Its freezing in here Mr. Bigglesworth..

Let me tell you a little story. It's made up 4 characters...Lauren (pronounced Lore-N), Kodie (KO-d), Bryson (B-love) and Whitney (Uhhh..Whit-NEY). One day Whitney said to Bryson, I've always wanted to go to Montreal. Bryson thought for a bit and said, I have always wanted to go too! And for some reason the four of them agreed to go at the end of January when temperatures were dipping below 0. No one objected to the cold factor, they just decided to go. Plus, they were getting tired of being back in Boston (well at least Whitney was). So, here are some fun illustrations to the Montreal Canadian adventure/random road trip.

So on the way up, I denied knowing any French, for I didnt want to be responsible as the translator when I hadn't spoken French in a long time. Sure, I could read road maps but I didn't want to suffer the wrath of a snooty French Canadian when I had to ask in broken French for directions to the nearest metro stop. When Lauren was reading us the pronounciation guide for common french words and having us guess what they meant, I got them all right. Then Bryson was like, 'whoa, you know a lot of french'. So the cat was out of the bag. And I served as a mediocre translator. Not like we needed it, everyone spoke English there.





Here's a pic of the outside of the Basilique notre dame in Montreal. First built in the 1700s, its been restored numerous times and is GORGEOUS inside. This was one of the highlights...going inside and seeing all the intricate stained glass work. It reminded me a lot of Sainte-Chappelle in Paris, one of my favorite stained glass churches. Lo and behold when I read about the history of the chapel, it was based on Sainte-Chappelle. Dang i'm good.

Interior of Sainte Chappelle.


It was SO cold on Friday when were walking around--- like -20 so we retreated to the underground shopping mall. I was amazed when we walked in the dollar store to find out they had some great things for a buck. I got a fabulous spatula to flip my pancakes with. Bryson and Kodie made out like bandits with their styrofoam swords. Little did we know the extent of the underground mall and tunnels...it covers the whole city...crazy.


Saturday it was so sunny and gorgeous and COLD. Here is a great pic of the ice skaters outside on the frozen lake with the montreal skyline in the background.


I loved some of the buildings in Montreal...lots of French architecture in Vieux Montreal.

For some strange reason, we weren't cold enough walking around so we walked to the river to see all the ice chunks. I've never been so cold in my LIFE.

And I found a swing set to play on.

Couche-tard, the french canadian version of sevie had this hilarious add for slurpees. If you can't tell, those are big balls of fat that are showing the sizes of the cups. I really dont get french canadian advertising. but whatever. It made me laugh. :D

Poutine is a french canadian traditional dish. I dont really know how it survived, but probably the high fat content makes it popular. Its french fries, gravy, cheese, and cheese curds. YUM.


Kodie kept picking up and more and more layers on our journey. I had some fun with the hats.


This is my favorite pic.


When we rolled into Montreal, I saw this mural with fighter planes and canadian geese. I thought it was funny.

Kodie and I freezing our butts off. Check out his expression.

Lauren and I being tourists.


On our first day we were trying to figure out what to do besides sight see. Lauren is getting excited to look up what to do. We kept asking the locals and they were like "uhhh...yeah...in the winter? I dont know..." It was not a good sign and we laughed about how cold it was, again.


This was the first day we came in. It was SO cold. I really can't say that enough. Like really, it was really cold. No foolin'.

This was the first night we were in. See Lauren's breath? That's right. COLD.

Me in front of the Basilique Notre Dame.


Kodie all bundled up.

Okay this sculpture was hilarious. We figured it represented a typical person who lived in Montreal in the winter..."why do i live here!? Its COLD"



Bryson.


We meant to take a pic of the cute houses, but Bryson got all of the gross street in with the dirty cars too. plus you can't even tell how cute we are. *sigh*


Sunday morning it was SO gorgeous. It warmed up a bit...it was like 10 degrees which felt like a heat wave. Here's a beautiful pic of our street bathed in sunshine.


For breakfast we went to L'Avenue which Sirisha told us we had to go to. We got there early b/c we didn't want to wait...and I can safely say it was best eggs benedict I've ever had.

It was poached eggs, the best hollandaise sauce ever made by man, brie, asparagus, roasted eggplant, all over an english muffin. My mouth is still watering when I look at this picture. It was DIVINE.


Lauren got eggs benedict too over a bunch of colorful veggies. So good!



After church on our way out we drove out to Olympic parc to point and laugh at the funny dome with the funny thing on top. Then we drove away and back home to Boston! I can't tell you how greatful I was that it was 38 degrees in boston, which felt like 70. The feeling of warmth only lasted a week and then i was freezing again in boston. Montreal is a beautiful city and I would LOVE to go back in the summer. So my tip: dont go when its freezing. Seriously.