Quebec City

When a good mission friend of Jared's and his wife invited us to spend a week with them in Quebec we decide now was as good a time as any. We purchased plane tickets in January and started planning all the fun sights we would see around their mission.

We set off on our journey bright and early the morning of August 5th. We flew into Montreal and had the joys of going through customs then Jared taking off to get a rental car while I met up with our friends who flew in an hour after us. Can I tell you how hard and stressful it is to keep an eye on a wiggly 18 month old in a crowded unfriendly airport while keeping an eye out for the Turners and corresponding through email on my phone. Aside from Preston managing to trap himself in the motion censored revolving doors all went well and we were off to our first destination, Quebec city.

What a beautiful area this was.   

Montmorency water fall

The water falls were gorgeous and it sure made it even better that they had a play ground and beautiful park for the boys to let out some energy. 

We love the Turners

 

Here we were crossing over a waterfall people come from all over the world to see and all Preston wanted was to run his stick along the fence. He is all boy.

The Chateau Frontenac

This is the castle of Quebec city which is now a beautiful hotel. We got to stay here for one of the two nights we were in the city. 

 

The rooms were beautiful, spacious, and modern.

Some of the decor in the lobby and halls were a little more castle like with lions and an old mail system. 

We spent a lot of our time just walking around this cute European feeling city. Many of the buildings were quite old now filled with boutiques and restaurants. The city is still surrounded by much of the original castle wall and the streets were filled with artists, performers, and other merchants. 

part of the original castle wall

Preston has been learning to whistle with his hands like daddy does. He had to do something to entertain himself all those hours he spent in the stroller. 

The stairs in the back are called the break neck stairs because they are so steep you could easily fall. Don't worry, we were very careful as we carried the strollers with little boys buckled in them down.

 

Jared has told me all about these maple suckers they would make in the late winter and early spring during maple harvest time. They boil maple syrup, pour it on the snow and then roll it onto a stick to make a taffy like sucker. Since we were there in the summer he didn't think I would get to experience it. We were quite excited when we found a maple shop that had created their own snow. Of course we had to get one for each of us.

Preston LOVED it. They were tasty but very sweet. I could only eat half of mine so I gave the other half to Preston (after he had already finished one of his own). He devoured that thing as fast as he could. Other onlookers were amazed at how quickly he inhaled it and then went looking for more.

Such a sweet face. 

Our little caravan

The castle in the background and more of the outer wall where canons were positioned. 

Lincoln was such a cutie with those blue eyes and his cheeks. 

Looking at the city from a top the castle wall

Preston loved sharing his crackers and getting down to play with Lincoln.

The citadel, a fortress the french built in case they needed to defend themselves from the English. It was never used but cool to look at. 

After just a day of seeing these horses all over the city we taught Preston to get excited whenever he would see a horse. Even today (a week later) he got excited when he saw one on TV.