Montreal Half Day

We really wanted to go back to Montreal, to the Jean Talon Market (a vast food market, even in the winter months), and bring Clara, since we had gone on a weekend trip without her last January.  It was just an hour and 15 minute drive from our hotel here, so we decided to go there for lunch.  We were hungry so we ate lunch first, at the Premiere Moisson bakery there, and had a delicious ham sandwich, soup, quiche...and creme brule for dessert. 

Everything looked amazing.  The market was as perfect as I remembered--we bought mushrooms, raw milk cheeses, beautifully canned maple syrups, dried mushrooms, and a hand-made lanolin lotion. I gave Clara $20 and we had a math lesson the whole way--and even if her subtraction wasn't the best, I think she was starting to get how much things cost and how it all works. 

 Then we went a couple of blocks away to Petite Italie (their Little Italy is the best I have ever been to--it feels just like Italy--old men sitting around, soccer games blaring on the TV, and Italian posters and soccer balls), and had a perfect macchiato at Cafe Italia.  Afterwards, we stocked up on all sorts of pastas, olive oils, anchovies, and mustards, at Milano, a great Italian supermarket a couple of doors down.

(homemade pasta at Milano)

(photos matthew hranek )

More Pics of Fairmont Chateau Montebello

(grand dining room)

More pictures from one of our favorite hotels ever, the Fairmont Chateau Montebello .   Yes, that's a curling ice (that's the proper term they taught me)...it's probably one of the only hotels in the world that has one. We didn't get any pictures of the food, but the breakfast buffet, while all good, has a couple of local dishes that are stellar: baked beans done with maple syrup and bacon, maple cream crepes...and the buffet is just $6.50 for kids.  An especially great deal if your kid eats as much as mine does.

(main lobby)

(dining area)

(photos matthew hranek )

Parc Omega

We've been to alot of zoos.  Some are better than others, for sure...but the Parc Omega , about 10 minutes drive from where we are staying in Montebello, Quebec, is probably the most awesome one we've ever experienced.  Here's what it is:  a huge wildlife park, that you drive through.  When you enter, you can put your radio station to 88.1, and have a guided tour.  Within minutes, there are huge elk surrounding your car, mouthing at your windows, waiting for you to roll them down, and feed them carrots.  It doesn't get old.  You move on, and all the while, you are driving through a very natural landscape--there are no fences...the animals really just roam.  Next we came upon alot of wild boar, and then it was caribou, and red tailed deer. Then the largest bison I've ever seen...and babies.  And mountain goats.  There are wolves and bears too, in a very natural environment, but they are fenced off. I only wish we brought more carrots so we could have kept on feeding them...it was such a blast--having wild animals put their faces into our car, and slobbering all over the windows.

(photos Matthew Hranek )

Winter Getaway: Fairmont Chateau Montebello

We arrived here late Monday afternoon, and wow, it is such an amazing property.  First, it's the world's largest log cabin.  It was built in 1930, as a private club, and became a hotel in 1970.  It has a lobby that has a fireplace right smack in the center, that I think is 6 sided,  and is 4 stories tall.  The furniture is great--nothing seems shabby, even though it seems vintage.  The scale of everything is so awesome.  It has a massive dining room, with fantastic artwork and totem poles, that surround a stage.  The rooms are smaller and cozy, but you aren't here to spend tons of time in your room.  It's the kind of place you come to experience the outdoors (cross-country skiing, ice skating, ice hockey, dog sledding, horse sleigh rides, tubing, curling)...and then there's the beautiful indoor pool.  I think it must be so lovely here in the summer too.  The food is really good (and so is the Molson Dry beer on tap)--they use local and organic as much as possible (this is actually a Fairmont standard).  More to come tomorrow.

(all pictures from matthew hranek )