Day Tripper

Mont Royal offers some of the most fantastic views of Montreal and they are just as spectacular by night. The weather last week was beautiful and so the evenings were warm and the sky clear giving perfect panoramas of the city, spotlighted by the full moon. McGill has some fantastic facilities for exchange students including the McGill International Student Network (MISN) who organise social events across Montreal and even Canada. Last week they organised a night time walk up Mont Royal complete with glow-sticks and doughnuts at the top!

The sun has been shining all week, perfect weather to study (or not) in the sun! There's lots of green space across campus which makes university a fantastic place to be, working or not. It is not unusual to see people juggling and slack lining across the university and on Thursday I even stumbled across an aboriginal festival on lower field! Lots of people were dressed traditionally and everyone was asked to join in the singing and dancing.

Friday nights are always lively in Montreal and this week I was escorted by some of the guys on my course directly from my tutorial at 5:30 to the pub- but not just any pub! On a Friday the basement of one of the engineering buildings is converted into something called Blues Pub. A crazy mix of people fuelled by cheap beer and cheese toasties- a great way to meet people!!

After a few drinks I headed out to a club on St Denis for an electro swing night! Everyone was dressed up in all manner of costumes and the venue was awesome. The DJs were fantastic, accompanied by live musicians, belly dancers and even a girl dancing around on stilts!! We attended the swing class at the start of the evening that gave us all the moves we could possibly need and proceeded to dance the night away until we were just too tired to continue!



On Saturday I ventured to explore the Old Port with Marie and I was not disappointed. The port itself is pretty industrial but the local area is lovely with lots of artists and little cafes. I came across more inspiring street art and some of the most beautiful autumn trees that I've seen so far! We also went to see an exhibition on The Beatles. It was very cool (nothing on the museum in Liverpool!) but also a little strange- Montreal seemed to have been completely obsessed with the band on the back of only one visit!

Sunday took me to the Marché aux puces or flea market at St Michel. The is only one way to describe it- it looked as though someone had emptied the entire contents of their grandmothers house (complete with grandmother) and decided to sell it. You could literally buy anything there- vintage clothes, books, cameras, bikes, guitars, furniture, comics, duke boxes, telescopes, vinyl records, you name it you could find it here! It was a very french experience (helped by the fact that I went with two of my new french friends!) and everyone we met was absolutely lovely and welcomed us with passion to Montreal. I only bought a couple of things for my room in the end but my friend came away the proud owner of his brand new retro bike for only $40- Not bad for a mornings work!!