Day 55, June 18, 2012: The highlight of a lovely week in Montreal is time spent with family and old friends. After all the dire warnings about the commercial traffic on the St. Lawrence going upstream to Montreal, we found ourselves all but alone of a  chilly Monday morning. We passed one freighter headed upstream laboring against the 3-knot current. We made the 40-mile run from Sorel in just under 2 hours, finding no reason to loaf and fight the flow.

Above is a view of the Old City from our marina. The adjacent view is of St. Paul Street, a street of bistros and art shops mostly of the high tourist variety.

I have posted a short film strip here of our previous day, Sunday, on the Richelieu River south of Sorel. The film is worth a thousand words. I can find only one—nuts!

We have a very pleasant space in Port d’Escale alongside. We are in the Old City and have covered familiar territory on foot as far up the hill as midtown. The Old City is nicely restored and preserved, architecture mindful of la vieille ville in Paris.

There is no evidence of recession here. Building and restorations proceed apace. The streets are  mobbed and traffic is dense. The restaurants are full and we haven’t found a bad one, yet. We have been out on the town every night with family and friends. I am still recovering from the performance of Sting.

We have walked the city until our feet were raw. Everywhere we go there is art and architecture, old mixed with new, modern with ultramodern. And everywhere there is  renewal of the dillapidated. The Centre d’Histoire de Montreal covers the displacement of even older communities. One gets the notion that the city is in a constant state of rejuvenation.