I posted quite a few photos over on my Flickr account, so I won’t offer too much of a travelogue, just some assorted impressions and observations.
We stayed at the Hyatt Regency, which turned out to be remarkably well-located for us. It’s right on top of one of the malls of the Underground City, including a Metro station. We used the Metro extensively on Sunday, going all the way out to Olympic Park, then back into the city to go to Schwartz’s Deli for lunch and then out to Parc Jean-Drapeau to go to the Biosphere. By the end of the day, we were exhausted, but at least we knew that once we got off the subway we were basically at our hotel. It was also easy walking to the Basilica Notre Dame and from there to the rest of Old Montreal/Old Port. The downtown isn’t as compact as Boston (though much more accommodating for automobiles), but isn’t as far removed from other parts of the city as midtown Manhattan is from other parts of New York. The northern part of the island has very little of interest to tourists.
We had absolutely no problem being primarily English speakers. We did not encounter a single waiter, cashier, ticket taker, shopkeeper, or anyone else who did not speak and understand English easily (although some people had some pretty thick Quebec accents). The trick was to say “Hello” instead of “Bonjour” whenever greeted, and this is the cue for the other person to speak English. Clearly, though, this is limited to the city itself. On Monday we drove out towards Sherbrooke to a water park before heading home (about 45 minutes from the city), and the park employees spoke little to no English at all. Later, stopping for lunch at a restaurant near the park, we were once again faced with a waitress who spoke no English and whom I could not understand well enough in French to get a couple of service questions she asked. My comprehension of French is good enough to be able to handle most brief interactions like ordering from a menu or reading instructions, but I just could not make heads or tails of what the waitress was asking. I presume there was some degree of Quebecois idiom involved that was outside my limited knowledge. Overall, though, it was far less intimidating to be in Montreal as an English speaker than it was in Paris, and we did not encounter any of the “I speak English but won’t do it for you” bullshit that used to be the Francophone reaction to Americans in Montreal.
I sweated A LOT. Montreal has a reputation for humid summer weather, and Saturday was a prime example. It was in the low 80s, hazy with periods of overcast, but the dew point must have been 75 degrees. All day long I looked like I had just gotten out of the shower (or needed to get into one quick). We would go into some air-conditioned place and cool off, then go back out and get sweaty all over again. In this particular photo, I have just emerged from a 30-minute multimedia show in the Basilica Notre Dame, which is NOT air conditioned. The weather was better on Sunday, but several of the indoor attractions we visited were hot and humid — the Amazon Rainforest exhibit at the Biodome might as well have been a steam bath, and the aquatic center at the Olympic Stadium was also purposefully warm and humid, though not quite as intensely so.
Yes, Schwartz’s Deli is every bit as good as they say. We went in the middle of the afternoon on Sunday, so we did not have to wait the customary hour for a table, even though the place was still full. We only waited maybe five minutes and shared a table with a young couple to fill it out. I ordered the small plate of the famed smoked meat and still could barely finish it. The smoked meat is beef brisket, but it’s not corned beef. It’s dry rubbed and cured like pastrami. It was simply delicious. Plus, the restaurant is air conditioned.
Bridget never did man up and order poutine, even though it is a routine menu item wherever french fries are served. She kept calling it “putain”, and I would have loved to have seen her ask some fast food worker for THAT.
The Bateau Mouche boat ride was probably the least scenic boat ride I have ever taken, but we really just needed to sit down someplace cool for an hour, and it fit the bill. If you are hot and your feet are tired, take the boat ride. Otherwise, it was the most skippable thing we did all weekend.
The tour of the Olympic Stadium was interesting, but the stadium itself is very depressing. It’s almost never used anymore because the roof collapsed from the weight of too much snow during an auto show a few years ago. It’s too expensive to maintain, impossible to insure, and too large for the lackluster professional sports teams in Montreal. So it sits empty most of the time, with only a small handful of expo shows during the good weather. I remember watching hour after hour of the 1976 Olympics and the crowds in the stadium for the track and field events and wishing so hard that I could be there. It was a weird and sad experience, but I’m very glad we took the tour.
On the tour of the tower, Charlotte and I were with a group of elderly New Zealanders. It must have been their first stop in Montreal, because they didn’t seem to know anything about the rest of the city. There were no tour guides on the observation deck, and I ended up fielding all sorts of questions from the Kiwis. “Where’s that American fella? Ask him what that building is!”
Necessary French vocabulary I picked up: at Starbucks all I needed to know was “venti glace”, though elsewhere it’s “cafe glace” or just “glace” (as long as you’re in a coffee shop). Lots of places serve “moka glace” or “cappucino glace”, but what you get is more like a milkshake than a coffee drink. At the water park we learned that “changing room” is “salle de deshabillage”. All sherbet and sorbet is just “sorbet”, but sherbet is “sorbet de laitier”. “Queue de Castor” is a unique Canadian confection which translates to “beaver tail” in English. It’s a big piece of fried dough topped with gooey sweet stuff like chocolate and bananas, fruit toppings, and so on. How this has not spread here to New England, where we get a ton of Quebec tourists in the summer, is a total mystery.
We really had a very good time. I think we managed to hit most of the family-friendly destinations, so we might until Charlotte’s a little older before we go back, but I’d love to go back for one of the bajillion festivals they have during the summer. Next time, though, I’m bringing an economy-pack of sweatbands and double the number of shirts.
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