Thanksgiving in Montréal, Nov 23-25
Mike and I spent the American Thanksgiving in Montréal, Québec, my first trip north of the border. Passengers and crew numbered no more than thirty on the flight out; we wondered if we were mad going to Canada in winter! It snowed heavily on the first day, but we managed to walk downtown, taking in Chinatown on the way. We then took the metro up to Le Plateau Mont-Royal district. The second day dawned bright and cold, and we explored the rest of the old town.
Our lovely hotel in Vieux-Montréal, an area established in 1642.
The Basilique Notre-Dame on Place d'Armes: built between 1823-9, this Gothic Revival church was North America's largest and houses the largest bell in North America.
Window-shopping on Rue St Denis.
We cut across the Champs-de-Mars and behind the Hôtel de Ville on the way back to our hotel...
...for a complimentary glass of wine - and the friendliest staff we'd ever come across.
Sampling some local brews at a nearby pub before dinner at an Italian.
A view of the St Lawrence River from our window (the Biosphere, built for Expo '67, can be see on the left). Montréal is the shipping gateway to the Great Lakes, but there was no sign of any cruise ships in the Vieux-Port while we were there.
Next door to the basilica, the Séminaire St-Sulpice, built in 1685 by the Sulpician Order, is the oldest surviving building in Montréal. The exterior clock, dating from 1701, is the oldest of its kind in North America.
Auberge Pierre du Calvet, a 1725 inn, and the Chapelle Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours.
The Hôtel de Ville. rebuilt in the Beaux-Arts style after being damaged by fire in the 1920s, sits on the beautiful Place Jacques-Cartier (a French explorer who claimed to have discovered Canada for King François I of France in 1534).
Rue St-Paul, the main cobbled thoroughfare through Vieux-Montréal.
