Old Montreal

After waking up at the Humaniti and having breakfast, we headed outside to walk around Old Montreal. We visited the Notre-Dame Basilica, walked to the Marché Bonsecours, and had lunch nearby before walking around the Old Port. We ended the day with a visit to Saint Joseph’s Oratory and dinner in Chinatown.

Morning

After waking up at the Humaniti, we headed downstairs for breakfast. We ordered the smoked salmon bagel and pancakes with fresh fruit.

The smoked salmon bagel features a bagel from St-Viateur Bagel! We visited St-Viateur Bagel yesterday and thought their bagels were fantastic. The smoked salmon was excellent as well. We had the pancakes with local maple syrup. It was also very good, though not as special as the bagel.

We headed out later in the morning to visit the Notre-Dame Basilica, which opens at 10am on Mondays. We noticed the Montreal Fire Department’s Engine 420 parked on the side of the road, though thankfully the air smelled fine!

We ended up making a navigational error and ended up by the Édifice Lucien-Saulnier, a government building, before realizing our mistake.

We walked between the building and Montreal Courthouse to get back on track. We passed by these signatures. A small sign explains this display in French, translated to English using Google Translate:

"SIGNATURES"

Signature, countersignature - index - endorsement - paragraph - subscription - observation - commitment - manifestation - mark - proof - symptom.

The meaning of "SIGNATURES" is imposed on bailiffs in a metaphorical relationship with the notions of registration, consistency, accuracy and sincerity of the facts that their reports report.

The set consists of three elements borrowing the triangular volumetric arrangement from the open book. Steel sections stand vertically framing the white marble pages. Each of the books bears a signature, an almost abstract relief, sculpted in the material reminiscent of paper. The outline of these signatures envelops the calligraphy of some bailiffs from the colonial era.

Jean de SAINT-PÈRE - He practiced his profession from January 1648 to July 1651 and from April 10, 1655 until his assassination in October 1657. He was in Canada, in the history of Ville-Marie, the first bailiff, clerk and notary.

Michel LE PAILLEUR - He began his career as a bailiff in Quebec. In 1703, he came to settle in Montreal as a senior bailiff, where he worked until 1730. He was successively and sometimes concurrently bailiff, royal notary, jailer, attorney-postulant, interim clerk, substitute for the king's attorney and interim civil and criminal lieutenant general.

Jean Baptiste DECOSTE II became a court usher in 1733 and held this position until the conquest. Several documents signed by his hand are preserved in the National Archives of Quebec.

Installed in the Allée des huissiers in the heart of Old Montreal, the work of Marie-France Brière was inaugurated on the 3rd day of the month of November, in the year two thousand and three in the presence of:

Michel Prescott, vice-president of the executive committee representing

Marc Bellemare
Minister of Justice of Quebec

Gerald Tremblay
Mayor of Montreal

Alan Horic
President of the Chamber of Bailiffs of Quebec

These sculptures are in front of the Édifice Lucien-Saulnier. It honors Marguerite Bourgeoys, who seems to be a religious figure dating back to the French colonial era. The sculptures appear to have been modified slightly by pranksters.

This building across the street houses the Court of Appeal of Quebec, the highest provincial court.

The Montreal Courthouse is a more modern building compared to the Court of Appeal across the street. It has a modern metal sculpture out front and a modern illuminated metal tree as well.

As we walked past the courthouse, we spotted an older looking building on the far corner of an intersection, nestled among newer structrures.

We noticed a large mural of a chicken about to step up on a protruding part of the building. Unfortunately, there was an unsightly temporary fence blocking the view a bit.

We soon arrived at the Place d’Armes, the plaza in front of the Notre-Dame Basilica. We noticed some spiky holiday decorations around a statue. The statue is the Monument to Paul de Chomedey, Lord of Maisonneuve, the founder of Fort Ville-Marie which ultimately became Montreal.

Basilique Notre-Dame de Montréal

Finally, we made it to the Notre-Dame Basilica at around 10:10am. A bit late but not too late. It turns out the building is currently undergoing restoration. We did actually see the basilica earlier when looking down a side street as we were walking. At the time we failed to properly identify the building because just one of the towers was visible.

While most churches that we’ve visited over the years are free to enter, this one is not. It isn’t particularly cheap either at $16 CAD to enter.

Upon entering, its evident that this isn’t just any church. This is an incredibly fancy church!

The basilica also has free WiFi… As well as various materials, including CDs, available for purchase.

We saw down for a bit near the entrance.

We then walked closer to the large illuminated altar at the far end of the basilica. The blue illumination creates gives it a dramatic appearance compared to other large Christian churches.

In case you forgot that this is French Canada, there is a statue of Jeanne d’Arc.

The organ above the entrance to the basilica is also quite impressive.

Like everything else in this basilica, the pulpit is also ornately decorated.

The view looking up in both directions.

There are also various small chapels, stained glass windows, and paintings on both sides of the basilica. Candles can be lit for various prices.

There is a small corridor behind the altar that is accessible from either sides. The Chapelle du Sacré-Cœur (Chapel of the Sacred Heart) is located there, though photography is not permitted as it is intended purely for worship activates and not sightseeing. This large circular painting is back there near the bathrooms.

Old Montreal

After our visit, we headed back out to the Place d’Armes.

This building, opposite of the basilica, is the Bank of Montreal.

The lobby of the building is public ally accessible and contains a working bank. The interior is reminiscent of the former Royal Bank of Canada building, which we visited yesterday.

There is also a tiny museum to the left of the main entrance to the bank building. We had to ask for directions as it isn’t obvious where to find it.

Back outside, these two statues flank the building on the southwest side of the Place d’Armes. These two statues are a statement on the difference between the English and French Canada. A sign helpfully explains in English:

THE ENGLISH PUG AND THE FRENCH POODLE

A dashing looking English man, holding his pug, is giving a superior stare at Notre-Dame Basilica, symbol of the religious influence on French Canadians.

210 feet away at the northern corner of the edifice, a woman in a Chanel style suit, poodle against her, shoots an offended look to the Bank of Montreal's head office, symbol of English power.

With their masters oblivious to each other, the two dogs on the alert have already sniffed out the opportunity to unite.

Inspired by the Commedia dell'arte and Two Solitudes from novelist Hugh MacLennan, these two snobs set up an ironically touching scene of the cultural distance between English and French Canadians.

Marc A. J. Fortier, Artist

From here, by the English statue, we started to walk to the northeast along Rue Notre Dame. This is the same street that we had arrived on after our initial navigational error.

After walking past the two courthouses and the Édifice Lucien-Saulnier, we reached the Nelson Monument at the northwest end of Place Jacques-Cartier. This column was built in 1809 and thus predates the larger column in London at Trafalgar Square. Nelson is famous for his actions as an Admiral against the French, particularly during his last battle at Trafalgar where he defeated a large French fleet but died from an injury during the battle. It is interesting to see such a monument in French Canada.

This building is the Montreal City Hall.

This fountain next to City Hall was empty, likely for the winter season.

This state, on the Place Vauquelin, depicts Jean Vauquelin. He was a French naval officer who fought to defend New France from Britain during the French and Indian War. The conclusion of this war was the loss of New France to Britain.

The Place Vauquelin is slightly elevated and provides a nice view of downtown Montreal.

The spiky stars that we saw at Place d’Armes are also present here.

We walked down Place Jacques-Cartier to get to Rue Saint-Paul.

We walked one short block on Rue Saint-Paul to reach the Bonsecours Market. This historic market building has been around since 1847. We walked around inside but didn’t really find anything of interest.

The market building sits on the side of a hill. Some of the lower level is occupied by the BreWskey brewery.

The road on the back side of the market, Rue Commune, was lined with trees. We were a bit surprised to see that they all still had yellow leaves on them!

We decided to go have lunch nearby. We went back up the hill and headed south on Rue Saint-Paul.

We decided to eat at Pincette, a lobster restaurant. Their lunch menu is limited though and most dishes don’t have lobster.

We started out with arancinis. They visually look a bit like meatballs but are kind of like fried balls of risotto. They were fantastic!

The tuna tartare was basically like real poke from Hawaii as it was marinated chunks of raw tuna! It’s too bad no one outside of Hawaii has any clue what poke is supposed to be! The fries were pretty good too, though as usual not as good as our favorite Hot ‘n Juicy in Falls Church, VA.

The risotto would have been fantastic if it wasn’t so salty! All the ingredients have salt already so the amount of salt was basically overkill.

Maybe we should have got something with lobster but the options were lobster roll, which is already fantastic in Maine where we’ve had it, or grilled lobster, which we don’t think is always the best way of cooking it.

This lighted decorative wooden ball was under a lamp. It reminded me a bit of a big rubber band ball!

The star is a bit reminiscent of Texas where they love their star and it put on everything but in this case it is probably the Heineken star logo.

We didn’t notice this earlier but the Jardin Nelson building here is just a facade. It looks like there is a garden-like courtyard inside.

We continued backtracking and walked past the front of the Bonsecours Market. We didn’t actually walk directly in front of the building earlier as we were inside.

The Chapelle Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours is just to the north of the market. It is on our list of places to visit but is not open on Mondays. It is currently a museum with a focus on Marguerite Bourgeoys. Remember that we saw a sculpture depicting her earlier in front of the Édifice Lucien-Saulnier?

We headed to the Old Port area along the Saint Lawrence River.

They apparently have jet boating here!

We walked out onto a peninsula with parking in the middle. The west side has a somewhat wide walkway along with seating and a beach at sea level. Or perhaps more accurately, it has some sand down there.

After walking a bit and looking back, we had a nice view of the market and adjacent chapel as well as downtown Montreal in the background.

We continued walking until reaching the clock tower by the end of the peninsula.

It is possible to go around the clock tower to get closer to the end of the peninsula. The sand below never actually touches water, thus disqualifying it as a beach. This is just a sand lot!

The clock tower was built in 1922 as a monument to Canada’s World War I merchant mariners. It was previously possible to go up to the top but that no longer seems to be the case.

There is a large stone tablet on the north sides that lists the purpose of this monument, as well as a smaller stone tablet that was put in place by the Prince of Wales. This would have been the future King Edward VIII who famously abdicated so he could marry an American divorcee. So scandalous! It seems he was also likely at least sympathetic to the Nazis so the British and Canadians probably were lucky to get his brother as King instead, who was Queen Elizabeth II’s father.

An metal plaque was added at some time to include World War II and the Korean War. This seems to refer specifically to the official Canadian Merchant Navy and not just sailors in general.

This plaque honors the Sleipner, a Norwegian sailing brig that was the first direct trip from Europe to Chicago via the Saint Lawrence River.

The tower, as seen from the north side.

Not sure if this smaller tower serves any function or is purely cosmetic.

Would there actually have been cannons here historically?

The view looking to the north, or downstream. The Atlantic Ocean is still a long way from here with the river not really opening up until Quebec City, about 150 miles away. And even then, its still a long way to go before reaching the actual ocean.

It was pretty windy at the time.

Looking to the south, or upstream, we can see another much longer peninsula.

The Biosphere, which we visited yesterday, was more or less directly opposite of us.

The water flows by pretty rapidly in the Saint Lawrence River. There is also a bit of a whirlpool effect here with some water flowing upstream by where we are.

We started to walk away from the clock tower on the river side of the peninsula. This was the view looking back when the clock tower was illuminated by a bit of sunlight. By comparing against other lines that should be perfectly vertical, the clock tower leans a bit towards the river. Interestingly, the four small windows near the middle seem to be properly leveled compared to the ground.

We continued walking by the river to the south, crossing over what seems like an artificial island in an artificial basin of water on the peninsula. Looking to the west, there is a large Ferris wheel, La Grande Roue de Montréal.

The path juts out from the straight line that we’ve been walking on so far.

We continued past the basin, which is currently dry.

Looking to the east, we can still see the Biosphere. The tip of the peninsula that we saw earlier to the south is here as well.

Another short video showing how the water moves here. Its pretty calm right in front of us but moves rapidly further out in the river.

These two seagulls allowed us to get pretty close before they flew away.

Straight ahead in the distance, on the peninsula to the south, the boxy structure is Habitat 67. It is a modular housing structure that was built for Expo 67. It is open for tours in the seasons that are not winter. It is a bit reminiscent of Het Blaakse Bos, the cube housing in Rotterdam that we visited recently. Though possibly not nearly as interesting as the Habitat 67 components are not at a 45 degree angle!

The peninsula that we are on ends here on the southern side of the Quai Jacques-Cartier. There is a long elevated platform that runs along the southern side of the pier with stairs for access. We went up to take a look.

It is basically a long wooden platform.

The view to the north towards the Ferris wheel.

And the view in the opposite direction, to the south. The tall structure in the background that looks a bit like a Tetris block is the Tour du Port de Montréal, basically an observation deck.

The view looking back. There were very few visitors here today.

We walked to the western end of the platform. The two towers of the Notre-Dame Basilica can be seen from here, as well as the Nelson monument.

Looking to the right, or north, we can see the dome of the Bonsecours Market. The tip of the clock tower is also visible. Also visible if one looks closely is the tower for the high end of a zipline, the Tyrolienne MTL Zipline. The lines for the zipline are also visible, though extremely hard to see. The lower end is near an ice skating rink by the Ferris wheel. We should have photographed it!

We decided to head to L’Oratoire Saint-Joseph du Mont-Royal (Saint Joseph’s Oratory of Mount Royal), on the west side of Mont Royal. We descended here and crossed the railroad tracks that are visible near the center of this frame, near the ambulance. The De la Commune / Jacques-Cartier bus stop is just a few steps away. We waited a bit for the #50 bus to arrive and took it to the Station Berri-UQAM stop.

L’Oratoire Saint-Joseph du Mont-Royal

It seems a bit stupid but we had trouble locating an entrance to the Berri-UQAM Metro station due to construction. We ended up walking an extra block and walking through Place Émilie-Gamelin. Maybe this place is nice during the summer but it was pretty deserted today other than some homeless.

We walked by the very modern Grande Bibliothèque before we found an entrance into the Metro. We then took Line 2 (Orange) to Snowdon.

After reaching Snowdon, we decided to take a little detour. Snowdon is home to the Snowdon Deli, one of Montreal’s famous smoked meat restaurants. It’s not as famous as Schwartz’s, which we visited on our first day here in Montreal.

The restaurant was basically empty and had ended table service. But it was still possible to order from the counter and eat in. We got one smoked meat sandwich with fatty beef which was fantastic, definitely equal in quality to Schwartz’s. We should have also tried their Matzah ball but were too full to do so.

After our snack, we went to the nearby Queen-Mary / Trans Island bus stop to catch the next bus to Queen-Mary / Du Frère-André. Busses 51 and 166 operate between these two stops.

We soon arrived in front of Saint Joseph’s Oratory. It is a pretty big building and sits atop a hill.

This monument to Saint Joseph stands in front of the oratory.

It was getting close to sunset so we quickly started walking up the stairs to the oratory as we wanted to see the sunset view from the building’s elevated position.

We could see a bit of color in the sky.

It was actually a bit confusing to determine where the entrance is. Do we go up these stairs? Or around to the side? We went around to the side as it seemed like that was the proper entrance.

We entered into a small lobby area where we picked up a small pamphlet about Saint Andre-Bessette.

We were extremely surprised to find an escalator going up! We’ve never been to a church with an escalator!

It turns out that the interior of the oratory is a bit confusing. We went as high as we could go but found that the doors to the outside would not open! So, we backtracked and went down a bit until we found a way out. It turns out that you can walk to those doors that do not open from the outside, you just can’t go through them!

We mostly missed sunset due to the confusion inside of the oratory.

This large sculpture is Angels Unawares. The message here is basically to welcome all as any one may be an undiscovered angel.

After briefly browsing a small gift shop, we headed back upstairs to the basilica within the oratory. It has a very clean and modern appearance inside. Extremely different from the Notre-Dame Basilica that we saw in the morning!

We sat a bit to rest.

We passed through a corridor on the left.

We ended up by the altar and the suspended halo of light above.

This chapel is dedicated to Father Basile-Antoine Moreau. A sign provides a very lengthy description of this chapel in English:

BLESSED FATHER BASILE-ANTOINE MOREAU (1799-1873)

This chapel pays tribute to Father Basile-Antoine Moreau, founder of the Congregation of Holy Cross, the religious community that gave birth to Saint Joseph's Oratory of Mount Royal.

Born in the village of Laigné-en-Belin in France in 1799, Basile Moreau studied for the priesthood and was ordained a priest at the age of 22. He was soon noticed in the diocese of Le Mans, whose bishop sent him to study with the Sulpicians in Paris to become a seminary teacher. On his return, he was given the task of teacher of philosophy and theology for future priests.

Between 1834 and 1836, Father Moreau founded the Association of Auxiliary Priests, which brought together priests destined to preach in parishes. In 1835, he also took charge of the Brothers of Saint Joseph, an association of teaching brothers founded in 1820 by Father Jacques-François Dujarié. His plan to unite the two communities came to fruition with the approval of the rule of life of the Congregation of Holy Cross in 1837 and with his religious vows in 1840. Four consecrated women joined the priests and brothers the following year, thus fulfilling Father Moreau's dream of a congregation reflecting the image of the Holy Family.

In harmony with his missionary desire, Father Moreau sent his collaborators to Algeria in 1840 and to the United States in 1841. The Holy Cross adventure in Canada began soon after: at the request of Bishop Ignace Bourget of Montreal, he sent two priests, eight brothers, and four sisters to the parish of Saint-Laurent in 1847. The beginnings were humble, but in that same year Holy Cross welcomed its first students in the sisters' day school, which later became the Pensionnat Notre-Dame-des-Anges (boarding school), and in the establishment of the priests and brothers that would become the Collège de Saint-Laurent.

Father Moreau had the opportunity to visit his Canadian foundation during his only trip to America in 1857, the year of the pontifical approval of the Rules and Constitutions of the Congregation of the priests and brothers. During a stay filled with administrative responsibilities, he gave a conference to all the priests (Salvatorists), brothers (Josephites), and sisters (Marianites) gathered in the same room. This moving trip would remain deeply engraved in the heart of the founding father. As for the pontifical approval of the Constitutions of the sisters, it did not take place until 1867.

Father Moreau died in France on January 20, 1873. He became a model for many of the Holy Cross religious, especially for young Brother André, who shared with him a deep devotion to Saint Joseph. Father Moreau was declared Blessed by the Church on September 15, 2007, during the pontificate of Pope Benedict XVI.

This chapel was bathed in blue light.

The underside of the dome above.

The organ above the entrance.

After going downstairs, we ended up at the Votive Chapel which is described as containing 10,000 votive candles.

We continued on to end up at the Crypt Church. The name comes from the structure of this room rather than it being an area for tombs.

A relatively small organ sits above the entrance door.

We ended up back in the small lobby where we first entered the oratory. A large mural is on the wall by the escalator. This particular escalator is up only but there are other escalators in other parts of the building as well at least one elevator.

It was dark when we exited the oratory. This structure, which looks like a fancy glass sided elevator shaft, is actually a carillon. Interestingly, the bells contained within were originally made for the Eiffel Tower but were never installed here.

We descended by stairs, though decided to take a ramp after the initial section.

The carillon, as seen from below.

One final look at the oratory before leaving!

Chinatown

We decided to take a different route back, catching a bus at the nearby De la Côte-des-Neiges / Queen-Mary stop. We took bus #165 to Station Guy-Concordia, a more direct route than the way we arrived. We then took Line 1 (Green) from Guy-Concordia to Saint Laurent.

We came across an ice skating rink, though it didn’t seem to be open at the time.

This seemed like a livelier area so we kept on walking. We ended up by the Place des Arts.

We ended up walking through the Complexe Desjardins, a shopping mall at the base of the green-illuminated Desjardins building which we walked by on our first evening in Montreal.

This holiday sculpture was near the eastern exit to the mall area.

After reaching Chinatown, we went to Gol’s Lanzhou Noodle. This restaurant started here in Montreal but now has multiple locations in Canada. It had a queue over the weekend, though it wasn’t as busy today but still was almost full. We got two orders of the Lanzhou beef pulled noodles, one with the thinnest noodles and the other with the 2nd thickest, which was something like biang biang noodles. It was a good meal, though not nearly as spicy as it looks. The thinly sliced beef was particularly tender and well prepared.

After dinner, we went back to Chicha Sanchen, which we’ve had here, in Philly, and in Austin. They’re the most serious about tea of all the options here as they have multiple tea choices. We tried the cassis black tea with milk and taro balls. It was very good!

We also went to Coco, another Taiwanese chain that we’ve seen around the world but never tried. We got the brown sugar pearl milk tea. It was sugary but good.