A little more exploring in the Old Town
Above: Across from the entrance to the Frontenac was a little store with decorations on the door. The skates are appropriate because Quebec City is a place for winter sports... and they get a lot of snow and cold! We heard from several people about the five metres of snow they’d had this past winter.
I almost wanted to take one of these little sheep home.
After a brief stop back at our hotel room we ventured back out to check out a B&B that got very good reviews on Trip Advisor. I was somewhat relieved when the woman there told us she didn't have a vacancy because I'm not big on B&Bs. The hotel I really wanted to check out was the Auberge Saint-Antoine in the lower town and we would do that later. As we were walking along, we noticed a row of police motorcycles. They turned up the street we were on but by the time I got the camera out of the bag, turned it on and got it focused, they were nearly gone. I read that motorcycles are generally not allowed in Old Quebec.
Aux Anciens Canadiens restaurant must be one of the most photographed buildings in town. We didn't eat there. You can get, for instance, "wild caribou filet and its homemade french fries, three mustard sauce" for $67. Or, "pheasant breast on the grill, old cheddar and smoked bison, oyster-mushroom sauce" for $39.
On the other side of the Frontenac we came upon this statue with the inscription on the side - François de Laval de Montmorency. He was the first bishop of New France.
Laval University – looks to be a school of architecture.
In Montmorency Park are these cannons. Montmorency... Laval - the dots are connecting. I don't know anything about cannons so Glenn had to point out to me that there is a post and pin at the front on which the cannon carriage can pivot. The sloped rails slow the cannon's recoil.
From here we can look down to the lower town where we will investigate the hotel.
Our first view of 'the' mural. More on this later.
This is the outside of the restaurant at the Auberge Saint-Antoine. We never ate there but probably should have because I'll bet it was very good.
We asked at the hotel desk about a room and they got a doorman to show us a few. In the elevator I realized he spoke very good English and found out that he was originally from Ireland. So I knocked off my lame attempts at speaking French. He gave us a general tour of the hotel including the exercise room and movie theatre, and he didn't just show us a room, he explained everything about it. I liked that it had a heated bathroom floor and its own patio with a view of the river. We didn't need to look any further. We said we'd take it as long as we could leave the Frontenac without penalty. It was an interesting comparison - this fellow in his casual clothes giving such friendly, attentive service then and throughout our stay, and the spiffily-dressed but generally useless doormen at the Frontenac. All the people at the Saint-Antoine were down-home friendly, so I heartily recommend this hotel if you should be in Quebec City. And really - everyone should go there. Pictures of the Saint-Antoine will be coming up.
We stopped for a snack in the Café Artefact off the lobby. Here, we had a little glitch with the language difference. We had wanted to share a sandwich and Glenn wanted a bowl of soup. Instead, we wound up with two orders of 'butternut' soup along with the sandwich, and a basket of bread, salad and fries! Our 'snack' cost $34. I have to say though, it was one of the best soups I've ever had.
Now we had to get back to the Chateau Frontenac to meet Glenn's sister and her husband who had driven up from New Jersey. We went back up on the Funiculaire ($1.75 per person), not on the steep road we'd come down on or by the stairs.
Glenn couldn't remember the last time he'd seen his sister and I had never met her. Neither of us had met her husband. We had a very enjoyable time together and a good dinner at the Frontenac. We would see them the next morning for breakfast before they headed back to the States. I was so glad that Glenn and his sister got to see each other again. It was too bad we'd had that soup and sandwich at 3:00 because we really weren't hungry at suppertime so we shared.Finally we come to the end our first full day in Quebec City.
