Canada day 2

Oh what a good nights sleep! We didn't hear the In-laws coming home and we slept like dead. No interruptions or problems sleeping Although, due to the jet lag we're probably going to have a few days to wierd sleeping patterns. I guess it's the down sides of traveling and if I'm being honest, I'd take sleep issues ANY DAY if I got to travel to new and interesting locations, see the world and all of it's wonders.

The room that we are living in, the guest room, is a room about 16 square meters, with an on suite bathroom and a walking closet. There is a very comfortable double bed and lots of space to move around in. We lived here last time we were here, even though Andy's brother Dr. SpiderPig was here at the same time. It's located in the basement next to the garage that isn't used at the moment so it's a great room since it's quiet and isolated.

Today, we woke up at 5 a.m. and could't sleep any more, I guess we're not really those people that sleeps till 11 a.m. (Swedish time). We didn't get up straight away though, we watched some TV in bed and then around 6 we climbed the stairs from our room to the living room and kitchen level. Some computering and reading until Andy's parents woke up. Andy's Dad was going in to work so we had breakfast together before he left.

Breakfast Canada style. Something that I really missed is the large amount of fresh berries that can be bought all year round in Canada. I love having fresh blueberries, raspberries or blackberries for breakfast. It's such a good way to start of the day. The American blueberries are large and very tasty, and as some know they are white-ish inside not like Swedish blueberries that are blue inside. The raspberries, my favorite berry/fruit are sweet and succulent - a bowl of it makes my day!

After Andy's Dad left for work. Andy had to fix his computer that was acting very strange. And then we wanted to check out if there were any geocaches to take near by. Andy's Mom and I started to make plans for the day and since the weather was nice we decided to take the chance to spend the day outside in Old Montreal/Vieux Montreal. It's an older part of Montreal with older historic buildnings and once was all inclosed by a wall. The area is now enclosed by Rue McGill, Rue St-Antoine and the Old Port of Montreal/Vieux Port.

Said and done, we got ourselves ready to head into town, first into Downtown for errend and then we'd walk down towards Vieux Montreal. But first the bussride from Iles de Soeurs / Nun's Island to town.

So off we went, Andy, his Mom and I. A small walk from the house to the bus stop. One funny thing in Montreal is all the 4-way-stops in the trafic and also all the other kind of stops. It kind of makes traffic go somewhat slower, at least in the suburbs.

Once off the bus at the corner of Rue University and Rue St-Catherine, right next to the Christ Church Anglican Cathedral - that has been one of my favorite churches to take pictures of since it has a very cool location and it looks really different in the different kinds of light. Maybe this time I don't have to take as many pictures of the church since I have quite a few already, but you never know =)

Our first errand in town was to Eaton Center, a shopping center on Rue St-Catherine, to visit a FIDO store to buy a pre-paid cellphone card. So that Andy can have a phone here in Canada, with a Canadian number. It's slightly cheaper to call to and from Montreal, as well as to and from Sweden, if we wanted to call there. Also we now have internet when we are out on the town, to use with our iPhones and apps. Which is really good. While waiting I looked into a shoe store, Bleu Marine & Co and found a pair of EMU slippers, Jolie ,that I bought. They were 50% of and at full price they were already half of the price in Sweden. I'm in love with them! I've been looking for a pair of sheep skin slippers for a really long time and I've always thought them to be slightly too expensive in Sweden. But now I finally found them =)

After some shopping we made our way to lunch. Andy's Mom sugested that we'd eat at 3 Brasseurs, or The Three Brewers. A beer brewery and restaurant, with their own beers and good food. For the first time in a really long time I had a beer with my food, I thought it would be fun to try the 3 Brasseurs own beer. There was a choice of 5 different beers, White/La Blanche, Blonde/La Blonde, Amber/L'Ambrée and Brown/La Brune and then a special blend/La Mousse de Moment. I had a Blonde and Andy and his Mom had an Amber.

According to Andy's Mom, their specialty are Burgers and that is at least to me a no brainer. I love me my burgers. There were 5 burgers all served with fries and 3 Brasseurs mayo. I ordered a Texan burger topped with BBQ sauce, mild jalapeno cheddar cheese, mushrooms and crispy onions. What a delight it was to eat. The burger was really moist and just perfectly grilled and the bread was crunchy. And also the it was big, very big. The crispy onions were really nice - like really good onion rings. I loved them. The jalapeno cheese was tasty too. Unfortunely the fries weren't going to be eaten since there was NO room after I had finished the burger. That was too bad since they were really good...

Andy and his Mom both ordered the Royal Burger topped with sauteed mushrooms and Roquefort cheese. It also was really tasty. Blue Cheese on a burger is really to die for. After finishing our food and our beers, we rolled out of the restaurant and started towards our next adventure.

We headed down Rue University and cut across Rue Belmont and cut through the park where St Bridgets Home (Asylums) ruins stand overlooked by St-Patricks Basilica. St-Bridget's was once a home for the aged, the infirm and homeless of Montreal. Now a park is situated on the site, where the residents of Montreal come for some tranquility.  

Then we continued along Rue de la Gauchetière and stopped to photograph a lot along the way. Among others the Hotel Intercontinental with the lovely Rapunzel Tower. I love the way Montreal mixes old and new buildings, different styles and different architecture. If we would have followed the road, a little bit more we would have ended up in China Town, but that is an adventure for another day.

When we had almost reached Rue Notre Dame, found this old house, it was the St-James Hotel. A truely beautiful buildning with so much to see. I loved it. Such intricate buildings.

At the Place d'Armes, there are lots of beuatiful buildnings to see, although at the moment there is quite a bit of construction going on. But one of the buildnings is the Cote de la Place d'Armes, with it's beautiful clock tower. The Museum of the Bank of Montreal / Musée de la Banque de Montreal and the beautiful Notre Dame.

 We did visit Notre Dame last year, although we didn't go in. Last time we were there we spent about 30 minutes looking for a cache, but it was nowhere to be found. This time Andy found it in a couple of minutes. Finally =) The church is a cousin of the Notre Dame in Paris and they both look similar. We are planning to go there at another date, so more about the church then.

We continued down towards the St-Lawerance River, via Rue St-Sulpice and then we turned back towards town and walked back on the Rue St-Paul, which is the "it-street" of Old Montreal. This is where all the cafées, resturants, boutiques and galleries are situated. It is such a picturesque place to visit. Lots of beautiful houses and lots of beautiful flowers now in the summertime. There were almost no people out, which made it really nice since we didn't have to fight our way through with all the other tourists. We stopped of at Square Victoria where Andy's Dad came an picked us up with the car and then we set of home.

We stopped of at the grocery store on Iles de Seours. Previously called Provigo, has changed it's name to Loblaws. But they pretty much have all the same products. And if there is something I love about traveling it is checking out the local supermarkets. Lots of fun products to try out and lots of products that I have been missing since my days abroad.

For dinner the In-laws had bought lobster. YUM! Do I have to say anything else. We each had a lobster and it was served with two sauces, one with dill and the other was Thousand Island, also toast for those who wanted. Lobster is truely one of those things that is amazingly good - the buttery flesh of the lobster is hard to not to love. And the whole thing that it's finger food makes it all the better!

We sat outside and  had a lovely dinner with white wine to drink. We sat out long after it became dark and enjoyed the lovely warm weather and the lovely food.

For desert we had ovenroasted Brie cheese with jams and crackers. The In-laws have a special oven baker dish for the cheese and it makes the cheese really lovely and runny. I love cheese and runny cheese feels so sinful =)

We had blueberry jam and apricot jam, and I like the blueberry the best, together with the cheese, the combintation was really nice. Lots of laughs and cheese, makes a good night =)

As we went inside, we were all reminded that there was a day tomorrow and that we were all really tired. A great first day in Montreal. Enough done to feel like we've done stuff but still enough resting to still make it feel like vacation. Lots of walking which is always good!


Läs även andra bloggares åsikter om Vieux Montreal, Montreal, Canada, Kanada, Old Montreal, Rue St-Paul, Notre Dame, Geocaches, geocache, Geocaching.com, geocaching, EMU, EMU australian, Jolie, Museum of the Bank of MOntreal, Rue Notre Dame, St-James Hotel, Rue de la Gauchetière, China Town, Rue University, Rue Belmont, St Bridgets Home (Asylums), St-Patricks Basilica, 3 Brasseurs, Royal Burger, Texan Burger

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