I left Toronto with a new sense of purpose. The travel fatigue had worn off and with tickets to London booked I was now ready to make the most of the last few days in North America.

I was driving to Montréal, Québec. Bruno had suggested taking a break on the way to see the Thousand Islands so that is what I did. I had always thought for some reason that the Thousand Islands were somewhere in Asia. Turns out that they are actually on the St Lawrence River, on the US-Canadian border. The islands are famous for their beauty and the natural amenity of the area with the Canadian side being part of the Thousand Islands National Park. There are also a number of State Parks on the US side.

The best way to see the islands is by boat so I took a cruise. The boat left from a tiny town called Rockport which was conveniently about half way between Toronto and Montréal. It was a hot day and the cruise was really relaxing. The boat zipped in and out of islands, travelling past countless mansions, as well as some relatively modest houses. The photos will describe it better than I can explain.

Beautiful houses are everywhere

The Thousand Islands Bridge links the US and Canada

Thousand Island dressing reputedly originated here before making it on to the menu of the Waldorf Astoria in New York. George Boldt, the owner of the Waldorf at the time, built Boldt Castle in the Thousand Islands. He was building it for his wife who tragically died before completion. Boldt never returned to the island. The buildings stood derelict until the 70s when the land and buildings were bought for $1 on the condition that they would be restored. The castle is now a major attraction in the area. I had hoped to get a cruise that visited the castle but unfortunately the timing did not work out.

Boldt Castle

This building provides power to the rest of the castle

The island on the left is in Canada while the one on the right is in the USA

It was soon time to get back on the road again. Before long I crossed from Ontario into Québec and for the first time on my trip I really felt like I was in a foreign country. Up until now I had never been challenged by language or culture. I have been trying to learn French for a few years so was looking forward to being able to test it out. The first test was understanding the road signs. This sounds easy but there are a surprising number of signs that only contain text. I managed to get the gist of most of them but I suddenly had to concentrate a bit more. Voice navigation for GPS had no idea how to pronounce French words which was a bit surprising. It was a bit of a guessing game trying to decode French words from phonetic English pronunciation.

The standard of roads dropped dramatically as soon as I crossed in to Québec. Rather than repair the freeways in Montréal they seem to have instead opted to just reduce the speed limits to 70km/h. There were so many potholes that it was impossible to avoid them. I managed to take a wrong to turn just before getting to my hostel and ended up back on the freeway and was forced to take a half hour detour just to get back to where I started. To make things more exciting my fuel light was on the whole time.

I eventually found my way back to the hostel, checked in, and put the car into long term parking. It was getting dark but I thought I would go out for a bit to explore. About five minutes after leaving the hostel a huge thunderstorm unleashed itself above the city. The rain was torrential and I got completely soaked. I tried to wait it out but as the temperature dropped and the wind picked up I was forced to give in.

Montréal is the second largest city in Canada after Toronto with over four million in the greater metropolitan area. The primary language is French and the city is the largest French speaking city other than Paris. Montréal is primary located on a large island in the Saint Lawrence river called Montréal Island or Ile de Montréal. The name of the island and the city itself come from a small mountain right beside downtown called Mount Royal.

I had two and a half days in Montréal and wanted to make the most of that time. I bought a special pass which gave me entry to a bunch of different museums and attractions as well as unlimited public transport use. Montréal has a decent underground metro system which made it easy to get around the inner city. The trains themselves are unusual in that they run on rubber types on flat tracks. The metro is the third busiest in North America which is impressive as Montréal is only the 26th most populous city.

To start I caught the metro out to the Olympic Park which hosted the 1976 Olympic Games. The park is a short distance from downtown and is surrounded by other parkland. Emerging from the metro the first thing I noticed was the impressive Olympic Stadium which features the worlds tallest inclined tower at 175m. Many of the sporting facilities have been converted to other uses. I first visited the Planétarium Rio Tinto Alcan which as the name suggests is a planetarium. The projections were brand new and looked amazing. Next up was the Biodome; a collection of indoor ecosystems built inside the

Olympic Velodrome. While not as impressive at some of the other zoo type attractions I saw earlier in the trip it was still worth a look, especially for the beavers.

The Racoons seemed a little sleepy

Beaver!

My pass included a ride to the observation deck of the Olympic Stadium. The deck is accessed via funicular which travels up the sloped side of the tower. From the top there is a great view over the whole city and the Saint Lawrence river. The streets and houses of the Montréal suburbs reminded me a lot of New York City. From up high I could see my next destination; the Botanic Garden, which was right next door. The gardens and the insectarium were nice but I was pretty tired at this point after walking around for hours and only spent a short time looking around.

The Observation Tower of the Olympic Stadium

View from the top

My tourist pass gave me $10 to use at the Montréal Casino so that is where I went that night. It was pretty small as far as Casinos go but felt a lot less sleazy than Vegas. It turned out that I had to first pay some money of my own in order to get the $10 and I almost managed to walk away with nothing until my final roll which won me back what I put in. The casino also had free (non alcoholic) drinks which was nice.

The next day I visited The Montréal Museum of Fine Arts for an hour or two and saw an exhibition on the works of Auguste Rodin; a famous French sculptor. I then hurried across town to catch a river cruse, again included in my pass. The weather was not cooperating as we set out but the soon cleared up enough to sit outside. The Saint Lawrence river is very wide and flows swiftly at Montréal. The city is also the eastern end of the Saint Lawrence Seaway; a huge system or canals and locks that allows cargo ships to travel from the ocean all the way through to Lake Superior, the most western of the Great Lakes. The opening of the Seaway was costly to Montréal's economy as ships that would previously have stopped at its port could now travel further inland. Even so the port still serves over 2000 cargo ships a year and dominates much of the view from the river.

Lifelike painting at the Museum of Fine Art

The famous Habitat 67 in the Old Port

The cruise started and ended in the oldest part of the city which felt very European. The streets were narrow and the buildings tall and grand. It was a feeling much different to any other city I had visited on the trip so far. The final attraction for the day was a look around Pointe-à-Callière, or the Montréal Museum of Archaeology and History. This museum was built on top of the the exposed remains of some of the city's earliest buildings.

The Vieux Port, or Old Port, felt very European

Up until this point I had mainly stuck to speaking English. I had been learning French for a while and could generally get the gist of things when written but understanding and speaking turned out to be a different story. The French spoken in Québec has some differences to that which I had been learning. Québécois (French speaking Québecers (apparently that is what they are called in English...)) tend to speak quickly and the informal language was quite different. I was determined to at least try and speak French but soon realised that it was a bit hopeless as even if I could say something that people were able to understand, I then had trouble understanding their responses! Turns out being able to read a language and being able to speak a language are two different things. Thankfully people spoke English perfectly and I was always able to fall back on that when my French failed.

The streets were very pretty

I started my final day in Montréal with a visit to the Grévin Wax Museum. Some of the figures were amazing while others were a bit hit and miss. Most of the museum consisted of different decorated rooms with figures in the middle. The last room however was a large open ballroom filled with the figures of dozens of famous people. I was one of the only people there so when I got to this room it was a really uncomfortable feeling not knowing if I was alone or if some of the figures were actually real people.

Mr Einstein

Montréal ended up being one of my favourite cities. I think that this due to a number of factors; in particular that it was the first time that I really felt like I was somewhere foreign, and the first place that took me properly outside of my comfort zone. The city was also really picturesque and vibrant, and I think three days was the perfect amount of time. I left just after midday for the last proper destination left on my trip: Québec City.