Cool Quebec
Visit this Canadian province for winery, scenery, history and cookery
Slide the blade along the wine bottle five times and on five, hit the rim at the top of the neck of the bottle. Simple. But I was holding a rather large and very sharp sabre!
However, the short snappy movement shown by Edith, sword-wielding bottleopening expert and host of my tour and tasting, described what I needed to do.
So, one, two, three, four, five and... success! One cork sent flying, sliced from the end of a lovely bottle of sparkling wine with barely a sip wasted.
I was thus inducted into L’orpailleur winery’s L’ordre des Maitres Sabreurs (The Order of Master Sabreurs).
I have to admit a winery was something I hadn’t expected to find an hour’s drive from the city of Montreal in Canada’s French-speaking Quebec province.
After all, this is a part of a vast country that spends months blanketed in snow with temperatures as low as -30C.
But at L’orpailleur winery they have used the hard winters to their advantage to produce their signature product, Vin de Glace (ice wine).
The grapes are picked at the end of the season and placed in nets which hang above the vines to freeze in the coming winter. When temperatures reach -8C-12C, the grapes are pressed to produce a beautifully sweet and smooth dessert wine.
The ingenuity and creativity of L’orpailleur’s grape growers and the region of Quebec as a whole is something I admired on my trip to Montreal and the towns and countryside of southern Quebec.
Even checking in to my hotel in downtown Montreal, The Monville, was a first for me as I used a computer in the lobby to get my room card. Then I was followed into the lift up to my room by a robot delivering room service, ordered by another guest using the TV in their room.
I managed to drag myself away from the large comfy kingsize bed to explore this city on an island in the St Lawrence River – with Mount Royal and its Plateau neighbourhood first on the list.
It’s a trendy area north of Downtown where amazing street art mixes with chic boutiques and eateries. But old local deli haunts, such as St-viateur and Schwartz’s, still have queues round the block.
I grabbed a “world-famous” Schwartz’s
pastrami sandwich, which I took with me up to the summit to savour with a view.
The main track up the mountain is easy, but I chose to explore the forest tracks that wind up, down and round the mountain (don’t ever call it a hill!).
You can’t come to Montreal in summer and miss out on a festival. On St Denis Street, for example, there was the
Montreal Completement Cirque (circus festival), where performers were swinging from trapeze rings on overhead beams, keeping the crowds gasping below.
Dinner beckoned and just a short hop from St Denis Street is Moleskine, a trendy restaurant where I opted for a Pizza Verdura, topped with pesto, courgettes, artichokes and mozzarella.
Feeling happily full, I followed the crowds to the Quartier des Spectacles (entertainment district) and the Jazz Festival, which has attracted stars such as Morcheeba and Norah Jones.
Next morning I set out to discover some of the city’s past, heading to its historic heart at the Old Port and the Pointe-à-callière Museum.
The highlight of my visit was walking on a glass floor over the site of Fort Ville-marie, built on the spot where Montreal was officially founded in 1642 but rediscovered only in 2014.
Emerging back into the daylight, it was time to leave the city and head to the green fields and hills of Quebec Sud.
For my sojourn away from the city, I based myself at Espace 4 Saisons on the outskirts of Mt Orford National Park.
The chalet-style hotel is not far from the Le Cerisier visitor centre where I was to start my rabaska (canoe) trip on Etang aux Cerises, a lake in the park.
With skiing, golf, fat-biking, mountain
biking and many trails to explore, it’s not difficult to see why this place is a favourite weekend trip for Montrealers.
Come nightfall, the Gorge du Coaticook becomes an enchanted forest where “fairies” followed me along the magical 2.5km woodland trail.
That magical feeling was kept alive on my last day with a hot-air balloon ride over the fields of the Monteregie region.
Leaving Montreal, I spotted the words “LOVE ME” painted on a roof.
Well, Quebec, I think I just might.