Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Montreal & Quebec Vacation - Part 1

MONTREAL!

Well, the first leg of our trip took us to Montreal for 6 days. We stayed with a friend, so saved quite a bit of $$$ on housing. Overall, Montreal is a pretty nice city. There is an amazing amount of beautiful, old, historic buildings all around the city. Sadly, anything built during this century is pretty awful...you know what I'm talking about...those monstrosities from the 50's, 60's and 70's. This creates a weird dichotomy of very beautiful architecture and very ugly architecture, with very little in between. The weather was wonderful the entire time we were there, sunny with temps in the 50's and 60's, nice, crisp fall weather!

The Old Town (Vieux Montreal) has the highest concentration of older buildings and has a very European feel to it, with gorgeous buildings crammed cheek-to-jowl, cobbled streets, and and lively atmosphere. I didn't realize quite how French they really are there. All the signs and menus are in French Luckily, we picked up some basic conversational French fairly quickly (well, at least enough to find our way around town and be able to order chicken instead of fish)!

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Montreal Old Town

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Christ Church Cathedral

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Montreal Old Town, Rue St. Denis

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Montreal Old Town, Random Church

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Chalet in Parc du Mont-Real

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Montreal City Hall

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Montreal Old Town and Bonsecours Marché (Market)

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Montreal Old Town

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Montreal Old Town, Basilica in background

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Old Town and Church

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Basilique Notre-Dame de Montreal

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Marie-Reine-du-Monde Cathedral interior

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Christ Church Cathedral

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Steps leading up to St. Joseph's Oratory

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St. Joseph's Oratory

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Mcgill University in Montreal

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Aldred Building in Montreal's Old Town

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Interior of Royal Bank, Old Town Montreal

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Gault Building in Montreal's Old Town

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Horse-drawn carriage in Montreal's Old Town

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View from Old Town toward Royal Bank Tower

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Marie-Reine-du-Monde Cathedral exterior

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The Olympic Stadium


That's a quick overview of our trip to Montreal...tomorrow...Quebec City!

6 comments:

  1. Tres bien! Ou est les jardins? Oubliez-vous les arbres d'autumn aussi? Merci pour les images, monsieur! Tres chic. A bientot!

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  2. Wow! Beautiful pictures. We went to Montreal for our honeymoon...we were married in December. It was very very snowy and cold, but beautiful. It's nice to see what the streets look like dry.

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  3. Never ever have I seen my city look as beautiful as it does in your pictures.
    Thank you for re connecting me with its beauty.

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  4. Hi Scott, I love old buildings. Juxtaposed by a autumn blue sky they're even lovelier.

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  5. Scott, what a beautiful city. Thanks for the photo journey-much appreciated.

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  6. Benjamin: Merci! That's as much French as I dare attempt...without horribly embarrassing myself :-) The tree and flower pics are inbound...I took so many at the Jardin Botanique that I'll still sorting through them!

    Danger: Thanks! I bet it was beautiful in the snow...then again, snow is not always as enjoyable when you're slogging through it :-)

    Allanbecker: Thanks...it's a great city!

    Grace: Thanks so much...it was beautiful there!

    Velva: Thanks, glad you enjoyed them!

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