Our whirlwind wind-up back in Quebec consisted of two memorable visits. First, we headed back to Quebec City for a couple of days, with history on our minds. The weather played a favourable roll in this as it was raining on our first day, so a visit to a museum was the perfect choice. The only one I wanted to visit on this occasion was the Plains of Abraham Museum. As an American living in Canada, I am not the most well versed in Canadian history, but I knew that the battle fought here was important and I wanted to understand why. In 1759, before the Americans decided to become their own country, North America was divided up mostly between the English and the French (too bad they forgot to ask the original inhabitants about any of this!). The French held much of the eastern part of Canada and had a large fortress in Quebec City. The English, deciding that they wanted this land, fought a battle over it. What made this battle memorable was the location and the way the English chose to attack. The fortress in Quebec City is up on a high ridge, and so the French thought that the English would attack farther north of the fortress. However, the English (sneaky sneaky!) scouted out a place where they could climb up the very steep embankment. In the dark of night, they moved their troops and a few canons, up to the top so that in the morning, the French guards looked out and found that the English were lined up to fight them on the land called the Plains of Abraham (apparently because Mr. Abraham used this land as pasture for his cattle). The French rushed out to meet them, but having a much smaller force who quickly came to disarray, they lost the battle. Both leaders, James Wolfe for the English and Montcalm for the French, died of injuries sustained in the battle. The French never recovered their stronghold after this and so ended up giving up their hold on North America. Of course, this is an extremely oversimplified explanation of the events (so don’t get on my case, Colin!!!) but you get the drift. At the museum, we saw a film explaining the battle as well as lots of artifacts and recreations of battle uniforms and such. It was an interesting morning and we both left feeling that we had a good understanding of this battle and why it is so important to how the history of our country evolved.

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The next day, the sun was shining and we had the perfect chance to park our van in the Plains of Abraham park and walk through history so to speak. Everywhere there are references to the battle, where the English came up the hill (it really is very steep – I wouldn’t want to try that in the middle of the night!) to where both leaders died. It was a very moving time and with our fresh understanding of the history we were walking through, we both very much appreciated being here.

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Our time in Quebec City up, we moved on to the tiny town of Knowlton, Quebec, where my cousin, Maria and her husband, Glen live (when they aren’t in Montreal). Having just recently been introduced to the writing of Louise Penny, I was gobsmacked when Maria informed me that Knowlton is the town that this author has based her fictitious town of Three Pines in! Amazing!!! Jim and I enjoyed a wonderful evening with Maria and Glen, catching up on all things family and touring their amazing home which has been in Glen’s family for several generations. The next morning, we walked into town and we got the official Three Pines tour. There is even a little map showing which events from which books occurred either in Knowlton or in nearby towns. Of course, it is not exactly the same (no Bistro attached to the bookstore), but it was really fun to see where Ms. Penny got her inspiration. Apparently she lives in the area and can be seen in town occasionally. What fun!!

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Our History and Mystery tours over, Jim and I headed off towards Ontario to meet up with yet more friends before heading south to the states and Jim’s very first Michigan Wolverine game!