Monthly Archives: September 2009
Quebec
Today was our day to see the city of Quebec.
We started out with breakfast at our new favorite breakfast/lunch place, Cora. Hopefully these will show up in the US soon.
We drove around Quebec, finally ending up in Vieux Quebec, or Old Quebec where we found a Tourist Information Center.
Info Building
We found that there was going to be a 2 hour bus tour at 2:30 pm and signed up for it. Luckily for us, today was the last day for this tour, and, even luckier, it was all in English.
We’ve noticed a lot of touristy things are starting to shut down, or reduce their hours, due to winter coming on, and the tourist trade is dropping off.
We had some time to kill before the tour started so we drove to a Glass Shop on St. Jean street that Jan wanted to visit.
St Jean St
Finally we headed back to rendezvous with our tour bus. Our driver, a Quebec City native named Francois, spoke very good English, luckily for us. But Jan said he sounded like Inspector Clouseau of Pink Panther fame.
Our tour gave us a look at the major sites in Quebec, in both the old and new sections.
Quebec Tour 1
Here is the Simons fountain in front of the Provincial Capitol of Quebec.
Simons Fountain
Here is the view from the Plains of Abraham battlefield site overlooking the St. Lawrence river.
Plains 1
The battle of Plains of Abraham, also known as the Battle of Quebec, took place during the French and Indian War in September 1759, and the British victory over the French led to France relinguishing all claims to Canada.
Here’s Jan with another view from the battlefield.
Plains 2
And here is the Chateau Frontenac Hotel, one of the most magnificent sites in Quebec. Built in 1893, the Frontenac is one of the premiere hotels in North America.
Hotel Frontenac
Here’s one of the many pedestrian-only streets in Vieux (Old) Quebec.
Quebec Tour 3
This church, the L Eglise Notre Dame Des Victoires (The Church of Our Lady of Victories) , is the oldest stone church in North America.
Quebec Church
Another view.
Quebec Tour 5
And this building, built in 1675, is the oldest one in Quebec City.
Quebec Oldest House
After our tour was over, we drove over to Tomas Tam’s, a Chinese buffet restaurant we’d seen advertised. And it was very good.
On our way back to the rig, we drove pass everyone’s favorite chicken place, PFK.
PFK
PFK???
Leave it to Quebec to put their own stamp on things.
PFK in French stands for ‘Poulet Frit Kentucky’, or Kentucky Fried Chicken to us.
Getting back to the rig, we got ready to head out early tomorrow on a long travel day.
More then…
Parlez-vous français?…
This morning we left Notre Dame du Lac, QC for St. Nicolas, QC, 166 miles away. St. Nicolas is a suburb of Quebec, and is right across the St. Lawrence River from the city itself.
We’ve decided to stay here for two days so we can explore the Quebec area before we head toward Montreal and Ottawa, on our way to Rome, NY and Niagara Falls.
We’re getting Frencified very quickly. Luckily, we’ve been able to stumble thru with people who speak a little English and my very little French. It does make for some interesting conversations, though.
We’re parked in a small cul-de-sac in this RV Park. I’m not really sure how I got the rig in here, and more importantly, I’m not sure how I’m going to get out.
We headed out for dinner at Boston Pizza. We figured even if no one spoke English, we could point to items that we know on the menu.
And it worked out pretty well.
Coming back to the rig, I got the satellite dish set up while Jan watched Mister roam around the woods surrounding our site.
Then it was in for the night.
More tomorrow…
