"The world is a book, and those that do not travel read only one page." My End-of-Year Travels: Québec City, Quebec and Vancouver, British Columbia Molly Dowrick
I never expected to feel so settled in Canada. Canada isn't just a far away country to me anymore, it's a way of life and a country rich in culture, beauty and people as welcoming as their stereotypes. Whilst the magical snow gracing the ground took me by surprise and despite struggling at first to adjust to the time difference and sometimes finding it hard to live in halls of residence with students a few years younger than me, I'm so glad I decided to study abroad at Trent.
I've always been a busy-body, my friends often say that I'm not very good at relaxing (but catch me on a beach on a Greek island with a cocktail in my hand, and that's a different story!), nevertheless, throughout my year abroad I knew I wanted to become involved in Trent and Peterborough life and explore Canada whenever possible. In reading break in October, myself and a few international friends went to Toronto and completed the amazing (read: terrifying) EdgeWalk and regularly returned to Toronto for sight-seeing, shopping and nights out. I also went to Ottawa for Thanksgiving, Montréal for my birthday and Thunder Bay for March reading break with my friend from residence. I really loved exploring new cities and becoming immersed in Canadian culture.
Winning the undergraduate 'Trent International and School for the Study of Canada International Student Travel Prize' was incredible. With the support and guidance of Jeannine Crowe, secretary of the Canadian Studies department, I began planning my trip for after my summer exams. As a literature student, I designed my travels to enable me to immerse myself in the French-Canadian culture I had read about in Canadian Literature classes, and wanted to visit places vastly different to Peterborough and Toronto. Travelling to Québec and Vancouver did wonders for my self-confidence when travelling independently, reignited my love of learning languages and further heightened my already growing interest in Canadian culture and the Canadian way of life.
I find it intriguing how one country can have various different cultures. Québec City felt like a different country to the rest of Canada! After reading Blais' A Season in the Life of Emmanuel for my Canadian Women's Writing course last semester, I was interested in the cultural difference between French-Canadian culture and the more stereotypical English speaking Canadian culture I was engaging with in Peterborough. Leaving Trent was a bittersweet experience, it was so sad to leave my friends and university memories, but so exciting to begin my travelling adventure. The train journeys to Québec City seemed to take forever and arriving in the rain was certainly not what I hoped for, but my visit to Québec was eye-opening and pretty awesome overall. I arrived in Québec City in the evening so made my way to my hostel for an early night. Waking early in the morning, I hoped to be met with a beautiful view of the city that I could Snapchat and Instagram (!), sadly, the rain and fog had other ideas! Ever the optimist, I ventured out of the hostel for a morning exploring. I say venture, because my jacket didn't have a hood. That was a mistake. No matter, I enjoyed walking around the lovely and traditional streets with boutiques and restaurants and taking my time reading information boards about the history of the city. My hostel was ideally located next to the city's outer wall, encircling Old Québec in what looks like a Disney or Medieval Castle, certainly inspiration for many French-Canadian poems and novels I'm sure. Maybe I should write a poem...
Anyway, I instantly felt immersed in Québec and was excited -and nervous- to explore on my own for a few days. Walking along the Citadelle, the residence of the governor general and the 22nd regiment in Québec, in the mist and rain felt slightly spooky, but I was pretty surprised to see snow on the fields in May! It gave the Citadelle a traditional and wintery feel, despite the sunshine I had been enjoying at Trent the week before! I walked along the 'Promenade des Gouverneurs' enjoying the view of the St Lawrence River and the city of Lévis on the other side of the river. The promenade resonated with my love of history and Victorian England and I loved the pretty band stands that decorated the promenade. I probably wasn't overly graceful with my dripping wet hair and damp jacket as I walked along imagining what the promenade would have been like when it was first built, but I enjoyed sight-seeing anyway. I stopped for a hot chocolate in a nearby cafe, which I ordered in my best Franglais ("un hot chocolate s'il vous plaît, un chocolate chaud? oui?') and people-watched for a while before joining an interesting tour of the promenade and the historic Château Frontenac. The hotel itself is designed to resemble a castle and it certainly epitomises classy French culture inside, with marble floors, golden engravings and portraits in meeting rooms and the walls of the ballroom. I enjoyed my mini taste of the high life - very different to my student-friendly affordable hostel - and enjoyed comparing the 'Frenchness' of Québec with the imposing skyscrapers and hustle and bustle of Toronto, the country-town feel of Peterborough and the historic yet modern feeling of Ottawa. I went for lunch with a South Korean lady I met on my tour and we had a lovely French meal in a restaurant. It was really interesting to hear her thoughts and reactions to Québec. Canada is extremely different to South Korea and the lady was struck by the friendliness but relaxed attitude of the Québec people. That afternoon we joined the Hostel trip to 'Le Ciel', and had a drink with other international travellers in a revolving restaurant at the top of a skyscraper, with a lovely view of the city - finally in the sunshine! Chatting with people from Germany, Australia and Québec was really eye-opening and although I don't speak French well, I studied it for a few years at school so was able to understand bits of the French spoken by many of my fellow travellers. It would be amazing to speak a language properly so I think I should add 'Relearn French' to my ever-increasing bucket list. It seemed all of us solo travellers were enjoying exploring Québec and felt it was very different to our home towns and other Canadian cities we'd visited. It was also nice to know that despite being 'solo', I wasn't actually alone.
On my second day in Québec I went on a tour of Old Québec and Modern Québec and was amazed that the city had two vastly different environments. Modern Québec, with its efficient tramways and public transport system, is well connected to the rest of the province and houses multiple shopping centres and the houses of parliament for the province. On the other hand -or should I say, foot - walking around Old Québec feels more like a step back in time, with historic buildings and remnants of wars, battles and history. When exploring Québec it struck me how much my tour guide, a local from Québec, felt connected to the landscape around him. Often I consider meeting people and my experiences with them as my memories, but to my tour guide, his memories are associated with the natural environment and striking landscape around him. It was eye-opening to see this first-hand as it was something I noticed when reading A Season in the Life of Emmanuel in my Canadian Women's Writing course last semester. French-Canadians seem very in-touch with the land around them and so it's somewhat unsurprising that this transposes into their literature.
I met some more solo-travellers on the tour and we became a make-shift friend group for a couple of days! We ate lunch at the 'Restaurant Aux Anciens Canadiens': the oldest restaurant in Québec and it's a good job I'm small because the low ceilings made the traditional restaurant a little bit claustrophobic! We explored the streets and took multiple photos for Instagram (got to be done!) and it was awesome to meet more people and hear their travel stories. Everybody had a different story and I'm now seriously considering blogging stories of people I meet on my travels. In the evening we got the Québec-Lévis ferry across the water to see the view of the Chateau and the city lit up at night, which was a lovely relaxing evening. Although I initially found travelling on my own to be daunting, this kind of travelling, where I was able to do my own thing when I wanted but was also spend time with other travellers when I wanted to, really suited me. I met two German students on gap years, a German guy on a short holiday to Canada, an American taking a long weekend away from work in New York, a French girl working in Canada for the year and a lovely Irish lady who chatted to me while brushing her teeth in the hostel bathroom about how she visited Québec years ago and loved it so much she keeps coming back. She was really interested to hear that I study English Literature at uni and that I'm considering travel writing as a possible future career, telling me 'you can do whatever you want to, there is no limit'. Awesome. I never expected to meet so many interesting people and to feel so included in our mini eclectic friend group from the hostel!
While in Québec, we also walked the Plains of Abraham, beautiful parks with historic cannons- a little bit random! We also walked through the beautiful narrow, old streets of Petit Champlain and marvelled at the 'Fresque du Petit-Champlain' mural in the evening. My French roommate and I also ventured to the Parc National de la Jacques Cartier. A stunning national park about fortyfive minutes from Québec, our coach left us at the top of a mountain, 10km away from the tourist information centre in the valley below. Not quite what we expected and when we got lost and our phones were low on battery; I was pretty concerned for our wellbeing. But the snow on the mountains, clambering about through long grass and seeing stunning views of lakes made the stress worth it. We eventually got to the tourist information centre, and from there we followed a walking path around the valley.
The information centre closed at 4pm though and our bus was at 7:30pm 10km up the mountain, so we were very lucky to have a lift from a member of staff at the centre who felt a bit sorry for the two young-looking travellers stranded in the national park! This did reinstate my faith in people! The lady didn't know us but drove us the fortyfive minute trip to the hostel, just to make sure we were safe.
The following day is a bit of a blur. I think I was still a bit traumatised and stressed from getting so very lost in the national park (and feeling bad that I had messaged my Mum and Dad in a panic about being extremely lost with low phone battery in the middle of nowhere!). On my last day in Québec, three hostel friends and I hired bikes and the plan was to cycle to Montmorency Falls, 12km north of the city. Nope. I can't ride a bike and it seems I can't really ride a tandem bike without aching and moaning either! So I gave up after 5km and walked back to the hostel for some much-needed chill time. In hindsight, I should have just got the bus to the falls and met my friends there but I didn't want to be on my own. Standard. But from this I learned not to change my plans based on what other people are doing and be more willing to do my own thing, even if it seems scary and lonely! That evening we went to a bar and I'd be lying if I said it was one of my best memories- because I don't really remember much! But, what I do remember was an awesome evening with new people drinking cocktails and relaxing!
From Quebec I flew to Montreal and then across the country for my six hour flight to Vancouver. How the heck is Canada so big?! I got the train into the city and then a taxi to my hostel and met up with one of my best friends from Trent for our week in Vancouver, my final week of my year abroad! Right from the first day, I loved Vancouver. Despite its huge size and big population, the city does not feel crowded or busy. Offices and businesses line streets opposite trees and parks. Schools and shops were surrounded by cherry blossom trees and friendly people, a lovely combination of cosmopolitan/business life, and relaxing nature.
Every neighbourhood in Vancouver felt different, from the Davies street area of our hostel with its restaurants and vibrant bars, to the commercial and cosmopolitan inner city area, and totally different relaxed, seaside feel of the neighbourhoods by English Bay and the downtown peninsula. Vancouver has everything: mountains, forests, parks and walking trails, fascinating indigenous culture, and fantastic shopping and businesses in the city centre. My friend Malika and I did some shopping one afternoon and as we came out of the book store Chapters, we crossed the street, turned to our left and BAM - there's a mountain. The mountain and lake views all around the city were breathtaking.
On our first day in Vancouver, Malika and I joined 'Erik's Vancouver Tour' which was an amazing all-day tour that left from our hostel. Erik, a 76 year old Danish man, knew Vancouver inside-out and was full of energy, having us hike through the forest and taking us all over Vancouver. Our tour began with a short bus and ferry trip across to Granville Island as Erik told us about the history and geography of Vancouver. Our tour group and I began getting to know each other as we further explored West Vancouver, walking around the beautiful parks, marvelling in the stunning mountains. We hiked through the Vancouver forest for a couple of hours, taking in the amazing site of the forestry and seeing the places where scenes from some Hollywood movies were filmed.
We saw the forest path that Bella and the vampires walk in Twilight and a forest environment featured in Planet of the Apes 2. Vancouver is often referred to as 'Hollywood North' and with so many different environments together: city, lake, forest, mountains - it's easy to see why. Malika and I also joined Erik's 'Lynn Canyon Tour' which took us to the beautiful Lynn Canyon, with its cave covering a secret waterfall and we visited the Capilano Suspension Bridge, walking 140 metres along the bridge, 70 metres above the river below: the view of the scenery all around us was mesmerising. We also completed the cliff walk and enjoyed exploring the mini treehouses and tree-top walk in the Bridge Park.
Whilst in Vancouver, Malika and I also visited the Museum of Anthropology on the University of British Columbia campus. We viewed the First Nations collections which can't be seen anywhere else in Canada and spent hours admiring the incredible totem poles and artwork by indigenous peoples. Walking the streets of Vancouver often felt like walking around a movie set and we even saw some students shooting photos for a magazine. We explored Stanley Park in the glorious sunshine and spent rainy mornings people-watching in cute coffee shops. We also went to a concert on the university campus. British band Bastille (whose drummer is from my home city, Plymouth) played an incredible sell-out gig in the university sports arena. The whole crowd were buzzing and the atmosphere was electric. On our last day, we explored the downtown/modern city area: a perfect way to end my travels, being immersed in a vibrant but relaxed city.
My travels were incredible and so very eye-opening. I learnt a lot about French-Canadian culture and enjoyed exploring Québec and Vancouver. I feel so lucky to have lived in Canada for the academic year and would like to thank the School for the Study of Canada and Trent International for the travel prize, and Jeannine Crowe of the School for the Study of Canada for all her help and support organising and booking my trip.
2017