Camping Alouette, Quebec, Canada (Montreal)
Do not say to your neighbor, “Come back later; I’ll give it tomorrow” – when you now have it with you. ~ Proverbs 3:28
It’s really difficult for us sit around – especially on a beautiful day. We were supposed to be climbing that mountain we can see from our campsite. But the way we (especially me) felt when we woke up today? No way was that gonna happen. About lunchtime and after my 1 ½ hour nap, I felt much better, but it was too late to begin the trek. Maybe tomorrow. Or maybe we’ll go back into town. Or maybe we’ll do both!
But alas, we’d never make it. : (
So, in case you’re wondering if yesterday was worth it? Check the pictures from yesterday. It was definitely worth it to us!
Instead, I chained myself to the laptop once again. And only ate two meals today – – Blaine’s scrumptious waffles with blueberries and city chicken for dinner. City chicken isn’t really city chicken anymore. It’s just pork tenderloin cut into cubes. I don’t even skewer it. Now when I was growing up, city chicken was pork and veal cubes the butcher skewered. Yumm!!! Tonight’s dinner was excellent, but not quite that good. 😊
Blaine made waffles and washed dishes. Other than that? I caught him actually reading a book! Not for long, but for a while. Until a shower came through and chased him indoors. He also listened to the Cleveland Indians baseball game via an app he has. Love hearing Tom Hamilton call the games! Oh! And they won!
So. Apparently, our neighbors changed this weekend. Same trailer. Different people. When we arrived, there was a single guy, late-twenties/early-thirties. He left every morning, seemingly for work as he was wearing sort of a uniform (maybe a restaurant?). Then, on Friday night, two couples in pickup trucks showed up, with two dogs. They spent the evening outside speaking French and eating French stuff for dinner – grapes and olives and bread and wine and we aren’t sure what else. All five of them (and the two dogs) slept in that little trailer. Where? We have no idea. And then the single guy left in his white car on Saturday morning, and we haven’t seen him since. Weird, huh?
We speculated all kinds of scenarios, but none really made much sense. 😊
At 6:30pm, we decided to drive into town. We’d barely moved all day and we were getting restless, and we’d heard about and had a map for, Old Town Montreal’s Walking Light Tour. It’s self-guided. We left at 6:45pm and it only took us 30 minutes tonight! And that includes driving all over trying to find a parking space on the streets! We couldn’t believe how many people were here! Of course, that made us much more comfortable walking around the streets of an unfamiliar town after dark. Safety in numbers, ya know?
illuminating the lovely orange barrels that seem to be on every other street.
In this particular one, two men eating lunch on sky- scrapper scaffolding.
It was a very nice evening, and we ended up getting in enough steps to walk off those mashed potatoes and gravy.
CITY CHICKEN – FYI, I modified this a bit from my mom’s version
2 skewers of “city chicken” per person or 1# pork tenderloin, cubed
1 C. flour
2 t. garlic powder
½ t. salt
¼ t. pepper
Vegetable oil just to cover the bottom of the pan
3 T. butter
2 t. chicken bouillon (or 2 cubes)
Water
Combine the flour, garlic, salt and in a bag. Flour the meat liberally. Heat the oil in pot large enough to hold the meat comfortably. Add floured meat and brown on all sides. Add the butter and when melted, add the bouillon and enough water to cover the meat, plus the remaining flour mixture you used to coat the meat. Stir out the lumps. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for about 1 hour, or until the meat is fork-tender. It should make its own gravy as it cooks.
If it needs thickened, mix a small amount of flour with some cold water and stir into the hot gravy.
Serve over mashed potatoes. Homemade are best! 😊