Monthly Archive for April, 2005

Yesterday I decided to play hooky and spend the day in Old Montreal.  I started in Place d’Armes and explored the candy-colored glass building that is the Palais des Congrès de Montréal. Next, I went to Aix Cuisine du Terroir, a restaurant that I read about in a food magazine.  I’d checked their website and saw that they had a delicious-looking menu, including breakfast, so I decided to treat myself.  Note: caramelized onions are very good on a bagel with smoked salmon and capers.

Next, I went to Notre-Dame Cathedral, which is quite beautiful with its architecture, stained glass windows, frescoes, lights, etc.  Also, it had the scent of beeswax throughout.  I’m not Catholic or even religious, but I acquired an appreciation for looking inside old churches after living in Italy.  It’s been a while since I wrote an art history paper, so I can’t define the architectural style, but it was built in the 1820′s and is based on the design of the Sainte-Chappelle in Paris, which is in the Gothic style.

Old Montreal is a good place to do a lot of walking around.  I like the cobblestone streets and the old buildings.  Most were built in the 1700′s.  I checked out the Bonsecours Market, which is an old market building on the port that is filled with clothing boutiques and art galleries.  On the port, they’ve put up the yellow and blue Cirque du Soleil tents; the Cirque will debut their 2005 show, Corteo, here in Montreal on April 21st, and yes, I plan to get tickets.

There was an interesting building that I passed while walking on the Rue St-Paul.  The front doors were French doors with large glass panels so that one could see inside.  The entire roof had been taken out (I don’t know what used to be in the building; there were no signs.  Possibly it was a bar or restaurant.) and most of the interior had been gutted, but there were a few carved wooden Doric columns standing in their original place, but with no more ceiling to support.  What made them unique was the antique-looking colored stencils painted onto them.  I hope whoever is renovating this building doesn’t throw out those columns, as they look antique, and are beautiful and worth keeping.

Wandering around further, on Rue Francois-Xavier, there was a brick building – on the side of it was the outline of an old stone house with a chimney!  I think that a house used to be at that location, and was gutted and built over, but the stone foundation was kept.  It was surreal – the outline of a stone house embedded in brick.  It looked like that building had been renovated several times; there was a section of older bricks with the outline of a much different roof over the stone house, and then newer bricks on top of that.  I need to go back and take a photograph.

I also passed the Chateau Ramezay (former house of the Governors and now a museum) and Hôtel de Ville (City Hall.)  I walked down the quai at the old port and watched the ships.  Yesterday was sunny and gorgeous in the upper 50′s with leaf buds forming on the trees.  In the evening, I went to see a light show at Notre Dame Cathedral, and then met up with the boy for a delicious dinner at Chez L’Epicier, a restaurant run by up-and-coming chef Laurent Godbout.  We walked home through Old Montreal, down Sainte-Catherine, and up Saint-Laurent.