On the Road Again...

Sunday was our last morning in Quebec City. We got up, had coffee, packed our stuff and then did one final walk through the Quebec City. It was cool and nice, not crowded at all. After checking out of the hotel, we drove to a local shopping area and browsed around for a while. We did not end up purchasing anything. After that, it was off to Montreal. The trip to Montreal is about a 3 hour drive. There was very little to see on the drive. The signage both inside Quebec City and throughout Canada, in general, is really good. Also, most of the drivers are very courteous. On the freeways, the left lane is pretty much only for passing and drivers are generally aware of the other drivers. We made good time to Montreal. We found our new hotel quickly (the Square Phillips) and checked in early. After checking in, we checked emails and I watched a little football. We then decided to walk around Old Montreal for a bit and grab an earlier dinner. Our first impression of Montreal is that it is bigger, dirtier, more cosmopolitan, more American and less quaint that Quebec City...we will see if that impression changes.



For dinner we went to a bistro recommended as a "value" by Frommers. The name of the restaurant was Marche de la Vilette. It definitely seemed like a local hang out. Even though it was a cool day (about 60 degrees), it was smokin' hot in the restaurant. The restaurant has a 4 course house menu as a special. The first course was a vegetable soup (quite hearty and good); Rosie ordered a country ham crepe for her entree and Rick ordered a croque-madame (fancy name for an upside-down ham and cheese sandwich); both entrees were good. The final two courses were coffee and dessert (stawberry and mandarin oranges). All-in-all, we agreed that it was a good dinner for 2 for $30 CAD.

After dinner we walked over to the Notre Dame basillica. There was a mass going on so we were just able to enter the church but not really go in. It looked amazing. We will be back on Monday to further check it out. As a side note, we see a lot of horse drawn carriages in both Quebec and Montreal. I am not sure why anyone would go on one of those as they stink when they just pass by, never mind having to sit in the back of one of those. Ugh! Nasty... After that, we headed back to the hotel for some more internet research on Monday's itinerary, some phone calls back home and some television.