Tales From Moose County

I left work early and caught the train to Montréal.

I packed away my Please and Thankyou’s and pulled out my S’il vous plaît and Merci’s.

I navigated the metro from Bonaventure to Lucien-L’Allier to my hostel, the lovely Auberge de Jeunesse.

The snow was already waiting for me.

As was the cold.

I dropped off my bags and headed for a walk around town. Starting on Rue Ste-Catherine I headed west, then east, until I found myself at Rue Crescent, the heart of the entertainment district. Bars, pubs and nightclubs galore!
Crashed for the night before embarking on a walking tour of the city. Walked down Rue Ste-Antione past Square Victoria before reaching the first stop, Old Montréal (see Wikipedia article here). Walked around the streets which reminded me so much of France it wasn’t funny! Some of the original streets even had the trademark cobblestones which i’ve only ever seen in Europe.

In a rare moment, I actually visited a church - the grand Basilique Notre-Dame.

Headed north on the metro, stopped for lunch (unknowingly in a separatist area) before taking a hike up Mount Royal. Located just a couple of kilometres from the CBD, Mount Royal (where the city gets its name) hovers over the city and provides some of the best photo-ops available in Montréal… Unfortunately for me, the sun had just set, it was minus five degrees, it was snowing and my camera doesn’t do night so no dice on the photos from there.

Walked south through McGill University before stopping a couple of blocks short of the hostel at Centre Bell where the biggest Ice Hockey game on the east coast was about to begin - the Montréal Candadiens VS the Toronto Maple Leafs. Scalped a ticket off the street for $60 to see the game and cheer on my adopted home team, Toronto. Ice Hockey has a reputation for being violent and I can confirm that it lives up to it. Toronto dominated the entire game and was winning 3-1 until the final 10 minutes when Montréal scored 2 quick goals, pushing the game into overtime. After a couple of missed attempts by Toronto, Montréal took out the game on penalty shoot-out. We were robbed!

The next day, apart from a short stint in the Quartier Latin where cheap food and great coffee was found, the snow began to really come down hard and without the right foot ware, navigating the icy city streets went very quickly from funny (I’m sliding all over the place) to just plain dangerous (I’m sliding into that moving car). So I had to move inside and discover the part of Montréal that I had heard so much about… the part where its a massive party town.

So I went to one bar

…And another

…And another

until that’s all I did for the next 2 days before having to catch the train back to Toronto.

Montréal, I will miss you and endeavour to return in summer when I hear you really shine your brightest. Je t’aime ! Au revoir !

Check the photos out here.