An Unexpected Adventure On the Lachine Canal

It is late Monday night and I meet the lady of the house standing on the stairs leading to the apartment above.  Her brother lives there but he is gone, so this week she stays in his apartment while she works downtown.  Just returning from dinner she looks very festive in her green print dress with a beautiful scarf draped in deep swirls around her neck.  Is she my age?  I can never tell. We speak of restaurants and food and markets.  I tell her of our Saturday adventure, although right then and there, I cannot remember the name, Jean Talon. She believes I must be talking about Atwater Market next to the Lachine Canal where you can get a wonderful breakfast for only $4. I am interested in the $4 breakfast.  So is Michael.

Atwater Market

Tuesday morning we are on our way to Atwater Market to scope things out and make comparisons.  Next week is my week to cook. The market doesn’t disappoint. Not as quaint as Jean Talon, I believe it offers even more. Fruit, flower, plant, and vegetable vendors border the exterior in deep rows, while the interior of the market is a long line of specialty shops that sing me their song.  I’m in a quandary about next week, but I find cuts of lamb and veal that I didn’t see last Saturday, that are not readily available at home, so I know I will be back.

The cheap breakfast eludes us and we settle for croissants and pastries at a local bakery that are light as air with crusts as crisp as a cracker—a reincarnation of those we had in Paris so many years ago.  I keep asking myself — why?  Why can’t we have this at home?  The last crumb demolished, Lachine Canal beckons.

Lachine Canal

With seemingly endless bike and footpaths along the water—separated by a wide strip of grass—we walk.  We walk a bit further, deciding to walk back to Old Montreal along the water.  My phone says it will take an hour; the distance, barely two and a quarter miles.  We set out, even though rain is in the forecast; even though it is supposed to hit Montreal in fifteen minutes.

Michael enjoys himself as numerous fit and thin young women— jogging, running—pass us by. Men bicycle toward us on the opposite path.

According to signs along the canal, Lachine was once the cradle of the industrial revolution in Montreal; a port of entry for a canal network that linked the Atlantic to the heart of the continent.  Its reincarnation is a park lined with picnic tables and the ruined behemoths of an age past.

Ruined Things Along the Lachine Canal

We are happy with the cloudy day and the few sprinkles of water that fall from the gray skies. The real rain doesn’t come until we are safely ensconced under a covered outdoor café where we share fried calamari and fries.  Frites are becoming a habit.