Day18 - Montreal QC

Today was shaping up to be quite a busy day so we started early while it was cooler.

Julie wanted to hike up Mont Royal.
Mont Royal is a volcanic based hill that sits over Montreal (and gave it its name).
It's 233 meters high and so deserves to be climbed.
After some heavy planning we set off for the metro to the closest station, except the closest station is on a steep hill, so we were worn out and out of breath even before we started the gruelling climb up the steps.

In actual fact it wasn't too bad and the views were nice as well as being significantly cooler with a nice breeze. We sat down at the 'chalet', basked in the sun and watched people come and go. They have a piano up there on the terrace that anybody can just go up and play. I must admit there are some very talented people who can tickle the ivories. I chose not to embarrass myself.
There were some great views of the city although a little hazy including the Olympic stadium in the distance (my zoom makes it look much closer).

We also walked around to the lake and generally checked the place out. Finally we took a different route back down to a different metro station which took us back to the old town.
Lunch was next so we had a Montreal smoked meat sandwich and some more poutine.

My friend Benoit had invited us for dinner. Ben is a colleague from Kronos where I used to work up until about 8 weeks ago. He lives with his wife Marie-Chantal in a log cabin. Ok, so perhaps not a cabin, more like a mansion but it is made of logs.
He bought 50 acres of land some years ago and has always had this dream of building a cool house.
Last year his dreams can to life when his house was ready for them to move into.
Ben and M-C were great hosts and it was great to see him again.
I've included a picture of his log cabin as well as his tractor (who doesn't have a tractor to play with on their 50 acres?)