Category: travel.

The final port of call on our Québec intensive cruise back in September was Trois-Rivières, which apparently, among other things, is known for its black squirrel population.

Well, in fact, all of Québec has a significant population of black squirrels.

We have them here in Minnesota too, so they aren’t new to me, but I was wondering if I’d see any on our trip.  Sure enough, as soon as we walked off the ship in Trois-Rivières we saw one.

He wasn’t exactly posing for photos, but I managed to get a shot of the back of him.  He held some of the other cruise passengers enthralled as they’d never see a black squirrel before.

There was more to see in Trois-Rivières than black squirrels though, well … sort of.

Unfortunately, we were there on a Monday to find that the one museum that I really wanted to visit was closed.  That was Le Musée québécois de culture populaire, or Le Musée POP for short.

My Lonely Planet guidebook said that this museum included quirky exhibits featuring pop culture.  At one time they even had an exhibit on “the social significance of garage sales”.  Would that have been right up my alley or what?

Clearly I should have read the fine print and realized that the museum would be closed when we were there so that we had a back up plan.  Instead we just spent a couple of hours walking along the riverfront promenade  and through the oldest section of town along the Rue des Ursulines.

Trois-Rivières was founded in 1634, however, it was mostly destroyed by a fire in 1908, so the oldest section of town doesn’t date back any further than that.

The preponderance of wrought iron railings reminded me quite a bit of Charleston.

Some of them were quite elaborate.  I loved this next one with its weeping tree design.

I had to give this next house some demerits for not planting anything in that fantastic stone wall planter.

Wouldn’t that be spectacular filled with something?  Something as simple as an ivy, some impatiens (it was in shade), or even just some creeping jenny would be perfect.

I enjoyed checking out some of the interesting old houses in this area.

That’s kinda my jam.

But there were really only a block or two of those.

We eventually came upon a little crepe place called Le Sacristain and decided to stop and get something to eat.

I’ve mentioned in previous posts that the food on our cruise was not very good.  Of course, I realize that since I had Covid for the last half of the trip, my opinion on the food should be taken with a grain of salt.  Also, most of my meals came from room service at that point too, so that made them even worse.  But Mr. Q wasn’t impressed with the food on the ship either.  The simple ham and cheese sandwich I had at Le Sacristain was absolutely delicious, and Mr. Q also really enjoyed his crepe.  So that tells me that you can’t blame the bad cruise food entirely on Covid.

In previous posts I’ve mentioned that we had spectacularly glorious weather nearly every day of our trip, but on this final day it started to rain shortly after noon and it continued for the rest of the day.  But that was OK, we needed to get our bags packed anyway.  Plus, I was still feeling pretty wiped out from the Covid.  So we headed back to the ship after our lunch ashore.

I can’t really give you an unbiased review of our overall experience on an Azamara cruise.  My experience was definitely sub-par having had covid for around half of our journey.  However, I can say that although we didn’t enjoy the food, we did enjoy sailing in this part of the world.

It was pretty magical to be floating along on calm waterways just enjoying the views.

But would I do it again?  Probably not.  That area of Canada was lovely, and I’d certainly recommend visiting.  But the cruise itself was rather expensive, and I’m not sure it was worth it.  In fact, Mr. Q and I may be avoiding cruises overall for a while (not including a cruise that I have already booked with my sister in February, but more on that in a future post).  We have realized that we definitely enjoyed our trip to the Brandywine Valley in May much more than this cruise, so we’re planning to do something similar to that next spring.  Fly to a major city, rent a car, stay in hotel suite with a little more space and just explore the surrounding area at our leisure.

We’re thinking about Chattanooga, Tennessee.  After all, it was named the friendliest city in the U.S. by Conde Nast last year.  Have any of you been?  If so, be sure to leave a comment with any recommendations for that area!

If you’ve been following along with my posts about our Azamara cruise in Canada, we’ve reached the point in the trip where I came down with Covid.

Just in case any of you are wondering what happens when you get Covid on a cruise ship these days, I thought I’d share some of those details.  First of all, some fellow passengers that Mr. Q befriended while getting me some hot tea offered us some Covid tests because we hadn’t thought to bring any.  We both did a test, Mr. Q was negative, but I was definitely positive.

Because I am one of those rule following sort of people, and because you’re supposed to report any highly contagious illness to the ship’s medical center, I called them from our cabin.  They sent a nurse to our cabin and he administered another Covid test, still positive.  However, I did not have a fever.  The Azamara policy was to quarantine me to our cabin for 24 hours, and if I still did not have a fever after 24 hours, I could leave the cabin wearing a mask.  Mr. Q, being negative, was free to do as he pleased.

The nurse returned the following day to take my temperature, and I still didn’t have a fever, so I could leave the cabin.

Getting Covid on vacation was definitely a major bummer, but I will say that the timing was better than it could have been.  The first day that I felt really poorly was a port day in the Magdalen Islands, and I was in no condition to go ashore.  The 2nd day, which was the day I reported my illness and was quarantined, was a day at sea.  Honestly, I would have stayed in bed all day regardless.  So ultimately I only missed one port of call.

The day that I was released from quarantine was the port that I was most looking forward to, Québec City.  Although I still didn’t feel great, I put on a mask and got off the ship.  Then Mr. Q and I spent a couple of hours wandering around.

As you can see in my photos, it was another absolutely spectacular day weather-wise.

And as you also might be able to see, Québec City is very hilly.  There were lots of stairs to tackle.

Which isn’t exactly ideal when you have Covid.

They do have a funicular though, if you want to skip some of those stairs.

Having been on a few funiculars before like the one in Bergen, Norway and the one in Santorini, I was expecting something a little more elaborate.  This was more like a small elevator that traveled on an angle rather than straight up and down.

Another thing I have to note about Québec City, it was very crowded.  I should have expected that, but since we were there in the shoulder season (September), I thought the crowds wouldn’t be as bad.

I was wrong.

But it was a beautiful day, and it also was a Sunday and there seemed to be quite a few locals out with their dogs in addition to all of the tourists.  So it was definitely busy.

We walked around for a bit checking out some of the things I wanted to see, like the umbrella street …

and Place Royale, which is where where Samuel de Champlain founded the City of Québec in 1608.

We checked out a couple of really cool murals on the sides of buildings.

We found a bench near this next one …

and I have to admit that I found it very amusing to sit for a bit and watch people setting up their very elaborate selfies in front of it.

There was one thing I enjoyed seeing lots of in Québec City.  Can you guess what is was from this picture?

Verbena bonariensis!  You know I love it, and for those of you not in the know, it’s the tall purple flower shown above.  It was everywhere!

We eventually ended up in Mary’s Popcorn Shop where we purchased the most delicious maple syrup and pecan caramel corn.

Quite honestly, this was probably the tastiest thing I had on the entire trip.  And really, if you go to Canada and don’t have maple caramel corn, have you really gone to Canada?

FYI, sidebar, you can also go to fake-Canada in Disney’s Epcot and get maple caramel corn …

In fact, I might even stop in there today and get some (I’m at DisneyWorld with my niece and sister this week).  I wonder if their maple caramel corn is as good as the stuff from Mary’s Popcorn?

I enjoyed seeing Québec City, but I’d definitely love to go back and explore it more in depth one day.  We just barely skimmed the surface before I ran out of energy.  By they way, in case you’re wondering, despite sharing a very small cabin and an even smaller bathroom, Mr. Q never did get Covid.  He has an immune system of steel.

Have you been to Québec City?  Or maybe you’ve tried that amazing caramel corn in either real Canada, or fake Epcot Canada?  If so, leave a comment and let me know.

Lately one topic that has been getting a lot of press is over-tourism.  So many of the most popular tourist destinations have become overrun with visitors; places like Venice, Barcelona or Amsterdam.

Perhaps you’ve seen news footage of locals spraying tourists with water pistols in Barcelona.

There is so much to unpack in any conversation about this situation and I don’t want to get into that here other than to say that I’m not keen on the idea of going somewhere where I’m not welcomed.  Although that being said, I have been to all three of those cities and had a perfectly wonderful time.

But today’s post is about a little known place that has precisely the opposite attitude towards tourists called Saint Pierre and Miquelon.

Saint Pierre and Miquelon is an archipelago of eight islands off the coast of Newfoundland.  However, it’s not part of Canada.  While France gave up most of its territories in North America after the French and Indian war, it held onto this one because its fishing industry was so important for keeping French citizens fed.  To this day, Saint Pierre and Miquelon is still a French territory, or more correctly, a ‘French overseas collectivity’.  The official language is French, and the official currency is the Euro.

In other words, it’s a little bit of France in North America.

Unfortunately, the economy of this small collectivity suffered greatly with the decline of the fishing industry and the 1992 Canadian cod moratorium.  As a result, there is now an ongoing push to promote tourism in an effort to boost their economy.

We took a guided walking tour on our visit, and although there wasn’t a whole lot to see, it was very interesting and informative.

We learned about the fishing industry that remains, and the Saint Pierre working dory.

These are flat-bottomed fishing boats that are unique to Saint Pierre.

We also learned quite a bit about what it means to be a French overseas collectivity.  They are semi-autonomous, having their own local government, while the French government retains authority over areas such as justice, defense, and university education.  Our guide told us that many of the college age residents go to university in France.

What I really wanted to know more about though was the Île aux Marins, or Sailor’s Island.

Doesn’t that look like the perfect spot to film a murder mystery?

Actually, there is a Canadian crime drama called Saint-Pierre, and it is filmed on location, but I’m not sure if any of it has been filmed on Sailor’s Island.  It airs on the Canadian network CBC.  I may have to figure out if I can stream it somewhere online.

But back to Sailor’s Island itself, it is a small island just a few hundred yards off the coast of St. Pierre that was once a fishing village.  However, it was abandoned completely in 1963.  It has now been turned into an open air museum (and you know I love a good open air museum).

Unfortunately, as I mentioned when I returned from this trip, I came down with Covid about mid-trip and this particular day was when I first started feeling unwell.  So I just didn’t have it in me to get up early, figure out how to get over there, and visit it, all before our previously scheduled 1 pm walking tour.

I have to say, I really regret not making more of an effort to visit it.  Although I’m not entirely sure it would have even been possible.  I never saw any boats heading over that way, so I do wonder if it was closed for the season.

We sailed away from Saint Pierre at 3 pm, so once our walking tour concluded we had to get right back to the ship and weren’t able to do any additional exploring.

It was a beautiful afternoon, perfect for heading back out to sea.

Have any of you been to Saint Pierre and Miquelon?  Did you even know that there was a little bit of France still located just off the coast of Canada (I didn’t)?  Leave a comment and let me know.

If you’ve followed me for long, you know that I love a good living history museum.

Probably my all-time favorite is The Beamish in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.

Another favorite is the Norsk Folkemuseum in Oslo.

But when Mr. Q suggested we visit the Fortress of Louisbourg on our recent trip to Canada, I wasn’t terribly excited.  I figured it would be another military history/battlefield sort of place.  As I may have mentioned in the past, Mr. Q is a war game fan, and he had played a game that featured a battle that took place here.  Thus, his wish to see it.

The Fortress of Louisbourg is a partial reconstruction of an 18th-century French fortress on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia.  And as it turns out, I was pretty delighted to discover that it is also a fantastic living history museum staffed with costumed interpreters.

The original settlement in the area dates back to 1713, but the fortress itself was built by the French in the mid-1700’s to defend against the British.  Unfortunately, it was built in a poor location for defense and it was captured by British forces twice.  The British then demolished the fort beginning in 1760 to prevent the French from recapturing it again.  The site was then abandoned by 1785.  So, considering it was the largest and most expensive European fortification in North America, it didn’t last very long.

The reconstruction was begun in 1961 and is the largest reconstruction project in North America.

We were able to catch a demonstration about hot chocolate in one building.

This costumed enactor was a wealthy merchant who imported chocolate.  He explained how expensive the chocolate was, and how they used it to make a hot chocolate drink.  It was slightly more complicated than adding 4 tablespoons of Swiss Miss to a mug of hot water.  Next we all got to try a cup.  Delicious, and educational.

We also saw a demonstration of how to fire a musket …

along with an explanation of what life in the fortress was like for the common soldier, which was not great.  Apparently many promises were made when they were recruited in France, but they didn’t really come to fruition once they got to Louisbourg.  Then they were stuck there thousands of miles from home.

We also enjoyed a demonstration of the entertainment of the time at the Inn.

The fortress had four gates that led inside including the Frederic Gate that was on the waterfront.

I thought that was an unusual design.

There are over 50 buildings to explore over 6 acres.

You are able to wander around through fully furnished buildings at your own pace, or you can opt for a guided tour.

Many of the buildings were manned by costumed interpreters.  We spoke with the housekeeper in this kitchen for quite some time as she explained what her day to day life was like.

My only complaint about visiting the Fortress of Louisbourg is that we didn’t have enough time there.  This is definitely one of the downsides of traveling on a cruise ship, you have limited time in each port of call.  There was so much more to see here if we’d only been able to spend all day, we really just skimmed the surface of what was available.  I’d love to return some day to see more, but I’m not optimistic about the chances that I’ll ever make it back to Cape Breton Island.

How about you?  Have you been to this part of Nova Scotia?  Or would you like to add it to your bucket list?  Leave a comment and let me know.

Every time I publish one of these travel blog posts I feel like I’m that family member who forces everyone to sit through a slide show from their summer vacation.

You know, like back in the 60’s when slides were the thing, and everyone had to sit in a dark room and watch as Dad clicked through slide after slide.

And most of those slides weren’t terribly good either.

Probably half of the audience fell asleep, and the other half desperately needed that cocktail in their hands.

So I apologize if that’s how you feel about these travel posts, but to be perfectly honest, I do these posts for myself.

I used to scrapbook all of my trips.

But I don’t scrapbook anymore.  I still miss it sometimes, but I also don’t necessarily want to continue to add to the 40 or so scrapbooks that will definitely end up in the landfill one day.

So, yeah, now I do these blog posts mainly so that I can go back and look at them later and reminisce about a trip we took.

Feel free to just skip over them if they just make you want to take a nap (or drink a cocktail), I fully understand.

And that brings me to the 2nd port of call on our recent cruise on the St. Lawrence seaway, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island.

As you can see, it was another absolutely beautiful day.  We had glorious weather on this trip.

I have to say that there wasn’t a whole lot to see here though.  We could have taken a shore excursion to visit the Anne of Green Gables house, but I never read those books as a child so that didn’t really interest me.  We also could have done a guided tour in a horse drawn wagon, but instead we pretty much did the same tour on foot on our own.

We walked through town admiring some of the historic homes along the way.

There were definitely some lovely old homes.

But here’s what stood out to me the most in Charlottetown, the locals were the friendliest, most helpful people I’ve ever encountered as a tourist.

We had grabbed a ‘self-guided walking tour’ map from the ship before disembarking, so as we walked along we had to stop a few times to refer to the rather unwieldy map.  Nearly every time we stood on a street corner with that map unfolded, a local would stop and ask if they could help us find something.  One guy was even just stopped at a stoplight in his vehicle when he rolled down his window and asked if we needed directions somewhere.

We could not possibly have felt any more welcomed by the locals.  It was truly remarkable.  Especially these days when tourists are definitely not welcomed everywhere.

We did eventually make our way to the Beaconsfield Historic House.  The house was built in 1877 as the residence of a wealthy shipbuilder.

And we happened to be just in time for a guided tour of the inside.

When the tour guide asked us to name the oldest thing in the dining room, I correctly guessed that it was the Christmas cactus in the window.  I knew those things could live for decades.  She said it was over 100 years old, although I don’t know exactly how they have a record of that.

The house was built with the most modern features of the time including central heating, gas lighting and running water.  Cold water, that is.  If you wanted hot water they still had to heat it on the stove and then carry it upstairs to the bath room.

I always enjoy seeing the kitchens in these old homes, not sure why that is since I don’t spend a lot of time in my own kitchen.

I’m not entirely sure whether or not those cabinets are original, but aren’t they gorgeous?

After touring the Beaconsfield House we moved on to walk around Victoria Park and the Prince Edward Battery, and then back through town towards our ship.

We had plenty of time left before we sailed though, so we then headed over to Lobster on the Wharf.

It’s the restaurant above with all of the red awnings.

Prince Edward Island is known for its lobster, so we figured we had to try some.  We ordered a lobster dip appetizer that was absolutely delicious.  We also ordered a lobster roll to share, and after one bite I decided that was not for me.  But Mr. Q polished it off and thought it was pretty good.  To be fair, I don’t particularly like fish or most seafood.

With that, it was time to sail away from Charlottetown and head towards our next port of call, Sydney, Nova Scotia.  If I haven’t put you to sleep with my travel posts, be sure to check back next week to read about Sydney!

The first port of call on our recent Azamara cruise was Gaspé.

Gaspé is about 650 km northeast of Québec City, and has a population of just over 15,000 people.  We were greeted at the port by a band of drummers which was a nice touch.

Mr. Q and I didn’t really see much of Gaspé itself though, instead we took an excursion to Percé which is about an hour further along the coast.

I had read that it was a very scenic drive to Percé, and it was lovely, although I have to admit we were spoiled by the scenic drive in Norway that we experienced back in 2023 and this wasn’t nearly as dramatic.

Percé itself is known as one of the most beautiful villages in Québec, and I will agree that it was lovely.

And as you’ll soon learn was the case for almost our entire trip, we had glorious weather that day.  Sunny and low 70’s.  Perfect.

Percé means ‘pierced’ in English and the town is named for the rock formation that is located on the tip of the Gaspé Peninsula.

I didn’t really get a good photo of it, but the rock formation does have a natural arch at one end (on the right end in my photo above), so in other words, it is pierced.

Percé is even smaller than Gaspé, having a population of around 3,000 people.  It definitely felt like a tourist destination with mostly small shops, cafes and hotels in the center of town.

It is beautifully situated on the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

But the shoreline is very pebbly.  Mr. Q and I attempted to walk along the water, but those pebbles are bigger than they look in my photo and they aren’t very stable to walk on.  I’m sure I wouldn’t want to attempt it barefoot.

Luckily Percé has added a very nice boardwalk along the waterfront that is far easier to walk on.

There were lots of comfy chairs where you could just sit and admire the view.

The boardwalk was mostly backed by small hotels.

I can see where this would be a great spot for a family summer vacation.  There are plenty of outdoor activities nearby like hiking, kayaking and birdwatching.  According to Wikipedia they get over 500,000 visitors per year.

But it was very quiet the day we were there since the summer season was pretty much over.

After first getting some coffee and pastries at a local cafe, then strolling along that boardwalk, we decided to walk along this road to admire some of the houses …

I suspect that most of these places are either private vacation homes or vacation rentals.

I certainly could see the appeal of staying in one of these for a few days.

However, I have to say that there really wasn’t much to do in Percé itself.  We were only there for about 2 hours and that was plenty of time to see the town itself, but not enough time to try out any of the surrounding outdoor activities.  I think this small village would be better experienced by staying there and exploring the surrounding areas rather than visiting on an afternoon cruise ship excursion.

That being said, it was a lovely day and I certainly don’t regret spending it in Percé.

If you enjoy my travel posts, be sure to check back next week when I’ll share our 2nd port of call on Prince Edward Island, Charlottetown.  And if you don’t enjoy my travel posts, check back on Friday when I’ll be sharing another makeover project!

Our recent Azamara Quebec intensive cruise sailed from Montreal, Canada so Mr. Q and I decided to fly in to Montreal a couple of days early so that we could see some of that city.

Let’s start with a couple of quick travel q tips in case any of my American readers are planning a trip to Montreal anytime soon.

First up, I highly recommend using the ArriveCAN app in advance to make your customs declaration.  You can then use the express lanes in the customs area in the Montreal airport.  We avoided some crazy long lines by doing this.

Next, although the taxi line at the airport was pretty long, it moved quickly.  Now, you are probably thinking ‘wouldn’t an Uber be cheaper, or quicker?’, but no.  There was an even bigger crowd waiting for Ubers.  Plus, as our taxi driver told us, a taxi from the airport to the historical city center in Montreal has a fixed flat price of $50 (that’s Canadian, so currently about $36 USD).  Since we arrived right around 5 pm, or rush hour, with surge pricing an Uber would have cost closer to $100.

My next tip is to take all of those tips you see on travel vlogger videos on YouTube with a grain of salt.  Many of the YouTubers I watched said it was considered rude to not at least try to greet people in French before assuming they spoke English.  So when we arrived at our hotel, we walked up to the front desk and promptly said “Bonjour!”, at which point the desk clerk rattled off a bunch of French back to me.  We then had to explain that we didn’t really speak French, and the clerk said “Well, why did you say bonjour?” and I had to explain the whole thing.  She said that was nonsense, just speak English.  Most people in Montreal, especially in the tourism industry, are bilingual and will respond back to you in the language you greet them in.

After checking in, we found a nearby restaurant for dinner and then called it an early night.  I have to admit, Mr. Q and I are definitely not night owls.

After fortifying ourselves with some coffee and pastries the next morning, we headed to the Château Ramezay.

This residence was built in 1705 for Claude de Ramezay, the governor of Montreal.  Now it’s a small museum with a mix of interesting exhibits showing 500 years of history.

I have to be honest and admit that I specifically chose it because it was the only tourist site I could find nearby that included a garden.

The chateau’s original garden was 4,200 square meters, but today only 750 square meters remain.  Nonetheless, the museum has done a lovely job of recreating a smaller version of the original, complete with a vegetable garden …

an ornamental garden (including some of my favorite verbena bonariensis) …

and an orchard (those trees behind the those trimmed arborvitae are fruit trees).

It was lovely to spend a little time in such a pretty setting.

After a quick lunch of some really delicious croque monsieur, we headed to the meeting point for a small group walking tour with MTL Detours.  We had decided to book a walking tour at the last minute the night before, and I’m so glad we did.

Our guide, Caroline, was full of information and also quite funny and entertaining.  She shared some of the history of Montreal, and how you could see that history in the architecture.

Some of the historic buildings are very French in style, like this one with its mansard roof.

And then there are places like Habitat 67 which was built for Expo 67, a World’s Fair held in Montreal in 1967.

The unique design consists of modular concrete boxes arranged in such a way that each individual living space has it’s own private rooftop terrace that isn’t visible from any other unit.

Caroline also pointed out the geodesic dome that was built for Expo 67.

See it over there on the other side of the river?  It was the United States pavilion and was designed by R. Buckminster Fuller.  It also was the inspiration for Spaceship Earth in EPCOT …

As a Disney park fan, I thought that was an interesting little bit of trivia.

We ended our tour at the Bonsecours Market.

The building was finished in 1847 and was originally home to city hall, but now it’s filled with restaurants and shops.

In hindsight, I’m now kicking myself for not going inside.  I wish we had at least taken the time to check it out a bit, but it was such a lovely afternoon that we decided to explore a bit more outside instead.

For dinner I decided I had to try poutine.  If you’ve been to Quebec and not tried the poutine, have you really been to Quebec?

If you aren’t familiar, poutine was invented (if that’s the right word) in rural Quebec in the 1950’s.  Traditional poutine consists of french fries topped with cheese curds and then smothered in brown gravy.  Poutine has gotten so trendy these days, and now you can get all kind of variations on the theme like lobster poutine, or buffalo chicken poutine.

I have to admit, I didn’t like it.  I had a feeling I wouldn’t.  I’m not a fan of soggy french fries, and really not a big fan of cheese curds either (unless they are battered and deep fried).  And brown gravy?  I like it on mashed potatoes, but on fries?  No thanks.  But now I can say I’ve tried it.

On our last morning in Montreal we decided to take a walk to the port to decide whether or not we needed a taxi to get there later with our luggage (we did not).

It was a lovely morning for a walk along the river.

And there were some nice views of the Montreal skyline from the quay.

It was the perfect way to say goodbye to Montreal before boarding our ship and sailing away.

If you’re interested in reading more about my travels, be sure to check back next week when I post about our first port of call, Gaspe.

In the meantime, have any of you tried poutine?  If so, what did you think?  Are you a fan, or do you also prefer your fries crispy?  Leave a comment and let me know.

You may have noticed that there hasn’t been much activity from me over the last two weeks.

Well … surprise!  Mr. Q and I were in Canada.

We took a 10-night Quebec ‘intensive’ cruise with Azamara.

I’m sure most of you haven’t heard of Azamara.  It’s a small boutique cruise line with only 4 ships.  Their ships hold around 700 passengers as opposed to the giant mega cruise ships that hold anywhere from 3,000 to 7,000 people.

That being said, they are an ocean going cruise line, not a river cruise line.  That seems to confuse people when I mention that we sailed out of Montreal, which obviously is not on the coast.  But we did eventually end up in the North Atlantic Ocean after traveling down the St. Lawrence River and through the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

Basically, if a river cruise and an ocean cruise had a baby, this cruise would be it.

It was very cool to be sailing down the St. Lawrence while sitting out on our balcony …

and while also being on a ship that had a few more amenities than your typical river cruise boat.

I thought it was pretty interesting to see some of the vessels that were going in the opposite direction fairly close up as they passed by, they definitely don’t pass this close out at sea.

It was also fun to be able to see the opposite shore much of the time.

That would have been better yet had we thought to bring binoculars with us!

And for those of you who may not appreciate the motion of the ocean, for the most part we barely felt any movement at all on this cruise.

Our weather was very nearly perfect with the exception of one rough night on the Atlantic, and one afternoon of rain on our very last day.

Azamara specializes in what they call ‘destination-intensive’ itineraries that focus on a single country or region.  Because they are a smaller ship, they can visit smaller, lesser know ports that can’t accommodate the mega-ships.

Although this cruise was called ‘Quebec intensive’, only half of our ports of call were in the Canadian province of Quebec.  The others were further east in Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and the Magdalen Islands.  We even technically visited France.  St. Pierre and Miquelon is an archipelago of 8 islands just off the coast of Newfoundland and it is a French overseas collectivity.  In other words, its residents are French citizens.

I’ll share more about that and the rest of the itinerary in future blog posts, I plan to post separately about each of our ports of call.

Azamara considers itself a ‘luxurious boutique hotel at sea’, and I have to say that whether or not they qualify probably depends upon your definition of ’boutique hotel’.  The Oxford dictionary defines it as ‘a small stylish hotel’.  Well … it was small, and while some of the public areas could be called stylish …

The cabins themselves definitely were not.

In fact, our balcony cabin was quite bland.  Zero artwork, zero color, horrible lighting, and one of the worst bathrooms on a cruise ship ever.  The shower was miniscule, I had to stand sideways in it, and the water temperature randomly fluctuated from scalding to tepid as you were showering.

That being said, the cabin itself was decent sized for a cruise ship and we were comfortable enough.

Another definition of boutique hotel however is ‘an independently owned property that emphasizes authentic experiences and personalized service’, and that does aptly describe Azamara.  The cruise line was originally owned by Royal Caribbean, but they sold it off to a private equity firm in 2021.  So yes, it is independently owned.  And Azamara definitely offers personalized service.  Every single Azamara employee that we encountered went out of their way to provide exceptional service.  Furthermore, Azamara’s focus on destination immersion definitely ’emphasizes authentic experiences.’

Before I continue on with the rest of this blog post about our overall experience, I should now mention that I ended up with Covid about halfway through our voyage.  And yep, that pretty much sucked.  I ended up mostly in bed for about 48 hours.  I hadn’t thought to bring Covid tests along with us, but some other travelers that Mr. Q befriended were kind enough to offer us some.  Sure enough, I tested positive while Mr. Q was thankfully negative.

Being a rule-following sort of person, I reported my illness to the ship’s doctor.  He then came to my cabin and gave me another covid test to be sure, and yep, it definitely was covid.  The ship’s policy was to quarantine me to my cabin for the next 24 hours based on the fact that I did not have a fever.  If I remained fever-free at the end of that time period, I could leave my cabin wearing a mask.  I had to wear a mask in public areas for the next five days, which was basically the duration of the cruise.

In other words, I spent WAY more time in our cabin than in any public areas of the ship on this cruise.  I also ate a lot more room service than I ever have before on a cruise.  Once I knew that I had covid, I felt like it would be wrong to take my germs to the ship’s buffet (masked or not), and I didn’t really relish spending a lot of time wearing a mask elsewhere either.

So … room service on the balcony was my only real option from that point forward.

And most of the time it was room service for one.  Mr. Q was still allowed to go about the ship at will, so I didn’t want to deny him the chance to find something better to eat.

Which brings me to the food.  In my experience, the food on the Azamara Quest was not great.  Now of course, once I had covid I couldn’t be a good judge, but even before that I was pretty disappointed in the food.  Everything on the buffet was lukewarm at best, and more often cold, by the time you got to your table to eat it.  The menu in the main dining room usually didn’t offer many choices that appealed to me either.

They had a couple of dining events that I did make it to starting with the brunch buffet on our first full day.

The spread was certainly spectacular looking, but like a lot of buffet spreads it mostly all looked way better than it tasted.  The baked goods tended to be somewhat dry, the hot foods didn’t stay hot, and everything was just a bit bland in flavor.

Mr. Q and I also made it to one of Azamara’s signature events before I became sick, their White Night Party.

This was basically another extravagant buffet, this time on the pool deck.

Everyone is encouraged to wear white, there is live music, they were grilling lobster tails, and the staff puts on a bit of a show.

It was a beautiful evening, once again the weather was perfect.  But also once again, it was a buffet, and there was limited seating so after wandering around for 15 minutes looking for two free seats, we ended up with cold food when we finally found a place to sit down.

I also have to point out that it was when we were on our way back to our cabin at the end of the White Night Party that I started sneezing, and over the course of that night I knew I had caught something.  I hoped it wasn’t covid, but of course, as it turned out, it was.  Having covid for half of the cruise meant that I missed out on a lot of shipboard activities.  It also meant that I didn’t really feel well enough to truly explore the last four of our eight ports, and in fact I missed out on one of them altogether.  So you can take my review with a grain of salt.  I’m sure I would have had a much different experience had I not been ill.

But I’m home now, I’m starting to feel a bit better, and I’m still hosting an occasional sale at my house coming up in a week and a half.

So I’m going to start gearing up, while also taking some time to rest up and fully recover.

I hope you’ll stay tuned for more posts about some of the lovely spots we visited in Canada, as well as some posts about the upcoming sale and what sort of merch I’m pulling together for it.

In the meantime, have any of you been on an Azamara cruise?  Or how about cruises in general?  Leave a comment and let me know.