Quebec City

For Valentines day Caroline and I went to Quebec City for the Winter Carnival that is held there every year. It was extra special this year because Quebec is celebrating its 400th B-day. We left on Valentines day, so we actually celebrated it the next day. We drove to Montreal and stayed with Caroline's parents for the night and dropped the dogs off with them. The dogs didnt mind because they have the freedom to run like crazy in Caroline's house. Early the next morning we drove to Quebec city which is a little over 2 hours away. We got there and checked into our awesome hotel. For anyone who has seen pictures of Quebec City than you probably have see the hotel that we stayed in Le Chateau Frontenac. It is abeautiful hotel that is over a hundred years old and designed like an old Chateau from France. Our room was in the tall tower on the top floor so it was really nice and had such an amazing view of Old Quebec. We bundled up the temp. was around 20 degrees on that day, and headed out to see the sites and the Carnival. We went to the Ice Castle that is the home for the mascott of the Carnival a giant snowman called "Bonhomme". We got our picture taken with him and we were able to go around and look at all of the ice and snow sculptures that are made by different students and countries for the Carnival. It was really pretty and fun. There was not a lot of activities that were planned for that day, but there were many for tomorrow. We were out for about 4 hours walking around and by that time we were done we were so cold we went back to our hotel room and sat in the jacuzzi hot tub for awhile so we could get warm again. That night we had our Valentines day a romantic dinner in the 5 star French resturant Le Champlain. The atmosphere was so nice, it was like in a big living room with a large fire place and a view overlooking the river. The food was fantastic and so good and the desserts were amazing. It was a really nice time and a very romantic Valentines dinner.

The next day it was cold and I mean really cold, the high temprature for the day was to get to only 5 degrees and to feel a lot colder because of the wind. We went to all of the different venues that had things to do like ice skating, tubing, sleding, and other various activities that you could watch or participate. At one place they had an Ice Bath where people could take a bath in the snow with just their bathing suits on, absolutly crazy in that temprature. We watched some horse and sleigh races which was fun, but again it was so cold that I could hardly believe that the horses were having any fun. We had a traditional Quebec meal for lunch a split pea soup and a beef stew like meal. It was good because it was able to warm you up from the inside. Again it was so cold that we went back to our room and sat in the jacuzzi to warm up because we were going to go out at night and watch the night parade. We left to go see the night parade at 6 and at that time it was about -20 degrees F and with the wind about -30. We had camped out at the end of the parade route which was probably a mistake because we waited for about 3 and a half hours before the parade got there. There were a lot of people there so that helped the temprature go up a degree or two. The only way to keep warm was to dance around and keep moving. The parade was fun by the time it got there and it was really fun to see all of the floats and all of the fun stuff that they had. And of course Bonhomme was there in the last float to say goodbye and thanks for comming and he would see everyone next year. We then tried to walk back to the hotel, it was hard because we were so cold and could hardly move. And again we cooked in the jacuzzi and ordered hot coco and desserts. And that was all of our awesome Valentines Day weekend. We got up the next morning and said goodbye to Quebec City and drove back to Montreal picked up the dogs and drove back here to NYC. All in all it was a great weekend.