May 28, 2007
Adirondack Adventure Day 4: McGill and Mont Royal
The next morning, Erica and I ate breakfast and took a walk around the main section of McGill before checking out of our hotel.
Then we found our way to Mont Royal. It wasn't hard. It's a big mountain in the middle of the city. We hiked it, too. Kind of. I mean, we parked half way up, but we still walked/hiked about a mile around the mountain to get to the observatory and the cross. The tulips at the observatory were beautiful.
You might recognize this pavilion from the movie The Whole Nine Yards.
But we mostly just wanted to see the view.
And then hiked a little higher to see the cross.
There was a different viewpoint on the other side of the mountain, so we thought we'd check out the view from there. We got a view of somthin - this guy.
Ugh.
We kept seeing this immense dome separate from the downtown area and wondered what it was. We also saw pictures of the Oratoire Saint-Joseph on a postcard and wanted to see it. (Tip: I always look at postcards to find places to visit when I'm in a new city. I also stop in the museum store and look at the prints to find out what paintings I want to see.) Turns out, they were the same thing and even more impressive in person. In fact, our photos just couldn't capture the immensity of it.
It also meant A LOT of stairs. I was not pleased at the prospect, but ultimately decided the view would be worth it.
We later found out there were escalators.
But that didn't keep us from having to climb down this scary steep, rickety, wooden stairs.
We took heart when we saw little old ladies on their way to mass climbing them.
One more picture and we were on our way out of town:
Before we left Canada, though, we had to stop for souvenirs.
And amazingly, the border into the US was completely clear and took us less than 5 minutes to cross. We were all prepared to play geography games while we waited. Before heading back to Ti, we stopped off in Plattsburgh because Erica promised me the best sub I would ever have and I wanted to see her Alma Mater, SUNY Plattsburgh.
The History Building, where Erica took her classes:
And the sculpture she saw and hated every day:
Throughout the trip, I was so pleased that we were so far up north that most of the trees were still in blossom because I missed the spring trees due to my thesis.
We weren't the only ones taking pictures. Apparently, it was prom night! All the lovely couples were there (with their parents) also taking pics.
Erica took me up to Clinton Community College, which used to be a cliffside hotel overlooking Lake Champlain.
And we stopped briefly at Ausable Chasm to look over the bridge at the falls.
