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Quebec

Posted on Aug 12, 2010 by | 1 comment

So maybe it is hard to tell but that little marker is the boarder!  Jacob was disappointed as he was expecting a line to be drawn on the grass and through the street.
It was interesting the distinct changes that could be observed when we left Vermont and entered Quebec.  Vermont was the gorgeous 5 hour drive through the mountains.  Beautiful tree and if I had counted the houses we saw from the highway it wouldn’t have taken all my digits for sure.  But right across the boarder, after the lovely welcome sign and the 50 km/hr does not equal 50 miles/hour sign, we were in farmland.  Little farm houses with the clothes hung out to dry and cars and tractors for sale in the front yards.  It was so cute.  The road we took to the city was lined with house after house, a bit like a typical suburban street except there weren’t more houses behind them just land, and lots of it.  It reminded me a bit of my old drive home, on Catawba Road, except sooooo much flatter.  
We stopped at a mall before we actually found the city.   Mainly because we were in bumper to bumper traffic and I made Jacob cross a cement barrier to make our own “exit”, if you will.  It was pretty rugged for our little Yaris.  So we wandered around and found amazing chocolate; Nestle makes a bar just for Canadians called an Aerobar.  The plain chocolate bars aren’t anything too special.  But we bought a mint bar and were so surprised by the pleasing explosion of mint mixed with chocolate that both Jacob and I decided was supreme to our beloved Andes mints.  But before we could enjoy the unique air-bubbles we were taken off guard by the ailen-egg-looking interior of the bar: What The Green???
Only in Canada.  Also, a new find was Jacob’s very own store: Jacob.  We just had to walk in to find the “sale of the season.”  (It sure is amazing how far a little bit of spanish knowledge and common sense will get you in a country full of signs in a language you really don’t know.  Everyone we met spoke English, which made everything just that much easier.)  I found an awesome shirt that is uber long and had a decent neckline, so now I can wear a piece my husband’s “line”.

Saturday morning we roamed the streets of old Quebec.  We walked through malls, cathedrals, and alleyways.  My planning couldn’t have been poorer as the two main attractions I wanted to see were closed for a wedding and a strike.  Nice.

But we found our way and got a taste of the city. Below, Jacob is looking at some odd holographs about the city and its founder.

Of course along with the food and the museums and the religion one needs to take in the art.

Quebec graffiti and public “art” tended to make us either hungry or sick to our stomachs.  This image portrays the first feeling.  The odd horse corpse out of paper mache hanging above a door to the theater on the other hand made me a bit queezy.  Turtles, however, always make me happy.  Like this one:

We found out in the middle of our trip that one of our desinations, though not closed for weddings or strikes had shut its doors for a bit of cleaning.  Sheesh.  But we still rolled out to the industrial area of town for a quick peak at one of my favorite places on earth: the Temple.

On our way back we enjoyed the kiddy museum about the environment that is housed in a pretty fancy dome.  The structure was built for the world’s fair in the 60’s.  After a fire and abandonment the place was revitalized to be a neat museum with a cool view of Montreal.

We were also very very grateful we didn’t have to fill up in Canada:

That’s per liter people!!  You know, the typical $4 a gallon story >.< I think my favorite sighting that was completely unexpected was KFC.  That may sound silly but I am easily amused by the french version: PFK.  I just found it so funny.  So here is Jacob and I recording for posterity the amusement of translation.

Sooooo classy.

And for the grand finale: Have you ever seen a Walmart lot this empty? Ever?

Apparently our neighbors to the north have a law demanding stores close at 5 pm on the weekends.  We missed the memo and also, thereby, missed out on restocking our supply of mint aerobars.  Such is life.  But really Walmart? 5 pm? You let us down. Hah.

We returned to our homeland early the next afternoon.  Although we were almost arrested for having brought a banana from our hotel.  And by almost arrested I mean the man at customs got out his handcuffs so we all could have a good laugh when we admitted our grievous crime.  It was a long drive home, one that I think we are still recovering from, but explorers we are and Canada is officially checked off my to-do list.

1 Comment

  1. Okay, the PFK cracked me up, too.

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