Quebec City - Day Two

Quebec City - Family pic!, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

The second day we took to go to the Citadel and the Plains of Abraham. I had no clue that they would be so integrated within the city.

Quebec City - gates of la Citadelle, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

The day started with a tour of the Citadel home of the Van Doo's. With Canada being at war in Afghanistan we had all heard of the Van Doo regiment what we didn't know was that Van Doo is a anglophone pronunciation of the regiment number Vent Deux (22). From the citadels top wall you could see all of the plains of Abraham as well as the St. Laurence and the city.

Quebec City - Plains of Abraham, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

The rest of the day we wandered though the Plains of Abraham. Most (ALL) Canadians should know about the battle(s) fought here and really everyone should visit them. It was one of the most memorable places of the whole trip. Seeing the spot where Wolfe received his mortal wound, imagining what the battle must have been like. The plains are rightly now a national park, but did you know that the plains of Abraham were named that because a guy named Abraham rented them to pasture his animals?
I would have never guessed!

Quebec City - city tour

Quebec City - Chateau Frontenac, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

I love Quebec City. Love it. It has enough Europe flair to make me feel chique being there and enough Canada to make me feel at home. If I spoke French even a little bit better I would move there. The old city is tight knit and comfortable. Lots of hills (not surprising) and views of the water. We did a few things in the city but I think the best thing we did was a walking tour. The tour started at Chateau Frontenac, once the governor's residence and now a luxury hotel. We then wandered down through the Seminaire de Quebec. It was full of school kids and so quite loud and full of echos but really beautiful.

Quebec City - Seminaire de Quebec, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

We wandered down outside the city walls and into Place Royal. Almost all of the land beneath the city walls is reclaimed land. The area we wandered into was built to recreate what the city would have looked like in Champlains time. This was a requirement the city fulfilled in order to receive UNESCO world heritage classification.

Quebec City - Rue Petit-Champlain, originally uploaded by girl from finito.

We ended with some shopping (of course) the main tourist-y shopping street was directly below the chateau and was extremely busy.