Our Trip to Quebec, Canada - Part 1 Quebec City

 We left home here in New Hampshire on June 25th and returned on July 3rd - one day earlier than planned.

Entry point to Canada

Our B & B with our three windows on 2nd floor.

Our first stop was Quebec City where we stayed in the old city at the B & B Quebec. It was a great locations for seeing this part of the city. But our accommodations were quirky - the spacious room was the library filled with books.  The bathroom had a claw foot tub with shower overhead. It was not easy to step into or out of and heaven forbid if you lost your balance while standing there because all you had to grab was the shower curtain!  I took a bath the second night and even then it was not easy to get out of.  

A disappointment with the B & B was the breakfast. This was the most expensive spot we stayed in so we were expecting rather a nice breakfast. Well, it was an easy prep for the staff person but not very satisfying for us.  There was a plate with sliced cheese and sliced ham.  A basket of croissants. A hard boiled egg we had to peel. Butter and jelly.  Coffee and tea. We were definitely hungry at lunch time which we started looking for before noontime.

We did enjoy talking with the young woman staffing the place.  She was from Italy and spoke English fairly well.  She said her French was much better and she knew some Spanish too.  She was hoping to get her permanent residency and become a citizen of Canada one day.

Old Quebec City is a charming spot and full of tourists!  We did not move the car from the 25th arrival until our departure on the 27th. 

 I did share a postcard [here] of the Snowbird flight group that surprised us though I'm sure residents knew of their plan to put on a brief show over the St. Lawrence on the evening of the 25th.  We had an excellent dinner at an Italian restaurant that first night.

On the 26th we did more exploring of the even older part of Quebec. We rode the funicular back up to the promenade and then descended into the archaeology exhibit under the promenade.  Lunch was good -  especially since we were hungry but dinner at a fondu restaurant was mediocre.

Here is our walk down to the oldest part of Quebec which is the level of the river. There are lots of statues to catch your eye.

Once down at river level there are excavations happening.

Murals

Restored buildings.

A marvelous square with lots of tour guides.

A view of Le Chateau Frontenac above us.

An old fort restored.

Then to the funicular.

Ride the funicular up with us.

One of the park staff of the Archaeology Museum took pity on Dan's French and our inability to download the app to hear the descriptions and gave us a mini tour at the start of this exhibit.

This was the ice house for the chateau which housed the governors of Quebec in colonial times.

I enjoyed the exhibit but took few photos.  We did learn that most of the recovered artifacts came from the privies because jewelry would drop in and broken dishes would be thrown in!

Before our terrible fondu dinner we attended the evening service at the Anglican Church.  Counting the three from the church there were less than 10 in attendance.  We wanted to hear the organ played.

But a smaller older organ was played instead.

Here is a recording;

The service was all spoken except for the prelude and postlude.  Once it was over we asked the organist if we could hear the larger organ and he played a very short piece.

After the same breakfast on the 27th we departed Quebec City traveling east on the south side of the St.  Lawrence River with our destination Ste. Flavie on the Gaspe Peninsula.