Cirque du Soleil

Magical Montreal

French speaking Montreal has everything: an amazing eating out scene, a scenic waterfront, stunning stone buildings, magnificent cathedrals, cobblestone streets and charming cafes.
It’s also a destination that knows how to let its hair down– particularly this year as Quebec’s largest city celebrates its 375th anniversary. And, at less than seven hours flying time from the UK, Montreal is closer than you think. TNT shows you the way to go…



Marvel at The Notre Dame
The neo-gothic Notre Dame basilica - where the late, great Luciano Pavarotti recorded his celebrated Christmas concert - is a masterpiece in itself. However to celebrate the 375th anniversary of the city’s founding, its grand interior will be the site of a multi billion dollar laser show which will light up the columns, stained glass windows, statues and crazily ornate ceiling of the basilica for a whole year.
www.basiliquenotredame.ca/en

Amble around Old Montreal
Most tourists make the Old Montreal neighbourhood their first port of call and for good reason. The scenic waterfront, stunning stone buildings, magnificent cathedrals and churches(Mark Twain famously called Montreal “a city where you couldn’t throw a brick without breaking a church window”) and cobblestone streets of Montreal’s Old Town could keep you contented for days.
www.vieux.montreal.qc.ca/eng

Go boho
For the TNT team, much of Montreal’s appeal lies in losing yourself in the Bohemian enclaves of Little Italy, The Village and Plateau Mont-Royal. The latter, home to Montreal’s media and creative folk, captures the imagination like no other neighbourhood.  So much so that it was even the star of its own show - Les Bobos - which looked at the life and loves of the Plateau's hip residents and ran from 2012-2013. It’s fun to browse the vibrant boutiques along Boulevard St Laurent, before retiring for a cafe au lait in one of the Plateau’s quirky pavement cafes. (Unlike other Canadian metropolises, Montreal has yet to be Starbucks-ified).

Park life
When you want to escape the hustle and bustle of Montreal, go to the city’s green lungs - aka Mont Royal Park. This leafy expanse was designed by Frederick Law Omsted, the architect behind New York’s Central Park, and holds a special place in the hearts of Montrealers . (Whatever you do, don’t make the mistake of calling Montreal’s ‘mountain’, a hill as Oscar Wilde once did in the 1880s). You can reach Mont Royal Park by taxi, public transport or by BIXI - the super affordable public solar powered bicycle system, that served as the blueprint for London’s Santander Cycles (nee Boris bikes).
www.montreal.com/parks/mtroyal.html

Go east
The Eastern Townships are only an hour's drive from Montreal down the Autoroute 10, but the contrast between Quebec’s cosmopolitan capital and the sleepy ‘Cantons d l’Est’ (as the Eastern Townships are known by its French inhabitants), couldn’t be greater.  The Townships’ sparkling blue lakes, quaint villages and rolling hills are reminiscent of New England (indeed the area was initially inhabited by New Englanders who moved north after the American Revolutionary War in the late 1700s) - and provide the perfect backdrop for some serious R and R.
www.easterntownships.org

Food glorious food
Make no mistake: Montreal has a love affair with food. The star of this gourmet getaway, is smoked meat sandwiches. Montreal’s best known bastion of brisket is Schwartz’s smoked meat emporium (owned by the Queen of the power ballad, Celine Dion) but be prepared to queue: expect to see a line snaking out of the door regardless of which hour you visit.
Need a break from brisket? Fill your boots with a Montreal bagel, which tend to be smaller and sweeter than their Big Apple counterparts. (There’s a fierce, yet friendly, rivalry between Montrealers and New Yorkers, as to which city serves up the best bagel). Two of the best places to try the Montreal bagel are Fairmont Bagel (www.fairmountbagel.com/) and St Viateur Bagel (www.stviateurbagel.com/) - look out for the newspaper articles from around the world, on the walls.
Another Montreal must try is poutine - French fries drowned in gravy and cheese curds that are surprisingly satisfying. You’ll find poutine on menus all over Montreal.

Get lost in the underground city
There’s no bad time to visit Montreal: spring sees maple saps rising, summer is all about blossoms and autumn is harvest time while in winter, there’s snowmen. Sure it can be now numbingly cold as temperatures plummet (often as low as -20), but this is when ingenious inventions such as Montreal’s Underground City - 20 miles of subterranean pedestrian tunnels packed full of shops, schools, offices,  restaurants and concert halls - come into their own. Discover more at www.montrealundergroundcity.com

Weekend excursion
Got a couple of extra days to kill?  Escape to Quebec City. The 400 year old UNESCO World Heritage site -  a quick and easy, if unattractive, three hour drive up the road from Montreal - is remnant of an older, miraculously unspoilt world. Case in point? Despite being the capital of Quebec (and the only North American fortified city whose walls still exist), the pretty city’s half a million inhabitants still refer to Quebec City as a ‘village’.
www.quebecregion.com/en

 

Get your nightlife on
Montreal is a place of parades, festivals and year round raucous concerts and shows, including those by home grown companies such as Cirque du Soleil (www.cirquedusoleil.com). A fan of jazz? Aim to coincide your visit with the world famous, fantastic Festival International de Jazz de Montréal (www.montrealjazzfest.com) which, this year, is taking place from 28 June-8 July. Alternatively if you want to catch the next Arcade Fire, check out Casa del Popolo (www.casadelpopolo.com) and Sala Rossa (www.lasaladelrosso.it) in Mile End, or Divan Orange (www.divanorange.org) on the Plateau where, for just a few dollars, you can hear indie acts any day of the week.

 

View the post here: http://digitaledition.tntmagazine.com/magical-montreal

French fancy

Kaye Holland is seduced by the sleek sophistication of Montreal and the old world charm of Quebec City in Quebec - aka the most surprising destination in North America

Confession time. Up until recently, Quebec - a French speaking region of eastern Canada - was a far away land of which, despite being three times larger than France, I knew little. Then in 2011, the province began to swim into my yen thanks to the new Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, whose inaugural Royal tour following their wedding, was to Quebec.

It’s certainly true that when compared to cities such as New York and Paris, Montreal - my gateway to Quebec - often gets overlooked, like a middle child overshadowed by its siblings. But in my mind, cosmopolitan (one in three residents is an immigrant), cultural, characterful Montreal - home to some three and a half million people - is one of the world’s greatest cities.

Most tourists make the Old Montreal neighbourhood their first port of call, particularly Place d’Ames. Here the main attraction is Notre Dame Basilica - a neo-gothic masterpiece, where the late Luciano Pavarotti recorded his celebrated Christmas concert. The scenic waterfront, stunning stone buildings, magnificent cathedrals and churches   (Mark Twain famously called Montreal “a city where you couldn’t throw a brick without breaking a church window”) and cobblestone streets of Montreal’s Old Town could keep you contented for days.

However, for me, much of Montreal’s appeal lies in losing yourself in the Bohemian enclaves of Little Italy, The Village and Plateau Mont-Royal. The latter, home to Montreal’s media and creative folk, captures the imagination like no other neighbourhood and has become the star of its own show - Les Bobos - which looks at the life and loves of the Plateau's hip residents.

It’s fun to browse the vibrant boutiques along Boulevard St Laurent, before retiring for a cafe au lait in one of the Plateau’s wonderful pavement cafes (unlike other Canadian cities, Montreal has yet to be Starbucksified).

When you want to escape the hustle and bustle, go to the city’s green lungs - aka Mont Royal Park. This leafy expanse was designed by Frederick Law Omsted, the architect behind New York’s Central Park, and holds a special place in the hearts of Montrealers (don’t make the mistake of calling Montreal’s ‘mountain’, a hill as Oscar Wilde once did in the 1880s). You can reach Mont Royal Park by taxi, public transport or by BIXI - the super affordable public solar powered bicycle system, that served as the blueprint for London’s Boris Bikes.

And don’t worry about working up an appetite, from all that exercise: Montreal has a love affair with food. The star of this gourmet getaway, is smoked meat sandwiches served with a generous dollop of ‘slaw. Montreal’s best known bastion of brisket is Schwartz’s smoked meat emporium (owned by the Queen of the power ballad, Celine Dion) but be prepared to queue: even on a monsoon like sunday afternoon in October, there was a line snaking out of the door that reminded me of the queue to get into Kudos, my local nightclub, when I was a teenager.

If, like me, you’re not mad about smoked meat (I’m a veggie), it’s all about the bagel. There’s fierce (yet friendly) rivalry between Montrealers and New Yorkers, as to which city serves up the best bagel. Montreal bagels tend to be smaller and sweeter than their Big Apple counterparts. Two of the best places to try the Montreal staple (usually coated in either poppy or sesame seeds) are Fairmont Bagel and St Viateur Bagel - look out for the newspaper articles from around the world, on the walls.

Another Montreal must try is poutine - that’s French fries drowned in gravy and cheese curds, to you and me. Admittedly it sounds downright disgusting, but it was - much to my surprise - also extremely satisfying. You’ll find poutine on menus all over Quebec, from McDonalds to more upmarket establishments like Au Pied de Cochon (reservations essential).

Indeed for those who want to dress up (Montrealers, like their Parisian counterparts, are notoriously stylish) for dinner, there’s a warren of gourmet restaurants, BYO bistros and ethnic eateries competing for your cash: Montreal has more restaurants per capita than any other city, save for New York, in North America.

There’s also a plethora of places for post dinner drinking and dancing, for Montreal is a destination that knows how to let its hair down. This is a place of parades, festivals and year round raucous concerts and shows, including those by home grown companies such as Cirque du Soleil. And with Montreal set to explode onto the world stage next summer with the release of Steven Spielberg’s Montreal shot sci-fi thriller Robopocalypse, it won’t be long before the secret is out.

By contrast, the 400 year old UNESCO World Heritage site that is Quebec City -  a quick and easy, if unattractive, three hour drive up the road from uber cool Montreal - is a much more sleepy sort of place and can’t be considered  a party town. Rather, it’s remnant of an older, miraculously unspoilt world: despite being the capital of Quebec (and the only North American fortified city whose walls still exist), the pretty city’s half a million inhabitants still refer to Quebec City as a ‘village’.

Montreal might be bilingual (you don’t need to speak French to get by) but in Quebec City, Frenchfirmly dominates proceedings. Indeed I would argue that Quebecois do French better than France, in every possible way. The road signs are all in French, shop keepers will speak to you in French (even if the guidebook you’re clutching clearly indicates that you’re a tourist, not a local) and you’ll find pavementcafes selling perfectly flaky almond croissants and coffee, as good as any across the Channel. And, mercifully, without the aloofness and snobbishness, that the French seem to specialise in.

Most visitors will spend the lion’s share of their stay in Quebec City, exploring the Old Town with its 17th and 18th century stone buildings that house buzzing Parisian style bistros and brasseries, boutique hotels and antique stores. Unlike Montreal, Quebec City’s Old Town isn’t just for tourists: 6,000 Quebecois still live inside the city’s old walls, so expect to share restaurants and wine bars with locals.

Highlights of my Quebec City sojourn included admiring the old town from the fortifications (4.6km of ramparts), the Eglise St-Jean Baptiste (North America’s oldest pilgrimage site), pretty Place Royale (Quebec’s founding site which Steven Spielberg used as an alternative to France in his 2002 film, Catch Me If You Can) and the copper turreted Chateau Frontenac.

Perched atop a cliff overlooking the spectacular St Lawrence River, the iconic Chateau Frontenac is said to be the most photographed hotel in the world. If you can’t afford to follow in the footsteps of Grace Kelly and Charlie Chaplin and stay here (prices will cause your palms to moisten), do at least have a drink in the bar and join in the hot topic du jour: will Quebec ever succeed in breaking away from the rest of Canada and, given its unique identity as an isolated island of Francophonie, become a country in its own right? Given that two previous referendums on independence have failed, I would say it doesn’t look likely - but every Quebecer has their own opinion.

Tempting as it is to stay within the Old Town, it’s worth venturing outside the city walls to St Roch (a urban wasteland that has undergone a remarkable renaissance in the last decade, and is now home to classy cafes such as Le Cafe du Clocher Penche), Montmorency Falls (situated seven miles from the city and some 30m higher than Niagara) and to Ile d’Orleans. A 15 minute drive from Old Quebec City, the hilly island has built up a reputation for growing organic produce - not for nothing is it known as the “garden of Quebec”. I enjoyed a stopped at Cassis Monna & Filles - a family business that turns blackcurrants into cassis (France’s favourite blackcurrant liqueur).

I find it to say which city I preferred: the charm of visiting both Montreal and Quebec City is its mix of modern and traditional, British, American andFrench influences. Quebec is a curious hybrid but the province personifies joie de vivre and happily there is no bad time to visit: spring sees maple saps rising, summer is all about blossoms, autumn is harvest time while, in winter, there’ssnowmen - and the world’s biggest winter carnival in Quebec City.

Sure, temperatures plummet (often as low as -20), but this is when ingenious inventions such as Montreal’s Underground City - 20 miles of subterranean pedestrian tunnels packed full of shops and restaurants - come into their own. And, at less than seven hours flying time from the UK, Quebec is closer than you think...

QUÉBEC FACT BOX
For FREE brochures, advice and information call Tourisme Quebec:

Tel:  0800 051 7055 between 3pm and 10pm daily

Emailinfo@quebecoriginal.com

Visit:http://quebecoriginal.com/uk

The site includes a full list of UK based tour operators featuring holidays to Québec.

Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/tourisme.quebec

Twitter - @TourismQuebec

For the low-down on Quebec's Eastern Townships, check out my article, Go east,  

here