We traveled from Montreal to Quebec City, which took us about 2 hours and 45 minutes. From pictures, the town looked very quaint and peaceful, so we wanted to check it out. In order to stay on budget, we booked a room outside of the cute, old town center (about a 10-minute drive) through Airbnb. We thought this would be similar to our experience in Montreal, but it turned out to be more similar to a hostel. The owner lived separately in the floors above three rentable rooms with a shared bathroom. We were a bit apprehensive at first, but the place worked out great because it offered a private, lockable room and we didn’t feel as though we were intruding on the owner’s space. Upon arrival, we dropped our bags and headed to the old part of town. There was cheap parking at the Justice Center ($5 CAD for the entire day), which offered a 10-minute walk to the city center.
As in Montreal, our first stop was the tourist center to grab some maps and information. On our way, we were overwhelmed by the number of tourists present in the small town. And at the tourist center, we were told that the annual 10-day music festival was in its last weekend. Unfortunately, this was likely driving up the number of tourists, but on the other hand, there was a lot going on and there were two free stages set up as part of the festival. We started exploring the small town, walking up all of the recommended streets and then stopping at one of the free stages, where we listened to Valley (indie pop). There were also several small pop-up performances and musical acts in the streets. One act was a group of older men playing jazz/blues music. People in the crowd gathered around them to dance in pairs (some sort of swing/blues dance to accompany the music).
We continued walking to the oldest part of the town – Quartier Petit Champlain. This part of the city is very picturesque (and flooded with tourists); we felt as though we were walking through a small town in France. We got dinner/drinks at a microbrewery outside of the old town area based on the recommendation of the woman who helped us in the tourist center – Kerrigane. Food was typical bar food, but good and the beers were also good. Patrick got a tasting flight, which included two lighter ales, a saison framboise, a cream stout and an IPA stout. Everything was very reasonably priced. During dinner it started to pour, and we learned that we should always travel with our rain jackets (even when chances of rain are low).
Honestly, we probably could have just done one full day in Quebec City, but we had one more night/day scheduled and paid for at our hostel. For that reason, we decided to make our second day a somewhat lazy day. We slept in and relaxed in our room until lunchtime and then headed back over to the old town. The Citadel was the last remaining tourist spot we wanted to visit. We lucked out because they were having some sort of celebration/kid’s day, so entrance to the Citadel was free (usually $16 CAD). There were also many stations/information sessions available – we stopped at one which was information on Canadian Coats of Arms. The woman we spoke with works for the Governor General of Canada’s office and works with individuals/companies/groups and artists to design and register Coats of Arms with Canada. Anyone can pay to have a Coat of Arms designed with symbols that have significance (or not) to them. Overall, it costs typically $45,000 CAD for the entire process, but then the Coat of Arms is yours and yours only for whatever use you choose. The process was fascinating.
After the Citadel visit, we stopped for a coffee break and then continued wandering through the town. The temperature started to drop a bit, so we decided to stop for dinner at Polina Pizzeria. Unfortunately, this was our first disappointing meal of the trip. The pizza was expensive and not that great. After a few more pictures in the quaint part of town, we headed back to our room for the night.
