Things What I See When I Walk Places.

Longest hiatus yet! To break the spell of blog-apathy, here's a picture-heavy amalgamation of things I've seen on my walks to various places/to nowhere in particular.
First up, some cool new statues that appeared in one of the squares near my apartment:

Last weekend I walked to a friend's house, and on the way I saw some pretty sights. The second picture is of Parc Jean-Drapeau, which is a theme park on a little island next to Montreal.

Although Emma has mocked me for my keen-ness for street art, I'm going to show you some more because YES I DO LOVE IT. The last picture is super dark, but it's from a part of town I don't usually go to so I thought I might as well get a picture when I saw it rather than pretend I'd go back in the daytime:

And here's my favourite square, again, but this time looking more autumnal and leaftastic. I'm probably going to cry when the trees have no leaves anymore; they've become one of my favourite Montreal sights.

Oh, and just because I hate the thought of this photo going to waste after Emma was so insistent I took a picture of her with the duomo at the Musee des beaux-arts:

Next entry: Boston, MA.
xx

Street Art Lol.

Just a short post to show you my favourite graffiti artist in Montreal. Unfortunately the first image has now been painted over by some cheese-phobic philistine (surely the opposite of cheese-eating surrender monkeys?), but the second was snapped only today. Long may it stay.

Well, who doesn't?
xx

Brighten My Northern Sky.

SORRY that I haven't updated yet in October. Pace of life has slowed down, everything's becoming more routine and comfortable which I guess leads to fewer noteworthy events. Fast or slow, dramarific or sedate, life here is beautiful. I walk a lot in Montreal and haven't taken any form of non-leg based transport for almost 4 weeks. One of my favourite parts of Montreal to walk is the half-hour stroll between my home and Emma's. Once you hit the Parc and start heading up the gentle incline, everything is lovely. On one side of you there's the mountain (Mont Royal ----> Montreal), and on the other there are spaces to play sport, which are always busy in the evenings with American football practice, people playing tennis, joggers etc. And once you get a certain way up, the whole of Avenue du Parc opens up before you and the car lights seem to go on forever. Last night, the sky was so beautiful, an amazing, luminous, pink-grey. My camera leaves much to be desired but I tried to get some pictures while the light lasted.

Fall is definitely here and the trees on Mont Royal are turning the most beautiful colours. Obviously you can't see very well here but you get the idea:

I absolutely love walking here, and I hope the weather lasts long enough for it to stay a habit. Also, I've heard on the grapevine some people have been wanting to get in touch with me since I 'retired' from Facebook but don't know how. My email address is bethany.carman@gmail.com so I'd love to hear from you there!
xx

Party in my Mouth.

While I've managed to kick my massive shopping habit that I spent the last 8 or so years carefully cultivating thanks to the UK high street, the main thing I find myself spending my dollars on in Montreal is food. Montreal has far too many great little cafes and restaurants to possibly list or visit, but since I've got here, me and the lads have made a pretty good dent in the Mtl food scene: Banquise? Check. Schwartz's? Check. Romado's? Check. l'Avenue? Check. Aux Vivres? Check. This entry will be dedicated to l'Avenue.

I'm a firm believer that poached eggs are possibly the greatest of all God's creations, and that any variation on them is a guaranteed win. l'Avenue on Mont-Royal is commonly regarded as the best breakfast/brunch joint in town, and their Eggs Benedict are legendary. So last Saturday Emma, Marianna and I braved the 40 minute queue (a standard wait on weekends) and were finally rewarded with a table. Feeling unadventurous, I opted for a bottomless filter coffee, but Emma had a moment of madness and chose a hot chocolate. Most people drink hot chocolate out of a mug. At l'Avenue, it's a soup bowl. The photo doesn't quite show the sheer size of it, but it does display how pretty it was.

For actual lunch, it could be nothing other than Eggs Benedict. But instead of playing safe, I went for a variation on my favourite theme. A spiced-up Eggs Benedict, with chorizo and peppers, served with a ramekin of comforting, herby potato homefries appeared before me:

Now, I'm usually a food machine. I have no problem putting away large quantities of unhealthy/carborific/sugary foods. But at l'Avenue, in their brunch, I met my nemesis. It took me a very long time to plod through this dish because it was just so rich. It was also amazing. Spicy, tasty chorizo; creamy Hollandaise sauce; perfectly cooked eggs. As some concession to health, all breakfasts are served with the fruit kebab you can see the end of in the hot chocolate photo, so I would definitely recommend only going to l'Avenue when you're genuinely hungry. For brunch, it's definitely worth a visit, and I'd say it's even worth the wait for a table. I'm going to make it a personal mission of mine to actually find the best breakfast in Montreal. A tasty mission if ever I heard one.
xx

On The Street Where You Live.

Coming from London, it's always a surprise when I go to a city that people really live in. Not in suburbs, not miles out of the centre of town, but actually in the city. Montreal is very much one of those cities, with beautiful houses and tree-lined streets all over town. The architecture of the housing here is beautiful, and it really is everywhere. It's not just the 'privileged', middle class families that live in gorgeous homes, it's all over Montreal, in every part of town. On my walk home from the Plateau this afternoon, I knew I really wanted to share this aspect of Montreal.

 

And this is my favourite little pocket of Montreal, Carre St. Louis, a residential square with a gorgeous fountain in the middle and completely surrounded with beautiful houses. This is definitely where I'd love to live if I come back here later in my life.

xx

The Fountainhead.

This morning, after completing a top-secret mission, I finally realised my dream of going to the Canadian Centre for Architecture. I'd been wanting to go for a while, and attempted to go on Monday, only to find that they don't open on Mondays or Tuesdays. It was a short visit, but a fascinating one. It's always free for students, but at the moment it's free for everyone because they're in-between exhibitions and so there's only one exhibition on, plus a few pieces from the usual collection. From the outside, it looked to me like something Howard Roark might approve of {get that reference and you'll be my friend forever}, although I'm sure he'd find a way of letting in light as to render the glass pyramids on the roof superfluous:

Inside I meandered around a really fascinating exhibition on the composer/architect Iannis Xenakis whose scope of interest, achievement and intellect is truly breathtaking.
In addition to that exhibition, one of the designs I liked the most from the permanent collection was by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, for a small city's museum. The way it was designed not only allowed for the environment and landscape to be seen from the interior, but even from the exterior its construction would mean you could essentially see through it. Cool.

The CCA also has a fantastic shop with hundreds of books on and around architecture and design, any of which I would have bought and read with interest had I only known where to start.

I think next I might supplement my Arts Plastiques de 1940 a 1968 course with a trip to Montreal's modern art museum. The fact I haven't yet been is probably unforgivable as it's on the next block from my home, but hey, I'm not a tourist. All in my own time.
xx

Just A Wee Bit O'Street Art.

Not sure how many people will still be reading this since my retirement from Facebook, but hey ho. This is just a short post to display some more delightful street art that I spotted one night on Blvd. St. Laurent, but it was too dark to photograph then so I made a return visit to snap it in the daytime.

and my personal favourite, Alfred Hitchcock:

xx