My girlfriend and I have finally decided to test eachother out as travel partners. We are in the beginning stages of planning a trip to Montreal & Quebec City, looking at early June. We will have two weeks.

As a start, we were thinking 5 nights in Montreal, 5 nights in various spots in the Laurentians and 5 nights in Quebec City. How is that for a time frame?

Things we like to do: Museums, hiking/walking (mild), walking around cities, history, a little shopping, one or two spa visits, and finding the unique, wonderful or quirky things about a place. I've read Montreal is better for nightlife, but neither of us is truly into that now.

We are planning to rent a car and drive from Montreal to Quebec City via exploration of the surrounding areas and that's where I'm getting stuck. I see lots of mountain resorts, but not a lot of info about what to see/do. Any ideas? Any websites that have hiking trails ( due to injuries we can only go on easier ones this trip). Any books/guide books, sites focusing on "must see" natural beauty spots?

This is just the beginning of our research and I've marked a lot of posts for retrieval, but if you can add to our info store, I'd appreciate it.

I doubt if you need 5 days in Quebec.
I found two good attractions, other than food: The Plains of Abraham battlefield site, including the museum with its multi media presentation, and Chutes Montmorency, which is/are a little ways down stream from the heart of the city.

I enjoyed the falls. There is a bridge which goes directly over the brink and one can look straight down at the vertical drop of the falls. The bridge, however, is no place for a person who fears heights.

Along either side of the chasm there are stairs with belvederes for viewing the falls.

I spent 5 weeks in Quebec City this summer, so I have some ideas to fill 5 days...

If you're staying in the city the whole time, you might get bored. But go to the Fields of Abraham and the park right "behind" it. The park is beautiful, and you could easily spend an afternoon just wandering around it.

If you are willing to venture out of the city, and are interested in history or religion at all, the cathedral at Ste. Anne de beapre is beautiful, and the town is cute. My family helped found the first church in Ste. Anne, and I walked around town a bit to see the home they lived in. The cathedral is supposed to have healing powers, and is a popular pilgrimage site.

Also, the Canyon Ste. Anne was really neat. It has various waterfalls and bridges, etc. I had a good time there, even though it was raining. It's kind of along the lines of "hiking" and definately a good place for natural beauty.

The Ile d'Orleans has a bunch of apple orchards/wineries and chocolateries, I believe. It was also very "cute" and the orchards were great.

There is some shopping in the old part of the city, and I heard there is a good mall, but I didn't get there. I also heard the shopping in Montreal was better.

We also went to one of the ski resorts that has an "obstacle course" (I can't think of what it's called - a rope course?) but I'm not sure what the name of it was. It was really neat - we were all roped in on pullies, etc, and it was through the woods on one of the mountains. Definately a neat experience that I'd never had before.

I hope that helps!

I knew it! Post on Fodor's and you get stuff that, even in all your searches, you never would've thought of! Yes, we are open to taking trips outside of QC, and Montmorency falls will be one of them. Thanks Bob. And Katie_scarlett, thank you, too. Do you happen to remember the name of the resort that had those rope courses? Thanks for your other input, I'll do searches on them.

Anyone else?

When we were there we did indeed visit the cathedral of Ste. Anne de Beaupre.

We also drove on to the Saguenay-St. Lawrence Marine Park. This park is where the Saguenay River meets the Saint Lawrence River.
I think a boat trip on the Fjord would be neat and/or a whale watching trip would be neat.

We returned to Quebec through Chicoutimi. It is in the heart of the province of Quebec and French is the language.

You could also drive a ways along the north shore of the Gaspé Peninsula.

The road is a little slow to try and to all the way to the end and back in one day. If you want to drive around it and return, I think you would need 3 nights on the Peninsula if you stop and see much. We spent two nights and it was not quite enough for what we did.


My initial response was focusing on the city only.

I'd be bored to death with five days in quebec City, even including some little trips outside of town.

And five in the Laurentiens is three too many for me; can't predict for you.

So...

Start in Montreal, without a car, for a couple of days.

then rent a car, and drive west to Ottawa, since you like museums -- there are lots, from airplanes to tanks to Indian artifacts to old money to potatoes (well, when I was last there) to trains (including a locomotive actually driven by my friend Jack, whose daughter bought me breakfast today.)

From Ottawa, get onto the north side ofthe ottawa River and drive east agfain, to Fairmont Montebello, and then turn north into the mountains and work your way through the Laurentiens.

From there, you can go back to Montreal or continue along the north shore of the St. Lawrence to Quebec City. Stay untilyou run out of time, or get bored (I'm betting three days is enough) and then drive back to Montreal via the Eastern Townships, which is on the south shore of the St. Lawrence.

There's a town called Tremblant, and a resort called Tremblant. In June, the resort is popular with hikers, wide-flower lookers, mountain bikers, etc. It's a compact little village where you park on the outskirts and walk into the town, and lots of restaurnts, hotels, stores, bars, etc. are all close enough together that you just walk from one to another. All in all, a nice place for half a day, one night, and most of the next day. You can leave Tremblant in the late afternoon and arrive in Montreal in lots of time for dinner.

Montreal and Quebec City are great for eating; you might build food intoyour travels as a sort of theme. Montreal's cuisine is French French, Quebec French, and Jewish-Deli to start with, supplemented with West Indian French, every version of Asian you can think of, a lot of Greek...

There's a great treain museum on the south shore, near Montreal, if you like trains.

Montreal and Quebec City are both walking cities.

This sounds like a fun trip. I agree that 5 days in Quebec City might be too much (the city is very charming but small), unless you do an overnight in one of the villages up along the St. Lawrence where there are lots of hiking and whale watching opportunities. The suggestion to spend some time in Ottawa is a good one, especially if you are into museums. Ottawa doen't have the charm of Quebec City or the excitement of Montreal, but for Museums, sightseeing and bicycling, it can't be beat.

It always amazes me when people say this many days is too much in that city. People live in those place and don't get bored.

Drive on the north shore up to Baie-St-Paul on the 138 or partly on the 360, then to La Malbaie on road 362. You'll find a buch of sites along the way. Continue to Tadoussac if you want. From La Malbaie, drive inland to Hautes-Gorges de la rivière Malbaie park. There's hiking and boat trips on the river. Then drive back using the back roads via St-Aimé-des-Lacs and Notre-Dame-des-Monts to St-Urbain-de-Charlevoix. Use a regional map found at most convenience store to figure out the back roads (I like mappart). In St-Urbain, take the 381 north to Grands-Jardins park. Go back whenever you feel like or "get bored". Infos on these parks at www.sepaq.com.

Closer to Quebec, there's Rivière Jacques-Cartier park (road 175). See www.sepaq.conm also.

Adjust the number of nights to fit in Tadoussac for sure (North of QC)and strongly consider Ottawa. Do web searches for both