couple of souvenirs in the gift shop and walked out to finally get something to eat. I thought I might head towards the Plains of Abraham Battlefield Park because I wanted to go there next, and figured I’d find somewhere to eat. It was after 12 by this time, so I guess that made it lunch. Unfortunately, as I walked up on the city walls I could see that they were setting up for a big concert or festival in the park so that was out. I saw a poster later that said it was a Madonna concert.

I got down from the wall and decided to head back into the old city instead. On the way I saw the spot where the horse-drawn buggy tours started from so I asked how much they were. It was $80, which is expensive for a tour that lasts less than an hour, but I was a tad footsore and thought it might be good to do. I decided to think about it over lunch.

I went and had lunch at an Italian place and decided to go for the horse-drawn buggy tour. My driver/tour guide was named Russ and the horse was Cigall. The tour was great. The buggy travelled slow enough to allow photos to be taken and Russ was a good tour guide. The horses seem to be treated pretty well – they have to change horses at lunch time so they’re not overused. We also stopped during the tour so he could have a drink of water out of a fountain.

As I only had a couple of hours left, Russ recommended that I take a ferry across the St. Lawrence River to see the city from the other side. So after finishing the tour, I walked over to the funiculaire that takes you down to the site of the first French settlement which is where the ferry leaves from. I bought a ticket, boarded and headed over the river. It was nice enough, but I’m not convinced it was the best way to spend one of the last hours I had in town.

Anyway, that was Quebec City. I highly recommend making the effort to visit if you come to Canada. It was like a little piece of Europe in North America. It has a lot of the best parts of France, including history, architecture and food, but the people are friendly Canadians who don’t mind speaking English! It was great.

But I had to move on. My next major destination was Boston, USA. As I wanted to see the scenery in the north-eastern US, I had decided not to fly there. The hire car companies didn’t want me to pick-up in one country and drop-off in another so my only choice was to catch a train to Montreal that night and on Saturday catch a bus from there to Boston.

The train ride was nice, but uneventful. It was Friday night in Montreal and there was plenty of partying going on, but I was tired and sunburnt from my day walking around Quebec City so I stayed in and watched the Discovery channel in the hotel. Another factor in the decision was that I was running out of Canadian money. For some reason my debit card hasn’t worked in any of the Canadian ATMs so I have had to change some US currency into Canadian. I wanted to avoid having to do that again if I could.

This presented me with a potentially awkward situation in the morning. After breakfast at the hotel I took a cab to the bus station. With only 2 $5 notes and some coins, I was praying that the bus station was not much further than the train station was. If it was, I would have had to find some other way to pay. Fortunately it wasn’t much further, but I had almost nothing left after the fare and the tip. I didn’t even have enough to buy a drink for the bus trip.

The bus left at 10:45 and first stop was US customs and immigration. I had to pay $6 for a visa, I think. That was a surprise because I had paid something online a couple of months back when applying to travel to the US. I think the problem may have been that my entry into the US was actually in LA at the airport, but because I was “in transit” they didn’t give me the card for my passport. Anyway, it was only $6 and I wasn’t about to start an argument. Other than that, there was no problem crossing the border.

The scenery in Vermont was beautiful and green. If I had come a month later as I originally intended, it would probably look even better with the onset of autumn. We made a few stops including UVM which I figure is a college/university and I was starting to get a bit worried that we weren’t going to be able to eat until we reached Boston at 6:45pm because there was no getting off the bus at the first few stops. Fortunately we eventually stopped some service station and were allowed to get off the bus so I was able to buy some food and a drink with my US currency.

All in all, the bus trip was okay. Before I had some food, I was thinking it had been the wrong move, despite the scenery. The people on the bus were not exactly pillars of society. Besides some college students, they were generally people who can’t afford to fly. I’m still not sure if it was the way to go or not, but at least I’ve seen more this way.

We arrived in Boston a little early and I caught a cab to my hotel, which isn’t far from the bus station. It’s the most expensive place I’ve booked so I was expecting it to be nice, and it is very fancy. I feel a bit out of place, really. But the staff don’t care obviously. I also apparently received an upgrade, which is nice. There’s a king sized bed and the décor is really, really nice. I’m glad to be staying somewhere for more than one night, and glad that it’s really swish.

Tomorrow I’ll be walking the so-called “Freedom Trail” to see the sights of the birthplace of the USA.

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Comments

[Jenny]

Interesting so far....
Yes we are definitely reading the blog (not allegedly!) even Connor and Lionel are....mind you Lionel is just looking at the pictures LOL! Quebec looks beautiful, I would have loved the horse and buggy ride. Your camera is taking good pics! How about some of the swish hotel? :)