Montreal: Arrival and First Glimpses

Saturday, October 8th
Frank and I were off to spend a week in Montreal with college friends John & Sue and Joe & Margaret. It was our first time using our passports to travel outside the US. (Well, there was a couple hour side trip to Ensinada, Mexico as part of our Carnival cruise New Year's Day 2014, but that hardly counts.) We had booked through Travelocity on a United flight run by Air Canada. Or was it an Air Canada flight run by United? Whatever it was, our travel papers cited it backward and gave us the wrong departure terminal. There were two confirmation numbers, one for each airline and we were never sure which to use. Airport personnel were not sure either; they sent us to the wrong counters in San Francisco – twice. The best advice we got was not from a ticket agent nor from an airplane captain, but rather from a custodian. But we did find our departure gate eventually, staffed by Air Canada. It is a good thing I am so paranoid about getting the the airport early. We needed all that extra time to find out where we were supposed to be.

Air Canada's gate set up was quite different from what we were used to. There were two levels to each gate. A public address system called you down to the lower level when your boarding time was near. The process was far different from the routine to which we had gotten so accustomed by flying SWA. The two-story boarding area was quite roomy and expansive. A large tiled mosaic hung over the gate agent's desk area. We admired it but truthfully we were not there very long to imbibe its details. Our circuitous tour of the airport to discover and arrive at where we were supposed to be had absorbed a lot of our contingency time.

Our SWA flying experiences did not include having these nifty monitors in the seat backs. There were movies and TV shows to watch but I liked the progress monitor that tracked where we were and how soon we would arrive at our destination. There was a overview option showing a great circle route with altitude and speed and air temperature.

There was a view with cities shown for orientation.

And there was a progress screen that answered the ubiquitous travel question, "Are we there yet?"

This would be Frank's and my first time through immigration and customs so we were not sure what to expect. A friend had clued me in that, in her experience, forms were handed out on the plane so they could be filled out before arrival. That is indeed what happened on our east bound flight where we would negotiate customs upon arrival in Canada. Frank filled out our joint form.

Wow! What lines when we got there!

The signage was scarce. The Montreal standard is a bilingual convention in both English and French, however, it does not matter what language a sign is in, if it is non-existent. But Frank and I managed. We just looked at what form people in line were holding and got in that line. The strategy worked. It took me three tries (out of four) to orient my passport correctly for scanning. Frank watched me carefully. Then it only took him two tries.

Montreal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport has the airport code YUL. I have no idea how those initials correlate with the name but there you have it. After some cell phone texting challenges with Canadian carriers, we connected with our friends who picked us up curbside at YUL. Their timing could not have been more perfect. We connected on their very first circle of the airport. We went directly to dinner at the Baton Rouge, a restaurant in a strip mall. My eyes lit up seeing it was next to a store front titled Stitches. I strolled over to peek the window only to be disappointed by a display of T-shirt type clothing, not sewing or quilting supplies.

The restaurant was far from a being disappointment however. We each had enough great food to enjoy then and there and enough to take home for another meal.

None of us were brave enough however to try Poutine, a popular local dish consisting of french fries covered in cheese curds and light brown gravy.

Sunday, October 9th
It had been dark when we'd arrived the previous evening at our rental home for the week. With the morning light we were able to see we were housed in a charming neighborhood with a bit of a European flair to it. Out my bedroom window, I woke to this view of the home across the street. Along the street where we were staying, the convention seemed to be a flowerpot or equivalent spot of color décor on each front stoop. I found it very delightful and quaint.

We were within walking distance of Saint Malachy Catholic Church, one long and two short blocks away. We attended Sunday Mass there. The stone architecture gave it a castle-like historic feel. It had been built in 1940. We were to learn during the coming week that much of Montreal is rich in a sense of history.

Our home base was within 15 minutes walking distance of a subway stop, but for our first day we took a  ~1/2 hour car ride to the top of Mount Royal in Parc du Mont-royal. The designer of Parc du Mont-royal also co-designed New York City's Central Park.

From the peak of the park we could gaze eastward for a panoramic view of the cityscape of Downtown Montreal and the waterways and bridges beyond.

Our traveling companions posed for a group photo at the top of Mount Royal. It was beautiful weather and a good omen for starting our week of exploration together.