HIGHLIGHT OF THE DAY: The beautiful city of Quebec
WORD OF THE DAY: Ooooh la la
DISTANCE TRAVELLED: 460km
I had a full day tour booked today to Quebec City. I had only heard good things about this city and I was super excited to get out and about. I checked the weather yesterday and it was supposed to be sunny and 30C today and when I opened the curtains, the sun was blinking through some cloud cover, but it looked like it was going to be a fine day. The tour is a BIG day with me getting picked up at 7am and then an expected return back to Montreal sometime around 8pm tonight. I had set my alarm for 6am to get ready and you could imagine my horror when I woke up at 6.45am!!! I had 15 minutes to get showered, dressed and ready to go. You haven’t seen me move so fast let me tell you and I was in the lift at 7.01am. Not bad going and as Murphy’s Law would have the transfer was 15 minutes late… but if I wasn’t ready they would have been on time, so I was just happy I didn’t keep anyone waiting and so thankful that I woke when I did. I had set my alarm but for 6pm, not 6am!!! What a goose.
The transfer bus had 3 people on it already and after a few more stops they take you to the Gray Line Office in Peel Street to take you final payment and issue you the actual travel voucher. I paid a deposit to the hotel (their commission) and then they took that off the final balance plus that god damn tax to get the final amount. Once we had out tickets we were good to board the coach. By 8am there were 28 of us on the coach and we were on the road with Larry as our driver/guide for the day. I was pleasantly surprised that the tour was in English only; I was definitely expecting a bi-lingual tour.
On our way out of the city we got a run down in sights. We passed the Port of Montreal on the St Lawrence River. It one of the largest inland ports in the world, it is the second busiest port in Canada (after Vancouver), and it is one of the busiest ports in North America. It is also the entry point to other major cities such as Toronto, Detroit and Cleveland. It handles 26,000,000 tons of cargo annually. It remains a trans-shipment point for grain, sugar, petroleum products, machinery, and consumer goods. For this reason, Montreal is also the railway hub of Canada. We then crossed one of the busiest bridges in Canada. With nearly 160,000 daily crossings, approximately 49 million vehicles crossing every year and 196 million people making it one of the busiest bridges in the world. The rest of the scenery was typical Canada with patches of shopping malls, residential and pine/fir trees for the rest of the journey. It was a 2 hour 45 minute drive from Montreal to Quebec City and Larry didn’t stop talking for the first 1.5 hours. I listened for the first hour and then decided to just enjoy the countryside with memories of truck days in South America come flooding back. The coach was super roomy and I had 2 seats to myself and I sat down the back as most of the ‘oldies’ LOVE the front rows. There was no-one around me at all and the rest were jam packed up the front! That’s old people for you…..
Quebec is the capital of the Canadian province of Quebec. It is the second most populous city in Quebec after Montreal. The narrowing of the Saint Lawrence River proximate to the city's promontory, Cape Diamond, and Lévis, on the opposite bank, provided the name given to the city, Kébec, an Algonquin word meaning "where the river narrows". Founded in 1608 by Samuel de Champlain, Quebec City is one of the oldest cities in North America. The ramparts surrounding Old Quebec (Vieux-Québec) are the only remaining fortified city walls that still exist in the Americas north of Mexico, and were declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1985 as the 'Historic District of Old Québec'.
Quebec City is one of the oldest European settlements in North America. French explorer Jacques Cartier built a fort at the site in 1535, where he stayed for the winter before going back to France in spring 1536. He came back in 1541 with the goal of building a permanent settlement. This first settlement was abandoned less than one year after its foundation, in the summer 1542, due in large part to the hostility of the natives combined with the harsh living conditions during winter. Quebec was founded by Samuel de Champlain, a French explorer and diplomat on July 3, 1608 also called "The Father of New France", served as its administrator for the rest of his life.
Throughout it’s over four hundred years of existence; Quebec City has served as a capital. From 1608 to 1627 and 1632 to 1763, it was capital of French Canada and all of New France; from 1763 to 1791, it was the capital of the Province of Quebec; from 1791 to 1841, it was the capital of Lower Canada; from 1852 to 1856 and from 1859 to 1866, it was capital of the Province of Canada; and since 1867, it has been capital of the Province of Quebec.
After crossing the 2 impressive bridges of The Quebec Bridge and the Pierre Laporte Bridge we arrived into Quebec City at 11am where we had a local guide to meet us and show us this wonderful city for the next few hours. Claude was really cool and used to be a coach driver for Gray Line for 35 years as we walked for 40 minutes of the Lower Town. The Upper Town is located on the top of Cape Diamond promontory where a high stone wall surrounds this portion of the city and the Lower Town is located at shore level, below Cape Diamond. Lower Town, which includes such sites as the ancient Notre Dame des Victoires church, the historic Petit Champlain district, the port, and the Museum of Civilization. The Lower Town is filled with original architecture and street designs, dating back to the city's beginnings. Murals and statues are also featured and the Lower Town is also noted for its wide variety of boutiques, many featuring hand-crafted goods. Petit Champlain is a neighborhood and it is the oldest commercial district in North America. The main feature of the Lower Town besides the cute shops and the cobble stone pathways was the Rue du Petit-Champlain Mural. The mural painted on the side of the house located at 102 rue du Petit-Champlain is a trompe-l'œil measuring 100m2. It represents the history of the district, the bombardments of 1759, the landslides, and the fires which have occurred in the district since its founding. There are around 20 of these murals painted on the side of buildings that don’t have windows as they face the direction of where the winter winds blow 5 months of the year and this was a solution to make the building look a little more inviting.
We were back on the coach for an hour’s drive around the city and I was mentally making some notes on where I would come back to this afternoon as we drove around. It really is a great vibe feeling city but there were a lot of day trippers and coaches also doing the same thing we were doing but it was a great way to get an overview for my exploration in my free time. The one stop we did do was of the Erected on an exceptional site atop a plunging cliff, the Fortifications of Québec tower which gave us a great view over the St. Lawrence River. Encircling Upper Town and covering 4.6 km the Fortifications' picturesque charm and superb vistas did not only help the defence system to become a tourist attraction immersed in the past. Moreover, the Fortifications are eloquent witnesses to Québec's military and urban history.
We were dropped back to the Lower Town where we had an hour to get some lunch as half of the coach had also purchased the additional St Lawrence Cruise that had a departure time of 2pm. They recommended a restaurant that served a 3 course lunch, a drink and all pesky taxes for 18CAD, and they get your food out in a timely manner as they know that we had a cruise to catch. I was sold as we were also close to the cruise port and where we had to be to collect our tickets.
The city experiences around 1,905 hours of sunshine annually, with summer being the sunniest, but also slightly the wettest season. While Montreal is considered by many to have a bilingual population, in which many of its residents have a working knowledge of both French and English, Quebec City and its surrounding region are largely Francophone. The vast majority of city residents are native French-speakers. The English-speaking community peaked in relative terms during the 1860s, when 40% of Quebec City's residents were Anglophone. Today, Anglophones make up only 1.5% of the population of both the city and its metropolitan area. According to the Statistics Canada website, 94.55% of Quebec City's population speaks French as their mother tongue. While nearly everyone speaks French as their first language, more than a third can speak both French and English.
The cruise departed at 2pm on a large old fashioned car carrier boat that has been turned into a tourist ship, The Louis Jolliet. After leaving the port and passing the icebreaker ships that keep the St Lawrence passable during winter we circled back past the departure point, leaving the old city and set sail on the St Lawrence River for our 90-minute cruise. There was a costumed guide that explained the history of Quebec City, the river and the surroundings. It was a beautiful sunny day and was great to take time to relax on the outside terraces while admiring the exceptional view of the old fortifications, the Château Frontenac, the Montmorency Falls, Île d'Orléans, the Côte-de-Beaupré and the Laurentian Mountains! The turn-around point was the Montmorency Falls. The falls, at 84 meters high and 40m wide are the highest in the province of Quebec and 30m higher than Niagara Falls. The falls are at the mouth of the Montmorency River where it drops over the cliff shore into the Saint Lawrence River. It was a nice cruise. It wasn’t awesome or mind blowing with scenery as such, but it was only 25CAD and the day really was stunning, so it was nice to be out and about on the water for a few hours.
The cruise was back at 3.30pm and we then had free time till 5.20pm to do our own thing where the coach was to leave Quebec at 5.30pm. I wanted to see more of the Upper Town so I caught the funicular car, which cost 2CAD for the 15 second ride to get me from the Lower Town to the Upper Town which brings you right up next to the Hotel Chateau Frontenac. Quebec City's skyline is dominated by the massive Château Frontenac Hotel, perched on top of Cap-Diamant. It was designed by architect Bruce Price, as one of a series of "château" style hotels built for the Canadian Pacific Railway company. The railway company sought to encourage luxury tourism and bring wealthy travelers to its trains. You are allowed to enter the first floor of the hotel and it was like stepping back in time and you could just imagine what it was like back in its time when the hotel was at her finest.
The funicular comes out onto the Dufferin Terrace which is a walkway along the edge of the cliff, offering beautiful views of the Saint Lawrence River. It really was super busy here with tourists but too much over run. The Terrasse Dufferin leads toward the nearby Plains of Abraham, site of the battle in which the British took Quebec from France, and the Citadelle of Quebec, a Canadian Forces installation and the federal vice-regal secondary residence. I then started my walk around the Upper town and to name a few sights The Parliament Building, the meeting place of the Parliament of Quebec, is also near the Citadelle. Near the Château Frontenac is Notre-Dame de Québec Cathedral, mother church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Quebec. It is the first church in the New World to be raised to a basilica and is the primatial church of Canada. There are 37 National Historic Sites of Canada in Quebec City and its enclaves. Much of the city's most notable architecture is located east of the fortification walls in Vieux-Québec (Old Quebec) and Place Royale. This area has a distinct European feel with its stone buildings and winding streets lined with shops and restaurants. Porte St-Louis and Porte St-Jean are the main gates through the walls from the modern section of downtown; the Kent Gate was a gift to the province from Queen Victoria and the foundation stone was laid by the Queen's daughter, Princess Louise, Marchioness of Lorne, on June 11, 1879. You really could have been in France, if anywhere in Europe. I had a great afternoon in Quebec City and I could see this as one of the very few cities that I would come back and visit again. It really was an amazing city.
I had to make my way back to the Lower Town to meet the coach. You could go back the way I had come up, via the funicular for the 2CAD or you can walk what they have dubbed the "Breakneck Stairs" which have been here since 1608 when Quebec City was founded. They are Quebec City's oldest stairway, they were given their current name in the mid-19th century, because of their steepness and the stairs have been restored several times. Either way, you will arrive at the intersection of Petit-Champlain and Sous-le-Fort streets where the coach was to be in 30 minutes. I made it down without breaking an arm or a leg and wandered around the Lower Town for my remaining time and took some more pictures of the Chataeaux.
Surprisingly everyone was back on the bus on time and we left Quebec City at 5.30pm for the 3 hour drive back to Montreal. We did a dinner/toilet stop at a McDonalds at 7.30pm and arrived back into Montreal just after 8.30pm. I was one of the last hotel drop offs getting back to my hotel at 9pm, but the day was amazing. I am so glad that I went and was totally worth the 130CAD price tag and the 14 hour day. Comparing that to a travel day in South America, this was a walk in the park.
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