Canada's major provinces have a funny trend, where their biggest city isn't always their capital. Vancouver in British Columbia, Regina in Saskatchewan, and Montreal in Quebec, respectively their province's biggest cities, but not their provincial capitals. There truly is something special about Quebec City, from its history, architecture, demographics, and status as a UNESCO World Heritage site. This city is strikingly different from Montreal, and a wholly different experience to boot.

Quebec City

Day 0 - New Orleans (2)

Same bus, similar experience. I guess it was interesting to see the roads from the perspective of a driver this time. Plenty of construction getting out of Montreal, pretty typical for a fast growing city. It was also cool seeing how the rural sections between the cities change over time.

After a stop in Sainte-Foy, I am dropped off at the Quebec City train and bus station. In theory, the walk from here to the hostel should be a brisk 10 minutes, but I discovered firsthand just how hilly the city is. Old Quebec is built on top of an entire mound, and I had to climb my way up from the water level to reach my hostel.

A little history lesson that I learned through museums and tours: Quebec City was originally a French colony and was in a great defensive position on the St. Lawrence. During the colonial struggles between the French and British in the American colonies, Quebec City attempted to construct a fort turned citadel, under French, then British-occupied rule during the 18th to 19th century. What remains now is the only fortified city north of Mexico, with much of the old walls and cannons still preserved and on display. This preservation of the walls also preserved the old town within, so Old Quebec still looks and feels like a European town. UNESCO declared the entire old village a preservation site, and that's how we ended up with one of the prettiest and nicest areas in Canada to walk around.

My hostel was run by HI Canada, a collection of hostels across Canada (mostly in the Rockies and West Coast). The area was even bigger than my Montreal stay, with multiple buildings worth of rooms and dorms connected like a proper hotel. Occupancy felt busier, my room was way larger, and also there were a lot of kids. This may sound weird because I never brought it up, but I never really saw kids in my hostels due to age restrictions and parental supervision, but there were a lot of families with kids, which is a common theme I'll mention later on.

Before the night closed, I went to sit on the wall. Yes, it was open to the public, and yes, it was cool being able to walk along the ancient walls and take in the sights.

The fire alarm went off at midnight. It was a false alarm, but the giant firetrucks took half an hour just to reach our hostel and let us back inside.

Day 1 - Old Quebec

I couldn't imagine any other start than just getting lost in Old Quebec. For what is a relatively small area that I would eventually memorize, there is genuinely something special about just walking around a preserved city built to be beautiful. The Europeans really knew what they were doing with their cities, because I've never experienced a town with so many people actually being there to enjoy the cityscape, and not for work.

Past the famous Fairmount Le Chateau Frontenac, a castle-like behemoth, I stumbled onto a boardwalk that took me along the walls of the citadel and ended up at the highest point of the city.

The citadel itself is still an active military base, while also serving guided tours and a museum. I hadn't even planned to visit, but since I was already there I might as well take a tour. Lots of well-preserved artifacts, structures, and cool views to see.

Obviously, I've visited some significant Canadian memorials, museums, and now military bases. Naturally, I'd see more patriotic pride or floundering, depending on your pov, but it's still somewhat surreal to see my nation wave its previous wars with pure pride. Especially in more recent conflicts like the war of Korea and Afghanistan, I appreciated the Ottawa War Museum showcasing everything in great detail, but having the wars Canada fought inscribed into the buildings felt patriotically tacky.

Afterwards, I started my descent down the hill and ended up in front of the provincial Parliament building. A beautiful building itself, with two things happening in front of it:

1. An LGBTQ2S+ rally in the front lawn. It was pride month (June) when I was going. If I could understand French I would also share their chants here.
2. A cyclist Grand Prix. Imagine 100+ cyclists neck and neck as they speed around the fountains and onto the turns of the main street. Very satisfying to the eyes.

Old Quebec is a great place for street performers. Being in a place where people actually want to hang out really helps with drawing in crowds and donations naturally. From musicians, singers, street performers, and artists, I saw at least 2 performers every day making a living through their talents alone.

The most European part of town is Rue Saint-Pierre, just multiple flights of stairs from the Fairmont Hotel. A narrow street packed with people and shops, activity for all the eye can see.

At this point, I've looped down the mound and back to the train station. This area is also nice to walk through, being next to the harbor, where boat tours happen, and the neighboring homes at the base of the hill. I'm really emphasizing the verticality of Quebec because The layout of this city is fascinating, how the building needs to be built slanted to the ground, and seeing where the roads wind around the small but uneven space. I'd compare this place to the hills of Vancouver, just shorter in length and steeper in incline.

It's a workout to climb back up to Old Quebec. There is a sightseeing elevator that costs $6 but I never rode it. As the night drew closer, I also came to appreciate the many sites where a person can sit down and relax, another common theme that will keep repeating itself in this blog. Speaking of blogging, here's me with my laptop in a public plaza and on top of the wall.

Day 2 - Montmorency Falls

To wait out the morning rush hour, I wandered down the Saint-Jean-Baptiste neighborhood to see the colorful, rustic houses. This place has been preserved for a long time, with most of the houses having taken on significant wear and tear from old age. Being built on an incline really added to the European style of dense, personal, human-sized neighborhoods that felt really cozy to walk in. Just look at these power lines that look like they could snap at any moment.

From up on the hillside, I descend down a column of stairs to reach the university station. The word column does not do the tall height justice -- the cliff I climbed down was about as tall as a large residential skyscraper. The verticality can get somewhat tiring when repeatedly going up and down the incline, but still very cool to experience firsthand.

The greater Quebec area operates the RTC transit system, a network of busses that links all the nearby neighborhoods. The normal routes are pretty infrequent, from up to a half hour or even 50 minutes apart. To compensate, they operate some express "metro line" along the major roads with at least 15 minutes frequency. Metro bus 800 goes across the whole city, from Sainte-Foy all the way to Montmorency fall in around an hour. It's a convenient and inexpensive option for a tourist like myself, my hostel had also partnered with RTC to hand out free day passes.

One thing I quickly noticed was how much more suburbanized the neighborhoods became the further we went. My original awe of the dense European-style mid-rises makes way for comically large parking lots and multi-lane freeways cutting through residential homes. Montmorency Falls is a paid park area, with lots of green spaces to hike, picnic, and witness a waterfall technically taller than Nigeria Falls. From the top of the mountain, with the suspending bridge and zipline, there is a massive set of stairs that took me to the bottom with a community center, gondola, and views of the waterfall. There was even this viewing area so close to the falls that it felt like I was standing in a thunderstorm. One way to refresh myself from all the stairs, which really is super tall.

The nearest bus stop back to Quebec is a fairly long walk, and I stumbled upon this "snack shack" along the way. Pretty pricey, but who knew how good the food in a small shack in a parking lot could be.

I decided to ride the bus further into downtown and visit the plains of Abraham. This was the original site where the British conquered the city of Quebec from the French and now converted into a public park. It's a fairly large area along the waterfront, with a big loop for cycling, green spaces for picnics, and enough open land for kids to fly their kites. I saw a couple of performers, the Abraham Museum, and even the venue for a future concert.

Day 3 - Jacques-Cartier National Park

As the title says, I wanted to dedicate a day to exploring the rural areas outside the city and settled on a day trip to the nearby National Park. A round trip with Quatre Natures cost me $55 for the bus and park pass and went from 9 am to 4:30 pm. The trip itself went great, with lots of nice trails along the river and canyon of Jacques-Cartier. While I didn't have enough time to reach the famous Les Lopus trail, the shorter paths were also nice. I met some really nice locals that day, including a class trip of elementary school kids all shouting Bonjour to me. That moment still feels surreal to me even now.

The shuttle driver even offered to take us to a boat rental, where I had a nice hour on a standup board. The cold water felt nice, and I even saw a family of Canadian Geese minding their own business. I don't have any pictures of me on the water (that's how I destroyed my old phone). I do promise I did look really cool while boarding.

Originally, this wasn't supposed to be my only nature outing, I wanted to visit the island of Orleans, the Sanctuary of Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré, and the lands of Charlevoix. Except for maybe a short cruise to the Sanctuary, you really need a car to explore outside the city, which feels like a big oversight of Quebec to miss. For a relatively smaller city that probably wants to reduce car traffic, I wish someone would offer more transit routes to these far-out locations, a good tourism and economic boost.

After that exhausting day, I splurged a lot more than I planned on some fine pasta and sweet creme brulee.

Day 4 - Downtown and Coast

I started today by walking West of Old Quebec among the locals. Lots of strolling through neighborhoods, some grocery shopping, and getting sunburned from being outside all morning. One thing I noticed was all the medium-density, mixed-use apartments as opposed to suburban standalone homes. Coming from other major Canadian cities, Quebec's residential areas feel the nicest to explore, on top of all the other benefits like more affordable homes, etc.

And more poutine because why wouldn't I get more poutine here.

Speaking of... There were a lot of kids in Quebec City specifically. Like this probably sounds weird to say out loud, but every day here, there were many youths with and without parents, from small circles of friends to entire field trips and sports teams. The walls from previous pictures were covered with teens, couples, and groups of people around my age or younger than me. I'd also seen intersections backed up by massive groups of tourists, and I mean massive groups. It was like every school from Montreal and Toronto was having their graduation trip. The timing does line up (second last week of June), but who knows for sure~

Anyway, I wasn't here in Quebec City to watch kids, so I went back to Rue Saint-Pierre and cut through to the harbor. I happened to stumble upon this TV show, where piano performers were playing in public to a crowd of people and three judges. For such a small venue, I gained a new sense of admiration for how much setup and logistics were needed on set. At least four cameras hooked up to a broadcasting trailer and popup stand, with tons of staff managing everything.

The edge of the harbor itself was closed off for some reason, so I could walk sorta near the waterfront. What I stumbled upon was this incredible open patio and bar that's submerged in water! You can put your feet in the water, and after so much walking this felt incredibly relaxing.

Like with any harbor front, the water breeze always makes these areas comfortable places to be during the hot summer days. Although it was raining slightly, I still found the weather to be perfect. It was easy getting back to the Old City and ending the day with a burger and an evening stroll back to the hostel.

Day 5 - Off to Moncton

In my next blog, you'll get to read all about my experience with my VIA rail trip to Moncton in New Brunswick. However, since the train was due at 10 pm, I had time to check in my luggage and spent a nice slow day around Old Quebec.

Something that's really underrated in Quebec is the amount of preserved architecture and important monuments and how they are so well integrated into the city. Anywhere I walked, I'd eventually stumble upon some historically significant exhibit, church, or important building. The estate of Samuel de Champlain is just casually resting under the boardwalk beside the Fairmount Hotel. The ruins of some houses were just left on display, not to mention most of the walls surrounding the old town.

But, what I appreciated most was how nice it was to be present in Old Quebec. Much of the town felt welcoming and nice to be in, sitting on a bench and watching everyone go about their day. Even where traffic was the busiest, it was still limited to a single lane of cars and tour buses. Hence, where most busy cities may only have a few pockets of nice areas between their oceans of noise, most places here were nice to be in.

So all in all, I think Quebec City might be my favorite place between the locations I've already visited in Ontario and Quebec. The people were incredibly nice, the atmosphere felt relatively calm, and maybe by 2040 Canada will finally build the high-speed rail between the four cities I just bused through. Realistically though, if I were to be looking for work, I would see myself enjoying Montreal more than Toronto as a major metropolitan to work in.