Montréal-Notre petit quartier (Our little neighborhood)

Part of the fun of our time in Montréal was staying in an apartment and being part of a real neighborhood for a few days.  We had everything we could need near our place: bus stops, markets, bakeries, restaurants, a bookstore, a movie theater, a drug store, parks, you name it.  The neighborhood was quiet, safe and quaint.

Laura in the kitchen of our apartment.

A view of the long, skinny entry hall to the apartment from the kitchen (which is in the back of the apartment).

The front door of the apartment.

It was easy to find parking for our van on our street.  The only glitch was that from Monday through Thursday, there are alternating parking restrictions on the street (i.e. you can't park on one side on M/W afternoons, and you can't park on the other side on Tu/Th morning), so Cliff had to keep moving the van from one side of the street to the other each day.  We're still not sure why these restrictions exist!

No parking on this side of the street Monday and Wednesday from 4:00-6:30 pm.

Our street for the week.

Many apartment buildings in the neighborhood had entries like this.  We thought they looked cool.

There's one for rent in the neighborhood!  Maybe we should move here! :)

Taking a nice walk through the neighborhood.

Montréal has Bixi bike rental stations all over the city.  You can rent a bike for a few hours and leave it at any other Bixi station.  Although we couldn't take advantage of this with the kids along on this trip, we thought it was very cool.

The Bixi stations are very well used.

As I mentioned in the previous post, we LOVED the bakery in our neighborhood, De Froment et de Sève.

Petit pain au chocolat in the morning.....mmmmm!

We enjoyed using the subway to get around the city.  It's a shame more American cities can't get on board with such mass transit.

Beaubien métro station: our subway stop.

Waiting for the subway!

One big thing we noticed in Canada was how much recycling happens. This, of course, made me very happy, especially since we currently live in an area of the US that is particularly behind on this issue.  We loved seeing this widespread care for the environment.

In the subway station, three recycling bins to one trash can.....and look which bins are overflowing!

One thing that always made me feel more at home when I studied in Paris was actually shopping for groceries.  I loved doing this in Montréal too.  There was a local produce vendor/ grocer just a two-minute walk from the apartment.  We stopped here everyday for fruit, veggies and goodies like hummus and tabbouleh.

Local market.  The prices were very reasonable, the produce was great, and the service was friendly.  He even let the kids pick out free bananas on one visit.

The apartment itself was small, but quaint and comfortable.  It's really more suited for 2 people than 4, but we made due regardless.  We put the kids in the bedroom (which you will see below has a window that opens on the living room), and we slept in the living room on the pull out futon so we could still watch TV when the kids went to bed.

The bedroom with a window into the living room.

Tiny bathroom, but fantastic water pressure!

Hanging at the kitchen table munching on veggies and hummus.  You can see the balcony that is off the back of the apartment.

The living room/my and Cliff's bedroom.  There is a balcony off the front of the apartment here, but in the summer, the window unit A/C is in it, so you can't open the door.

View of living room looking back into the bedroom.

There was also a bike lane on our street, which was nice to see (and very well used), but what was unique was that it was actually between the curb and the parked cars.  This meant that to get to our van, we actually had to look out for bicyclists more than other cars; they move quickly!  Two times when Cliff was moving the van (see parking restrictions above) he noticed that a cyclist had hit our side mirror (which bends right back into place).  Our thought was "Ouch!"

Well used bike lane right in front of our place.

Our apartment building.  The top, right balcony is to our place, but it is the one we couldn't open due to the A/C unit.

We loved our experience as temporary residents of this great city!  We would absolutely stay in this apartment and lovely neighborhood again if we are ever fortunate enough to visit again!

Gina