Quebec City Day 3: Il d'Orleans, Montmorency Falls and Miro

After breakfast, Jeanne and I, went to get the car out of the parking lot to bring it to our street. We stopped at the Depanuer on the way to get the car.  The Depanuer or Dep is like a 7-11.  We needed a little more milk for breakfast tomorrow.

Our car, with a nice view of the Observatory.

We did not know how strict they were about parking on the street.  It is free until 9 am and we did not leave until a little later so we did put some parking money.  We thought that we had left the apartment in plenty of time.  We had signed up for a 10 am bus tour of the Il d'Orleans. They always suggest that you get to these tours 15 minutes ahead.  So we left the apartment at 9:15.  We got up to the right place in plenty of time, but NO PARKING!!! Argh.  We finally found a parking lot but it was not close.  By the time we walked there we were no longer early.  The driver was just ready to shut the doors.  Luckily, Jeanne got there first and was holding the door open for us.  We were on our way by 10:03 am.  But we were hot and tired by this time, so it was a good thing that we could relax on the bus.  

Bridge to the island

The island of Orleans is a pretty island.    

The last functioning windmill in North America.

It is mostly farming in the center, with big homes all along the river bank. The architecture shows both French and British influence.

One of the few churches on the island.

Hay

Grapes

There is one road that goes around the island, so you can't get lost.  First stop was at the Chocolaterie.

A sample of chocolate with maple and raspberry filling.  

Each place we stopped we had a free sample of some specialty, followed by an opportunity to buy.

This is one way of getting your vegetables.

A small waterfall that used to run a flour mill. The island is not very hilly so I am not sure where the water came from.  The driver/tour guide said that there was a small lake above the falls.

Maple syrup tubing with the sugar shack in the background.  Very interesting process to get maple syrup.  Used to tap each tree and hang buckets then they would have to collect the buckets.  Now they tap the tree and attach a tube.  Gravity takes the sugar water directly to the shack.  So the forest is full of all these tubes.  Much easier process to collect the sugar water.  The sugar starts to flow early spring as things start to thaw. 

Another church.

Next stop was at Vignoble du Mitan winery  We had 4 tastings for free with an option of a tasting of their ice wine for $2.  We went for it.  Very tasty dessert wine.

Our bus

Next stop was a cider place, Cidrerie Verger Bilodeau.

Very good hard ciders.  We had 3 tastings, one of them was an ice cider.

We had a tasting of their apple butter and then we could request tastings of some of their other products.

Interesting floor decor.  The floor of the whole place was painted.

Next stop was a nougat place, La Nougaterie.

We had tastings of the classic flavor and their salted caramel flavor.  Then you could request other tastings.

Last stop was Vin de Cassis. we had 4 tastings.  Apparently, the person giving us tasting was supposed to only give us 2 tastings.  Oh well.  None of us were complaining.

Then we drove back to the beginning place.  We had asked the driver if he could let us off at a point closer to our car, but he said he was not allowed to do that.  

Of all the tours we did, I was the least impressed with this one. Jacque was our driver and guide and he drove very fast and he did not slow down much at any of the sites he spoke about.  We were just lucky if we happened to snap a picture that came out.  The company had said that the tour was 10 am to 1 or 1:30 pm. We barely made it back by 1:30 pm.  We did have a full bus.  I think that they should list it as a little longer tour so that they could be a little more leisurely driving.  He was not very animated.  Though he told the same stories that we had been hearing all along.  One thing I learned was the word Quebec (ka bec) is not a French word it is an Algonquin word, meaning "where the river narrows".  This tour felt the most "touristy".  Drive quickly, taste, then buy, then drive quickly.  The tastings were good.  We had thought about having Jeanne do the drive.  That might have been better.  Though the tastings may not have been provided.  

Since we had to walk so far back to the car we barely made it to our 2 pm lunch reservation at the Montmorency Manoir.  Actually we got there at 2:10 pm.  Jeanne and I each had a veggie burger, Sharon had roasted chicken and Kris had a tuna burger.

After lunch we walked around to the top of the falls.

  Picture of the cable car coming up.  

By having a lunch reservation we did not have to pay for parking at the upper and the lower parking lots.  We did not need to take the cable car up.  Kris was happy about that.

The manor.

There was a nice boardwalk to the upper falls.

The suspension bridge

Looking up.

Looking down.

We walked through the garden.  They must be just putting the garden in.  It was not very impressive at this time.  

This was the extent of the garden.

There were a few pieces of art, I think left-over from last year's art festival.  This year's festival is supposed to start June 23rd.  I think that they have a lot of work to do before then.

Moose

Face in a tree

We thought that this looked like a bride with a train.

After looking around the upper area we drove down to the lower level to get different views of the falls.

Awesome falls.

We could have gone up or down the 400+ stairs.

I got pretty close to the base of the falls, I also got drenched.  This was a highlight for me.  I was wearing my raincoat, since we had been having rain showers off and on.

We drove to the art museum by way of the Jeanne d'Arc sculpture.    

We found parking close to the museum.  It was a huge museum with several buildings but we were there for the Miró exhibit.

First stop was a sit-down break.  We had wine and Catalan Tomato Toast at Tempera.  We could not have wine unless we ordered some food.

Interesting utensils.

The first thing our waitress did was to open our knives for us.  

We had 2 orders of the Catalan Tomato Toast and shared.  We had to order food if we wanted the wine.  

Then we went in to see the exhibit.

I like this picture because it showed Miró in his studio with his paintings.

This was one of the art museum buildings.

This was the building we went in.

We drove to Cartier street, which was close to the art museum.  This was the street with the artistic street lamp shades.  We wanted to see them lit up, so we found a place for dinner on the street.

Interesting lamp shade

We ate at Pizzedelic, though Sharon was the only one to order a personal sized pizza- chicken, feta cheese, and Mandarin oranges! Jeanne and I each had the French onion soup.  Kris had vegetable soup and salad.

The red color is because we are sitting under an infrared heater in the covered outdoor seating area.

It was fun looking at some of the lights.  They were down the whole street but we only took pictures of the few close to our car.

Jeanne drove us home.  She has been amazing with dealing with all the traffic and street issues.  I am glad that I was not driving.  We parked the car on the street since it was after 9 pm.

We started getting organized because we were to head off tomorrow morning to fly to Minneapolis.  I checked us all in.