Day 16 – Quebec City

Day 16 – June 30, 2008

Its sunny today! Horraaay!!!!! Well, I must say this was an eventful day for all of us. Phil has always wanted to see Quebec City because of the history, but thought he would never get to see it. Lucas did not know about old Quebec City – he thought we were seeing another old fort, but didn’t know about old city walls, or the old city downtown core. I thought it would be old, dirty, and the people would be unfriendly and not speak English.

We were all pleasantly surprised! We visited old Quebec city with the citadel, the Plains of Abraham, old beautiful buildings and streets, restaurants, the Parliament Buildings, Chateau du Frontenac, Notre Dame Basilica. It was really beautiful! We started out the day at the citadel, which is a working fort, which means there are army personnel living there today, some just came back from Afghanistan, and some are getting ready to go. They live here, practice and gear up to go. The 1 hour tour was guided throughout the complex. We were fortunate enough to be up on the ramparts when a navy ship went by (a Corvette we think) and when a navy ship passes Quebec Citadel it gives a 21 gun (artillery) salute.
We then had lunch outside at an Italian restaurant, which was among a whole long street of restaurants, shops, and galleries. We enjoyed watching the people come and go, the horse drawn carriages tours, and the busyness. It was very busy, but in a calm way. We actually have experienced our best customer service of our trip right here in Quebec. They are really friendly, helpful, and all the people we have encountered so far speak English, and appreciate our feeble attempts to speak French. Once they hear us stumbling, they go right into English. I was impressed. It was just a great sunny day in the heart of Old Quebec City. We all would like to come here again and spend week just walking around and seeing all there is to see.

We then left for the city of Montréal. Speed limits posted on the freeway are suggestions as best. Everyone speeds here, and not just a little, a lot! We got terribly lost in Montreal as the address in our Super 8 book and our GPS did not agree. We found the address in a run down residential area, completely on the opposite side of the city where we were supposed to be! After about an hour, we found our hotel exhausted.

Lucas’ statement: Did you know… within the Citadel there is another ”mini fort” where soldiers could make a last stand.