More French than France

Normally I haggle a bit on the price of a motel. This almost always works except for here in Quebec. All English has all but disappeared and the abrupt attitude of the people towards our Englishness means no discount for us! Again we look around a couple of motels, neither of which offer non-smoking rooms, and settle for one rather nice place outside of town. I attempt speaking a bit of French here and there as I desperately try to remember the school days. It seems that I can do nothing but think of the Spanish for everything which makes it all the more confusing. There are benefits to this French speaking madness as it does feel like a break from the Americanised world with a bit of a taste of the good living of Europe once again.
Instantly Quebec is a quieter and better looking city than we've come across in Canada. In fact it feels a lot more historic and European than anywhere we've seen in North America.
Quebec is also the name of the territory in which Montreal, Ottawa and Quebec itself resides. Some years ago the idea of Quebec becoming a separate country in it's own right was put up for vote. The majority decided to stay with Canada but it just shows how the Quebec people feel about themselves and their territory. Unlike other areas of Canada where signs read in both French and English here the English has been dropped altogether. There's no compromise. It's French and that's that. Again, it seems no-one told these people that the British won and in fact they've been part of the British Commonwealth for hundreds of years now.


The downtown area of the city is typically dull but at least this time 'downtown' is the right description. The real heart of the city is high above on and around a large hill overlooking downtown. It's an old walled city that includes a fort that was built to fend off the British, it failed but still looks great. Once you're within the old city walls everything changes and you're thrust into a French town complete with cobbled streets narrow alleyways and tall thin stone buildings. It's unashamedly European and I love it. Unfortunately it's much chillier than Montreal and up here on the hill ice still remains. We dive into a pizza restaurant where we eat the best pizza we've had or seen in North America, nobody yet has managed to beat the Peruvians on quality pizza making.
In the daylight of the following morning we get to see Quebec in it's real light and much warmer sunshine. Lots of places here declare themselves as being 'National'. Like the parliament, which blatantly isn't national as that is housed in Ottawa. National this and National that just really means that is the capital of the territory of Quebec. Great buildings though and a large square houses a mixture of these 'national' structures but it seems one has had a recent fire and all but the stone frontage has succumb to the flames. It turns out to be the once grand looking army barracks.
We take a stroll over the park where the English defeated the French toward the river. It's another murky looking thing that looks less appealing when that wind blows. We follow a boardwalk that is built along the edge of a main wall over the river and spot some graffiti reading, "Go home Canadians". This is followed underneath by, "I am home". This again shows a little bit of the attitude of the people. Not all of them really consider themselves to be part of Canada. It's all very odd to me.
We walk around the grand green roofed chateau overlooking the water toward a street of outdoor cafes. This feels just like Europe.
And, like Europe, the food is right on the money too. Finally we're eating good bread and pastries again. Just to have a sandwich here is great. I've no idea how America got used to being fed such bad overpriced bread and poorly baked pastries and cakes but they think everything they do is amazing so nothing has changed. Once over the border and into Canada the food instantly improves. Supermarkets have butties and other such take-away items that are totally edible and there's plenty of choice too.
In Montreal there was the small old town area but here it's vast. Street after street looks superb, although street parking is somewhat expensive. At this point we decide to only put minimal amounts into parking meters. I like these things because quite often you turn up and the previous driver has left some time on the meter. We duly get a parking ticket for leaving the car for four hours and only paying for one. The ticket is for $25 and totally written in French. I'm sure this should be illegal. Either way we're not paying it.
A bit lower down from the large Chateau is the Small Champlain area, named after a French explorer. This is a pedestrianised collection of alleys, narrow shopping streets and squares. Brilliant. Americans can't get cities right, except for a couple of exceptions, so coming here is like a breath of fresh air. It's funny how we've thought that some of the best cities in the world have some flavour of Europe about them. We can't help but think how lucky we are to live in such close proximity to vast array of great places Europe has to offer.


Flash boutiques, clothes and ice cream shops are dotted around Small Champlain, aswell as the odd well finished wall mural.
The outdoor life is part of the French way of life and translates well here. I like this place a lot and it without doubt is one of the top cities in North America.


We heard cheers from a pub the previous night due to the Montreal ice hockey team winning the famous Stanley Cup. The celebrations were later shown on TV. Around downtown Montreal police cars were over turned and set fire too and windows were smashed in and places like 'Footlocker' were looted in full view of tv camaras. Molotov cocktails were thrown at the police and so on. I'm glad we left when we did!
Before leaving we drive along the waterfront, the city has a large river or two flowing around it, to view the most expensive and highly sought after accommodation in Quebec. These blocks of flats were built in the 60's for the World Expo that was held here. They were hailed as a marvel of modernist design for their grey quirky boxy nature. They couldn't look more grim if they tried. A large industrial silo stands a hundred metres away and other large industrial rusting structures are all within a stones throw of these multi-million pound apartments. Overpriced and pretty ugly. It's such a shame that these are consider the place to live when old town Quebec is clearly a far more attractive proposition.
Quebec is great but our budget has been hammered by consistently overspending in Canada. It's not far to the American border from here and that's where we're heading. I'd have liked to have seen more of Canada but on this budget we could only see soo much. But still it was enough to make me come to the conclusion that I quite like the place. The vast wilderness and unfathomable expanses to the North will have to be savoured on another trip, one with a more forgiving budget.

The more east the more French

I don't remember a thing about the drive from Ottawa to Montreal, the freeway is incredibly dull. Once we do arrive it doesn't improve much. The outskirts of town are a mass of crumbling graffiti-strewn overpasses criss-crossing around us choked with traffic and the now standard crazy driving. Downtown Montreal could be anywhere with it's long shopping street of the usual high street stores that ebbs away into unkempt buildings and littered streets. It's certainly busy though.
We try a couple of hotels but they're way out of our price range so it's an out of town motel once again. This is also pretty expensive in comparison to the US as well as being vastly worse. In fact it's one of the worst we've stopped in on the whole trip. It resembles one of those on-site cabins used by construction workers but a lot smaller, with the addition of water damage and mould along with a bullet hole in the window.
We escape the depressing accommodation to stroll around downtown and see what this place is all about. I was under the impression that Montreal would be full of French style buildings and cool streets but it wasn't at all, it was totally unimpressive. The French has stepped up a notch again here as although people can still speak English you can tell they're not too comfortable with it.
From the main shopping street we explore the small Chinatown, just one short pedestrianised street, and dive into a busy looking restaurant to eat some surprisingly great food. Things are looking up.
The sun of the day fades into early evening as we head to the Old Town area. This is much improved and is nearly what I imagined Montreal to be. Narrow cobbled streets shouldered by stone French buildings that have low lit restaurants full of grand artwork and people with a lot more money than us. Small boutiques leave their windows on at night to show of their window displays of quirky sales. Almost pub-like wrought iron signs swing from many a shop front along the streets that lead up to a large church and then down a wide pedestrianised collection of bars towards the waterfront. Winters here are also long and very cold, so on this moderate night it's no surprise people are drinking outside bars while they have the chance. The street is short, steep and lively and also marked with a statue of Nelson at one end. The French didn't seem to take too kindly to this so erected another statue to commemorate a French General that defeated the English. We continue on as a homeless guy approaches and begins to speak in French to us. We look bemused and just as he asks, "English?", I respond, "Don't bullshit me man, I don't care." His face took on shocked look and he seemed put a back for a moment. My patience with these people has completely run out. I have no interest in their business or time for their stories of hardship and lies. Back on the main shopping street we pass a lad in his early twenties crouched outside a shop shaking a tub full of change. I had to take a second look as this beggar was watching a film on a brand new iPod! I stop and look back. He turns to me and says, "It was a present". I laugh at the sheer ridiculous nature of it all. We pass another girl reading a book with a cardboard sign which reads, 'Need money for travel'. I've had enough of this. I need money for travel too but I'm not going to beg on the street for it. Besides, it'd probably be easier to just get a job. Further along another guy has a cardboard sign reading, 'Need money for pot'. It's all I can do to stop myself shouting in the faces of these people. From the horrors and misfortunes of Chinese beggars to seeing this lazy display of 'the world owes me a favour' attitude the people really do nothing to endear me to the Canadians or American way of life.
We have a quick look around the dull waterfront area before heading back to our hovel for the evening. We were originally planning on a two night stay here but we really have no reason to. The next morning we have to take a look at the city's parkas we'd heard good things about it.
Mount Royal is the park's name, which I presume is actually the name of the city itself once translated. It's a park on top of a hill that looks over the pretty dull city. The large lake here is still frozen which goes to show just how cold it must get here in winter, no wonder it's a popular cross country skiing place. From up here we can see the Olympic Stadium and the cycling velodrome, which has now been turned into a Biodome in which tropical plants of all types of boring nature now exist. In Manchester when we held the Commonwealth Games we built a velodrome. Instead of turning it into a greenhouse we used it for cycling. Seemed a bit more like common sense to me. As Britain has the best velodrome cyclists in the world, who train at Manchester, it seems to have paid off. Maybe the people of Montreal have now become world class gardeners.
Only the Old Town and the Latin Quarter save it from being a Toronto style waste of a city.
The Latin Quarter is a couple of student filled streets with more appealing buildings and restaurants and full on French everywhere. It's still a bit littered and grimy but at least it has more of an interesting youthfulness about it.
I expected far more than I got from Montreal. There are a couple of OK areas but on the whole it's a bit dull. The Mount Royal Park, designed by the same guy who designed New York's Central Park, fell short of all expectation and really was too far out of town to be considered a city park. Paying for parking once we got there was just adding to the annoyance of having to drive in the first place.
We were certainly glad to get out of our motel and back on the freeway. We had one city left to visit and after seeing this place we weren't getting our hopes up.