Mon July 22 Quebec

 

Today was our day to do what we wanted! We had breakfast and visited with a few folks from the group before they all went to the airport. We met with our guide to get his ideas about options for today and for Montreal, as well as to discuss various ways we could travel to Montreal: train versus bus. Later, I suddenly remembered that I had hired a car service in France to take Michelle and me from Charles de Gaulle to Chartres. So I called a couple companies and was quoted ridiculous prices! Then the hotel gave us the name of someone we should try. His name was Dany and when I spoke to him, he said he was not available to take us tomorrow, but then he offered to find us a driver who could take us! With text messages back-and-forth all day we ultimately got connected to a guy he has known for 20 years and completely vouches for. He will pick us up at our hotel and take us to our hotel in Montreal! We are thrilled! managing our bags on the train or bus would have been quite difficult. It is about 150 miles to Montreal from here.

The  first thing we wanted to do today was get on a boat on the St Laurence was river so we could experience being on the water. We took the ferry boat from the lower town across the river and we’re surprised that it was only about a 15 minute ride! ( we were taught that the name Quebec means the place where the river is narrow ). On the other side, there wasn’t much to see except for the view back to Quebec city but we had a nice cup of coffee and a good coffee house, then returned to Quebec city.The pictures are from the boat trip. Notice in one of them, the old city wall on the cliff. It was explained to us many times that it was easy to defend the city with that cliff and the wall. ( I did not take time to edit the pictures because it’s late and I want to go to bed!) 🛏️ 

When we got off the boat, we were surprised to see our local guide from yesterday waiting at a bus stop. We had a question for her about finding a local bank and laughed at what a coincidence this was—-We know exactly one person who lives in Quebec city and we ran into her!

We had lunch and did a little shopping and ended up back at the hotel for a little rest. We went to a local Restaurant for soupe à l’oignon gratinée & a desert crêpe.  Yummm!  

C’est tout pour maintenant !