tbt | montreal, canada

after i graduated from college in may 2013, i visited one of my dear friends from waseda, shelly, in montreal! not only was it my first time in montreal, but in canada! since shelly was going to mcgill at the time, i figured this would be the perfect opportunity to see her and canada. i couldn't wait to hear her french skills in action. i decided to take the train from penn station in new york on a thursday since i've never taken the train on the east coast -- each way took about 12 hours. although it didn’t seem that long, i’m never doing that again. i couldn’t complain about the beautiful view though. on the way to montreal, i sat next to this older moroccan woman who was super sweet. i got in a little late at the station so shelly and i decided to just go to her friend’s apartment.

the next day we went exploring to chinatown where we ate our favorite, shabu shabu. shelly and i basically walked or took public transport everywhere -- one of the coolest things about montreal is you can get around the city underground. then we went to the old part of montreal and old port where they filmed part of life of pi (which we watched later that weekend). we stopped by another restaurant where i ate poutine for the first time! that night we met up with her friends and my friend allison (who was also visiting montreal) at a korean restaurant called bob n soul. i didn’t realize i would be eating so much asian food this weekend, but i wasn’t complaining since i don’t get to eat much of it in dc.

saturday we had a delicious breakfast at eggspectation where i ate real canadian maple syrup! then we went to a farmer’s market where i found lavender macarons (my favorite). this is where we also found a timmy’s and stayed in there for almost an hour to use their wifi. haha. we met up with her friends for dinner in chinatown then got free tickets to see mark knight (never heard of him) at new city gas – a really cool club. closest thing i could compare it to in dc would be fur.

for my last day we met up with my friend perry at a vegetarian restaurant near mcgill. after, we went to the mount royal park which was designed by the same guy who designed central park. this was very typical of shelly to want to go on a hike. the trail brought back horrifying memories from when we hiked mount fuji. after our hike, we walked to st. joseph's oratory which gave us a beautiful view of montreal. for dinner we ate at a burger place where i ordered their award winning burger. little did i know the burger was going to be as big as my head. probably since it had poutine INSIDE of the burger. it started to rain and we stayed in and watched life of pi.

although the trip was short, it was so much fun and i’m so glad i got to see shelly! not sure when i’ll see her next. montreal was awesome with its hipster feel. i hope to come back one day. au revoir!

xoxo,
camryn